When my husband and I visited Sicily last May, we had the supreme pleasure of being introduced to blood oranges (Moro oranges) and fell instantly in love with this very seasonal fruit. We loved their sweet juice, so much less acidic than naval oranges, bright, cheerful color, and even found some marmalade to purchase.
While I was in Florida, my sweet husband 'went to town' (for us, that means a grocery store with MANY choices -- unheard of in our part of the woodlands) and found these same variety of oranges, currently being grown in California. To surprise me for my homecoming, he bought several bags, and when I called to say I was enroute, he was as excited as any child with a secret, teasing me with "I have a BIG surprise for you!" LOL
After unpacking and settling in, he cut several of these luscious fruits for me -- his fingers turned purple/red with the juice, and both of us enjoying not only their flavor but also the memories they evoked.
Even though I had a mere 4 hours sleep, I was buoyed by Charles' enthusiasm and quickly finished my stacks of laundry and began jam production.
After my first batch of jam, Charles pronounced it "better than" we had overseas, and promptly returned to town to buy a CASE of the oranges! OH MY!!!
I used my recipe for raspberry jam for the Arance Rosse jam and was rewarded with wonderful, sweet/tart jam in a bright red/purple shade.
I then found a Siclian blood orange marmalade recipe in a book Charles gave me years ago -- "Sweet Sicily" with recipes to all my favorite sweets. This yielded a more 'orangey marmalade' tasting confection, again with that wonderful color and sweeter taste.
So in between jam and marmalade I knew I just HAD to put this fruit into a sketch.
I certainly need a nap, though!
8 comments:
I love this sketch and your tales of blood oranges. I never thought about them being good for jam -- hmmmm... They're very good in a salad with red onions, though!
:-)
Glad you're back from your trip!
Hmmm.... reading your story of Blood Oranges reminded me of our visit in January. Rob is back in Italy now, but I just may decide to make marmelade while he's gone.
I KNEW this would make it to the sketch book. LOL. Gorgeous Lin! That colour is wonderful!
Beautiful sketch Lin and I love the story that goes with it.
Would you send me the recipe for the cactus jelly please? I want to try it for my months cacti theme. Thanks Lin.
This is a great sketch of the blood oranges! I have a funny story to relate....when visiting Italy in 1985, I too, fell in love with Blood Oranges. I didn't know they existed until then and in 1985, I don't know if they were readily available in the U.S. Anyway...I purchased several dozen of them to bring home...only to find out as we were flying over the ocean that they wouldn't clear customs and would more than likely be confiscated. My girlfriend (who had accompanied me on this vacation) and I proceeded to stuff as many blood oranges into our faces as possible --because "THEY WERE JUST TOO GOOD TO WASTE!" It turned out --our flight was really late arriving in NY and we needed to rush to catch our connection to Pittsburgh. Customs officials rushed us through and never even noticed the oranges! Now we were upset that we had devoured so many of them at once! :) Thanks for the fun memory!
Keep Creating!
What a great story, Lin---and a great sketch, too. Your husband sounds like a peach....or an orange, at least ;D. Your energy and your passion for sketching are so delightful.
I've never had these, but you've sold me on them just by your description alone. Sounds yummy. The sketch is vivid and such lovely handwriting. :)
What a sweet, sweet story!!
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