Monthly Archives: March 2013

Bar Top: Frozen Pomelo Minty Margarita

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Now this is a margarita you can eat with a spoon!

This is quite a yummy take on margaritas and my own special concoction!  Since pomelos are pretty fibrous and not very juicy, this margarita is best serve frozen.  Remember the left over  mint syrup we had from canning the grapefruit in minty syrup?  We are going to use it here (see, I told you not to throw it out!).

First, you will segment your pomelo.  Now that you have your pomelo ready to go, you will need the following:  Tequila, cointreau, fresh lime, minty syruip, pomelo segments, ice, bar shaker, shot measure, and a blender.

Ignore everything in the background…I have a small kitchen, ok!

In your bar shaker, throw in a small handful of pomelo segments, add about a 1/2 oz cointreau (or triple sec), 1/4 oz minty syrup (or to taste),  juice from half a lime, and 2oz of tequila (oh, who are we kidding?  Make that 3!).  Place the top on your bar shaker and give it a good shake.  Next, throw a few ice cubes in there, pour into your blender and whir it up into an adult slushy.  Rim your gass with kosher salt, pour in your margarita, and enjoy!
haha, you can see some lemon zest drying in the background – oh, and my very sad basil plant…
Frozen Pomelo Mint Margarita
Generous pinch pomelo segments
1/2 oz cointreau or triple sec
1/4 oz of minty syrup or to taste
Juice from half a lemon
2 oz tequila
Kosher salt
  1. In your bar shaker add pomelo segments, cointreau, minty syrup, juice from half a lime, and tequila.  Give it a good shake.  Add a few ice cubes, pour into blender, and blend well.
  2. Rim a glass with kosher salt, pour in glass, and enjoy!

    

    Don’t Waste That: Citrus Peels

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    I hate waste of any kind.  If I throw something out I feel so ashamed and guilty.  Some people may call me cheap but when something is perfectly fine, I try to find another use for it.  One thing that has a lot of uses are citrus peels.  I save them.  All of them.  If I take an orange to work, I wrap up the orange peel in a paper towel and bring it home – I know, I know.  I can feel your judging eyes.  If I use the juice of a lemon or lime in a recipe, I save the peel. 

    These last few weeks I’ve been eating an orange a day and I’ve been saving those peels for another use:  Orange Vinegar.

    When I make orange vinegar for eating, I always zest the orange because the pith will give the vinegar a bitter taste.  Add the orange zest to a quart jar, fill with vinegar, and steep. 

    After it’s steeped for a good amount of time (a month or more; taste it to make sure it’s at the flavor you want), strain and bottle.  This vinegar is yummy in a lot of things: adding it in marinades, adding to sauteed greens, using it in a salad dressing.  The possibilities are endless.

    Another tip: do not throw the pith out after you zest it.  Throw the pith down your garbage disposal, turn it on, and it will help disinfect and clean it!


    If I can’t get around to using the peel right away, I save them in my citrus peel bag.  My citrus peel bag has peels from an assortment of citrus that I keep in my freezer.

    Limes, Lemons, Oranges, Grapefruit, you name it it’s in here!

    My citrus peel bag is specifically for making citrus cleaning vinegar.  I do not remove the zest from the pith.  I just fill up a quart jar with the reserved frozen peel, fill the quart jar up with white vinegar, give it a good shake, and let it steep on my window sill.

    I let them steep for a long while; usually I forget about them.  When I think the vinegar is ready I strain and bottle it. 

    See how pale the peels are?  that’s what we’re shooting for!

    I fill up a squeezie bottle with citrus cleaning vinegar to use as a rinse in my dishwasher and I also half it with water to use it as a cleaning solution in a spray bottle.  I label it Cleaning Vinegar.

    No, it doesn’t look tasty…& it’s not!  This solution is simply for cleaning!

    Homemade Extracts

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    I do *a lot* of baking hence I use quite a bit of extract.  Extracts can be so expensive to buy in the stores; $3 or more for a tiny bottle of extract.  Because of this, I have started making my own.  My very first extract that I ever made was vanilla extract.  This year, I’m going to make four:  Lemon, Orange, Grapefruit, and Vanilla.  I’m a little little nervous about the grapefruit extract because I don’t generally like the taste of grapefruit peel, I find it too bitter, but the cost to make homemade extracts is negligible so I’m going for it!


    For extracts I like to use quarter pints.  I feel like using anything larger makes too much extract and wastes a perfectly good jar.

    For the citrus extract:  I just took the zest off of 2 lemons, 1 orange, and half a grapefruit and put them in their respective jars.  Fill it up with vodka (90 proof), cover, shake, and keep in a dark place.  Shake every so often.  After a month or so, check the extracts.  If they are at the flavor of your liking, strain and bottle.  If you would like, if it’s too bitter, you can add a teeny, tiny bit of sugar to the extract. 

    For the vanilla extract:  I cut the ends off of three vanilla beans and sliced them down the middle.  I then cut them into fourths.  I placed the bean in the jar and filled the jar with vodka, cover, shake, and keep in a dark place.  Shake every so often.  I don’t strain the vanilla bean when the extract is ready to use.  When I bottle the extract, I keep a vanilla bean or two in the bottle.

