Pithed off oranges

I haven’t developed a lisp … I’ve been making marmalade.

This is my first go so I’m quite excited. The pot in the background contains the boiled up jars I’ve been saving.

Marmalade oranges were on sale so I thought I’d give it a go.

Did my usual Google search and found an easy peasy recipe … some of them looked more complicated than surgery … and I’m all for simple & elegant solutions.

Scooped the fruit from it’s skin and then went about removing the pith from about 30 orange quaters … it takes time and patience folks.

So … there I am pithing off the oranges … my mind wandering … when I started to amuse myself by thinking of ways to use pith …

How do you pith an orange off?

What scares an orange pithless?

I’d hate to run into a pithed off pack of oranges.

You get the drift.

I did find a way to pith the orange … halve the half … make a quater … and then use a sharp knife to slice it away … like filleting a fish.

The mix … with water and squeezed lemon juice is now bubbling away merrily.

The smell of oranges through the cottage is gorgeous.

In about an hour I’ll add sugar and then we’ll see what I created.

I didn’t add pectin as it occurs naturally in some part of the orange … hopefully not the pithed off part … hee hee.

Heard childrens voices outside and found some Hamill and D’Arcy boys throwing snowballs.

Great aim James.

And here’s the snow fuelled trio … Gavin, James & Thomas … just before they threw their snowballs at moi.

Oh yeh … and that would be John D’arcy supervising the boyos … making sure their aim was straight.

If I can peel myself away from the fire and newspapers I will take Coco and camera for a walk later.

Hope your day is going well.

Slan

Liz

p.s.

Made the marmalade and it’s exactly as I love it … bitter sweet with big chunks of peel.

Instead of all white sugar I mixed it with muscovado sugar.

It all looks lovely … and tastes delicious … and it was really easy to make.

Total time to make – from scooping the orange from its skin and pithing it off (30 minutes) … to … boiling/simmering (1.5 hours) … about 2 hours.

Total cost for about 1kg of delicious marmalade – 2 euro.

I’ll make it again.

I had an email from one of my dearest friends who lives in Oz.

Lisa has been my friend for over 30 years and we have had many adventures together … some of them totally unprintable … but what great memories.

She told me that she’ll be in London for 2 weeks starting in early March.

She wants to catch up with me and is offering to pay my airfare and accommodation … lovely friend.

I hope to go over from Tuesday March 3 and come back on Saturday March 7 – via Belfast Airport … so much less stressful than Dublin Airport.

We’ll be staying in central London in Westminster … close to the Tate and lots of interesting places … I will have fun researching online.

All I need is for the money fairies to get their act together … Full Moon wishing this week.

Night night

Liz