This candied orange peel recipe is one of my mum’s signature dishes. She makes jars of these sweet citrus rolls when orange is in season and stores them for use all year-long. You can enjoy them as such, you can use them to decorate cakes, you can cut them and use them in cakes or cookies. They make perfect gifts for those in love with citrus sweets.

Candied orange peel

You can find a printable recipe here

Orange peel

For the  syrup

Sugar

Water

Lemon juice

To make the syrup 

In a pot add 1 cup of water, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice  for every two cups of sugar

Simmer over medium heat till the sugar dissolves completely.

Allow to cool.

To prepare the orange peel

Slice ends off  the oranges, score the peel from one end to the other, and remove the peels from the oranges

Collect the orange peel in a bag in the fridge till you have enough (try not to make it more that a week or 10 days at most or the peel might go bad)

Place the orange peels in a pot,add enough cold water to cover the peel

Bring to a boil, turn off the heat.

Allow to cool completely then drain the water.(This process will get rid of the bitterness in the peel)

Allow the peel to drain in a colander  for a couple of hours or overnight

Roll the orange peel into little rolls and secure them with tooth picks

Arrange the rolled peel in a pot

Add enough syrup to cover the rolled peel.

Bring to a boil using low heat (if you use medium or high heat you might burn the sugar) and cook for 10 minutes.

Turn off the heat, allow to cool for a few minutes

Pour the peels into a colander to drain off the syrup (do not discard it)

When the peel has cooled take out the tooth picks and arrange in jars

Important notes

• Adding the lemon juice to the peel prevents it from re-crystallizing when it cools
• Boiling the peel reduces the bitterness in the peel
• The amount of time you cook the peel in the syrup determines the texture of the final product. 10 minutes will give you soft candied syrup. an extra 10 minutes will give you caramelized and really chewy candied peel (something similar in texture to fruit leather). For decorating cakes, I prefer the soft ones. As a sweet treat I prefer the chewy ones.
• If you made your orange peel chewy and after trying it you decided you liked the chewy ones better. Place the candied peel in a pot and add a little water (enough for water to come up half way up the rolls) and cook over medium to low heat for 7-10 minutes, stirring occasionally.Drain the orange peel. This will soften the orange peel.  
• The syrup that you get from draining the candied orange peel is amazing on ice cream or to top your yogurt with. It is infused with a citrus orange flavor.