    Top Left: Lemon; Top Right: Orange; Bottom Left: Grapefruit; Bottom Right: Vanilla

    Preserved Oranges

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    Remember when we did Preserved Lemons?  Well, you can do the same thing with oranges (and limes and gragefruit, basically any citrus)!  I don’t use preserved oranges as much as preserved lemons but they are great for a well stocked home bar.  You know all those annoying drink recipes that call for a “twist of orange” and you’re like, “Damn it!  I’m not going to buy an orange just for a twist!”  I just replace that twist with a sliver of preserve orange rind!  It gives your drink the same oomph as a fresh twist and you don’t have to do without; plus, you can eat the rind!



    Preserved Oranges

    Ingredients

    4 Oranges
    4 T Kosher Salt

    Directions

    1. Slice 4 oranges into eights – maybe smaller depending on how big you want your slices to be and how big your oranges are
    2. In a sterile quart jar, sprinkle about a half tablespoon (I use one generous pinch) into the bottomof the jar.  Lay around 6-8 slices into the jar and push them down until they start to express their juices.
    3. Sprinkle half a tablespoon over the layer of orange slices
    4. Repeat layering oranges and kosher salt until you fill the quart jar up to the neck.
    5. Let oranges sit on your counter for 24 hours.  After 24 hours, fill the quart with fresh orange juice, ensuring that you cover the oranges.
    6. Let the oranges sit for a week.
    7. Label and place in the fridge.  After a week in the fridge, check your oranges.  If they have expanded add more juice to cover.  They will keep about a year in the fridge.

    Three Citrus Marmalade

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    I’ve always been on the fence about marmalade.  Some commercial marmamalades are too tart, some are too bitter, and some are too sweet.  There are hardly any that I could find that I really truely liked.  So, when I recieved Eugenia Bone’s book Well-Preserved, it surprised me that I really wanted to try her Three Citrus Marmalade.  It sounded so good on the page.  Yes, the very first jam I ever made was a marmalade (what can I say?  I’m an overachiever!).  It was hell.  I stayed up until 4 am making it…but you know what?  The next day when I tried some of the excess marmalade with toast, it was amazing.  The.  Best.  Marmalade.  Ever.  Having a mix of three different citrus really balances out the individual strong flavors of all the citrus.  I really want you to make this marmalade.  Really.


    The name of the marmalade says it all:  Three Citrus.  You can use any three citrus you want just be sure to use oranges and lemons.  You can use ruby red grapefruit, seville oranges, navel oranges, cara-cara oranges, meyer lemons, ponderosa lemons, etc; as long as you stay with the ratio 1 grapefruit:  3 oranges: 2 lemons  For this batch, I used a pomelo, 3 navel oranges, and 2 lemons.  The easiest way to make this marmalade is in two days.  If you break it down into two days, you won’t be up until the wee hours of the morning finishing the marmalade.

     
    On the first day, once you have scrubbed and dried your citrus, you want to peel each citrus in as large of pieces as you can get.  It’s easiest to do this with a paring knife.  A paring knife will allow you to make equal sizes of peel.  You’ll then cut off as much pith from the peel as possible. 
     
     
    Once you have the citrus peel cleaned.  You will cut the citrus peel into small matchsticks until you have one cup.  I don’t like the taste of grapefruit peel so I leave it out (I find it too bitter) but I alternate between lemon and orange peel so that I have an equal amount of both.  Some people like all orange, some people like all lemon.  It’s really up to you and what you enjoy.

    In a medium pot, add the slivers of rind and cover with 3 cups of water.  Cook over medium heat for about 25 minutes.  Do not drain.

     
    

     You will cut the citrus in half across the equator and pop out any seeds.  Using your food processor, blend up the citrus into a pulp.  At this point you want to measure your pulp.  However much pulp you end up with, you will add that much sugar on day 2.  I had 4 cups of pulp. 

    Pour this pulp into the pot with the rinds and water.  You will stir this up, cover, and put in the fridge overnight.

    On day two, transfer the pulp mixture into a wide heavy pot.  Add the sugar in accordance with how many cups of pulp you ended up with the night before (I added 3 cups, 4 cups is just too sweet for me) and a teaspoon of butter (the butter will help the marmalade from foaming up).   Cook over medium low heat until your candy thermometer reaches 220 degrees.

