Bitter orange flowers offer a sweet flavour
Distilling orange blossom, celluloid heat in the kitchen and sloe berry cordial
POD NEWS
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Here at The Lemon Grove we have been planning a podcast. It’ll be called The Life Lemons Give You and will involve story telling about food, drink, travel and culture all with a twist of citrus. Guests will include growers, sellers, cooks and chefs, writers and authors, and those with an interesting tale to tell. Watch this space for news. But to whet your appetite (see above) here is a mini, pod with some of the week’s news. Let me know what you’d like to hear more about, and who you would like to see as guests on The Life Lemons Give You.
Natoora
Observer Food Monthly
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Bitter orange flowers offer a sweet flavour
High above the Mediterranean Sea in Vallebona, an ancient town in the Italian province of Liguria, lies a grove of bitter orange trees. Family-run, the La Vecchia Distilleria grove is developing a reputation for high-quality orange water known as Acqua di Fiori d'Arancio Amaro and for a limited production of neroli, an essential oil.
Flowers are handpicked, a painstaking job performed between April and early June by Pietro Gugliemi, his family and friends.
Around 100kg of flowers is needed to distill 100 gm of the essential oil neroli, the final and most valuable product. This is sold to perfumers. About two litres of distilled orange-flavoured water are produced for every kilo of flowers.
I first met Pietro at the vast, international 2018 Terre Madre Salone del Gusto event organised by the Slow Food organisation in Turin, Italy. Pietro is the latest generation of his family and the energy behind the reopening, recovery and newfound success of La Vecchia Distilleria. He has trebled the number of trees in the grove to 300, invested in distilling knowledge and equipment and revitalised a post-harvest street feast in Vallebona. It's here that bouxie (in local dialect) or bougie (fritters) are served smeared with sugar and sprinkled with orange water.
Pietro kindly sent me a bottle containing 100ml of orange water, liquid gold. I made a delicious cake (see recipe below), sweet focaccia and an orange blossom lemonade.
Real orange blossom water has a floral flavour with little of the acidity you might expect from a citrus product.
RECIPE: ORANGE FLOWER BREAKFAST CAKE
A simple, aromatic, fresh-tasting cake that is ideal for breakfast, with coffee or afternoon tea. Pietro's orange water is hard to find (search for La Vecchia Distlilleria on Facebook). However, other orange blossom waters can be used. However, try and avoid synthetic brands. Better to use orange zest and juice from half to one orange.
Many thanks to Francesca for sharing this delicious recipe … follow her on Instagram at @frikassea.
You'll Need
Large mixing bowl
Wooden spoon/ mixer
Sieve
Cake tin (max diameter, 24cm)
Ingredients
125 gm butter, unsalted and softened
125 gm Muscovado sugar, or cane sugar
80g plain flour
2 egg yolks
2 eggs
4 gm baking powder
Salt, pinch
3 tablespoons of orange blossom water
Butter, knob to grease cake tin
Icing sugar, sprinkle (optional)
Preheat oven to 175˚C.
Combine the softened butter and sugar with a spoon or mixer.
Add yolks, one at a time. Mix.
Add eggs, one at a time. Mix thoroughly.
Sift flour and baking powder into the mixture.
Mix thoroughly.
Fold in the orange blossom water.
Place the mixture into the cake tin.
Bake in the oven for 30-35 mins. Check at around 25 minutes if using a fan oven.
Cool.
Top with icing sugar (optional).
Serve and enjoy!
Serve with
Have the cake neat or with a dollop of rich, double cream. The orange water is a delicate taste, so you don't want to overwhelm it with intense flavours, but maybe a citrus sorbet might do the trick.
Wine pairings
This cake also pairs well with chilled white wines such as a Semillon or Semillon-Sauvignon blend and, my personal favourite, a sparkling wine such as Franciacorta from Italy or a glass of Spanish Cava. Suppose you are really looking for a boozy hit. Why not pour yourself an indulgent frozen Orangello or perhaps an orange liquor such as Triple Sec or Cointreau.
READ, WATCH, LISTEN ... SOME RECOMMENDATIONS
There are many highly watchable food films and TV series out on release at the moment. On Disney+, you'll find the fast-paced The Bear. It's shot in a fast-paced, choppy style which is not to everyone's taste but does reflect that cooking style and workplace atmosphere. Blame Anthony Bourdain for putting such energy and passion into celluloid film. Watch a trailer for The Bear, below.
Tune into Netflix to find Chef's Table: Pizza, part of the genre-changing food show. Also recently added is the adrenalin-addled, stress-inducing Boiling Point – the hospitality industry won't be using this film for recruitment anytime soon.
Here's another recommendation: The Menu. I have yet to see the film, but like what's being trailed. The Menu is a smart and bloody satire of the culinary world set for general release on November 18. It's directed by Mark Mylod, best known for his work on the television series The Royle Family, Entourage, Game of Thrones, Shameless, and Succession.
Defining creativity
Trying to define creativity is like trying to wrestle an eel (I would imagine!). But it's an issue I enjoy exploring and seeing how others understand what it means to be creative.
British gin maker and Bombay Sapphire has partnered with the fabulously creative film director and visionary Baz Luhrmann to launch a new campaign Saw This, Made This. With creativity being cited as the second-most in-demand skill in the world, Luhrmann has issued a creative call to arms. He's inviting people to discover the creative inspiration that exists all around them. This is similar advice I give to students in my creative and food writing; always carry a notebook and pen and watch, observe, study even sketch and draw.
Watch this rather lovely, inspiring video here.
Image bank
It’s always great to receive images and stories of citrus fruits from around the world. Please feel free to send snaps of markets, cocktails, art, orange groves or a single on a Seville street. Here is one that landed in my Inbox this week - a watercolour of a halved lemon, spoon and some finely crafted linen by an artist who’s signs her/himself as ARR. The spoon appears to made of pewter, but this metal reacts badly to citrus juice, so I’d to think it’s silver. My friend Sue assures me she would have bought it home for an early Christmas present, had it not already been sold (as indicated by the red dot sticker).
RECIPE OF THE WEEK
Sloe Berry Cordial
Frosty mornings are ushering in deep Autumnal days foragers busy in the hedgerows and field edges. They are seeking those naturally grown foods last for seasons or perhaps over a few special days, for micro-seasons.
From the prickly Blackthorn tree, often used as naturalistic hedging on farmland and along rural lanes, sloe berries are used to make Sloe Gin and cordials. Far too sharp to eat raw, they settle well into infusion with alcohol and sugar or for cordials sugar and water. Sloes are best picked after the first frost.
Cordials can be made and used on the same day, while sloe gins and vodkas relish time to mature and can be enjoyed after spending three months in the dark for three months. To make sloe gin, freeze 450 gm of sloes (with leaves and bugs removed) overnight, then add add to 70 cl of gin or vodka to 450 gm of sugar, in a sterilised jar. Shake daily for seven days to dissolve sugar. Leave in cool, dark place for at least three months. Filter out berries, decanting into sterilised bottles. It’s ready to drink now but try and keep some for a year, allowing time for flavours to develop. If you can fill little bottles, say 250 cl, sloe gin makes welcome Christmas presents.
SLOE BERRY CORDIAL RECIPE … DOWNLOAD THE PDF below
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Bruce McMichael
Writer, Podcaster, Educator
Website: www.thelemongrove.net
Twitter: @lemonbites
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Disclosure: I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org
Had to re-shuffle a freezer draw yesterday! One thing led to another and so I ‘had’ to make 3 litres of Sloe Vodka!