Christmas baking - yummy yummy

Chocolate covered orange peel - yummy yummy

 

I have made a few Christmas presents this year and had a lot of fun doing so!  Isobel has also helped - though the big Isobel moment is coming tomorrow when we attempt to ice the cake!!!

Firstly, I made some chocolate covered orange peel - oh I love this stuff.  It costs a fortune in Brussels chocolate shops so I was beside myself with excitement when I saw a recipe in the Waitrose magazine.  And I got to test out my free citrus peeler which I got at a Jamie at Home party.  It's really quite good despite being a bit of an unnecessary item.  Here it is together with the resulting orange peel pieces:

Now, I've tried to find an online version of the recipe to link to but can't so here it is:

- take 2 large oranges and remove peel.  Cut peel into strips about 0.5 cm wide;
- plunge strips into boiling water and simmer for 5 minutes;
- drain and then repeat;
- put 250 g of caster sugar in a pan with 250 ml of water and heat until the sugar is fully dissolved;
- add 5 cardamon pods (bruised) and a tablespoon of orange blossom water (which you can get in Sainsburys and such places) and the peel;
- simmer for one hour until the peel is soft and translusent;
- leave to cool on wire rack (put some greaseproof under it as it sticks to everything!) for 24 - 48 hours or until it's basically dried out.

- then melt 150g plain chocolate over a pan of water and dip the orange peel in the chocolate.  Sprinkle with cocoa powder and chopped pistachios (we used about 20g cocoa and 30g chopped nuts).
- leave to set.  Then eat...or should I say, wrap as gifts!

My second baking effort was biscotti - I remember talking to Mrs WP about it whilst out looking for coffee mugs in Starbuckles.  How do you make biscotti we wondered? Surely it's low in fat/sugar and high in goodness we thought (??!).  So, I had a go at the BBC recipe for Christmas Biscotti:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8022/fruity-christmas-biscotti


And they were pretty good really - Mrs WP should comment as we gave some to her and Mr WP for a gifty.  And suprisingly easy to make!  Really recommended.