    You will need to prepare at least 4 half pint jars.  I always have extra with this recipe, however, so I always prepare 5-6 half pints.  I ended up with 5 half pints and an 1/8 of a cup that I poured in a ramekin to put in the fridge.  Process using BWB for 10 minutes

     
    
     
    
    Three Citrus Marmalade
     
     
    Yield:  4 half pints
     
    1 Grapefruit
    3 Oranges
    2 Lemons
    3 cups of sugar
    1 teaspoon of butter
     
    Day 1
    1. Peel citrus in as big of pieces as possible.  Cut most of the white pith off of the rind.  Cut the rind, alternating between citrus peel, into little match stick until you have 1 cup.  Pour rind into a medium pot, cover the rind with 3 cups of water and cook at medium high heat for 25 minutes.  Do  not drain.
    2. Cut the citrus in half across the equator, pop out the seeds, and grind in your food processor until you have a thick consistent pulp.
    3. Measure the pulp and take a mental note of how many cups you had.
    4. Pour the pulp into the pot with the citrus rinds, cover, and put in fridge to rest overnight
    Day 2
     
    1. Prepare 6 half pint jars per “Kitchen Tactics:  Boiling Water Bath Canning”
    2. Pour pulp mixture into large, wide pot.  Add 1 cup of sugar to 1 cup of pulp.
    3. Add 1 teaspoon of butter
    4. Cook over medium low heat until candy thermometer reaches 220.
    5. Pour into prepared half pint jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space.
    6. Process for 10 minutes
    

    Grapefruit in Minty Syrup

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    My friends at Pearson Ranch California Oranges helped me out again.  Right now they have a combo citrus pack with 10 pounds Oros Blancos and 8 pounds Pomelos.

    The other “grapefruit” are Pomelos

    Oros Blancos are the smaller grapefruit.  They are a very light yellow and their fruit is a golden color.  They are much sweeter and not as tart nor as sour as Ruby Red or Pink Grapefruit.  They are a lovely mild grapefruit that is sweet at the front on your tongue but mildly tart once it hits the back.  These would be a great grapefruit for those of you that do not enjoy the brash tartness of the Ruby Reds.

    I wanted to can enough to last me a year or more, so I ended up canning all ten pounds of Oros Blancos in heavy mint syrup.

    First you want to fill your canning pot with water and add the specific number of 1/2 pint jars to the pot (I needed 8).  You will need to sterilize the jars first because these segments will only be in the BWB for 5 minutes.

    While your canning pot is coming to a boil, you will want to wash and scrub your grapefruit.  Remember the post I did about segmenting citrus?  Well, we are going to do that.  To all 10 pounds (yes, you can start cursing at me now.  Ok, ok, I won’t make you do 10 pounds, I’ll just make you do 5).

    Once you segment all the fruit, you’ll have a bowl full of lovely grapefruit segments!

    Try not to eat them all before you can them!

    Next you are going to make your heavy minty syrup (the syrup you make for this doesn’t have to be heavy.  That’s the beauty of canning yourself, you can make the syrup however you want).  The original recipe called for fresh mint but since it’s winter, I used dried mint; 2 tablespoons in a cheesecloth spice bag.  Holding the fruit back, tip the bowl over into a 4 cup measuring cup to pour out all the grapefruit juice.  Fill the water until you have 4 cups of liquid.  Pour this grapefruit juice/water mixture into a medium saucepan and add 2 cups of sugar to your mint.  Bring the syrup to a boil, cover, and simmer until you get the minty taste you want; I simmered it for about 20-25 minutes.  If your jars have not sterilized by this time, take the mint spice bag out of the syrup and toss it, then keep the syrup simmering until you are ready to can.

    Now that your jars are sterilized, place your 1/2 pint jars on a placemat or towel.  Working quickly fill the hot jars with your grapefruit segments leaving about a 1/2 inch head space.  Then ladle your simmering syrup into the jars up to about 1/4 inch head space.

    As you can see, I ended up with a yield of (7) 1/2 pints of grapefruit and (1) 1/2 pint of minty syrup and then some extra that I’m not canning.  I will can the 1/2 pint and place it in my liquor cabinet.  There are plenty of drinks we can make with the minty syrup!  Stay tuned!

    Run a chopstick around the fruit to release air bubbles, wipe the rims with a damp paper towel, top with lid and ring, and place in your BWB.  Once the pot starts to boil, start your time for 5 minutes.  After the 5 minutes are up, turn off the heat, and let the jars sit in the pot for 5 minutes.  Place on a place mat or towel on your counter.  After an hour check the seals, if they have not sealed, place in the fridge and eat within the next two weeks.  If they have successfully sealed, let them sit undisturbed overnight.  Take off ring, wipe down with a damp towl, label, and place in a dark cabinet until ready to eat.

    DO NOT THROW OUT THE EXTRA MINT SYRUP THAT WASN’T CANNED!!!  Bottle it and put it in the fridge!  We will revisit the mint syrup later!

    Grapefruit in Minty Syrup

    Adapted from Canning for a New Generation by Liana Krissoff

    Yield:  4 half pints

    5 Pounds grapefruit
    1 Cup sugar
    2 Tablespoons dried mint placed in cheesecloth spice bag

    1. Sterilize your jars and keep them hot in the canning pot.  Follow BWB canning procedure as per “Kitchen Tactics:  Boiling Water Bath Canning”
    2. Segment your grapefruit per “Kitchen Tactics:  Segmenting Citrus”
    3. Holding your grapefruit segments back, pour the collected juice into a 2 cup measuring cup.
    4. Add enough water to make 2 cups liquid.
    5. Pour into a medium saucepan and add 1 cup sugar and mint spice bag.
    6. Bring to a boil, stirring until sugar is dissolved.  Lower heat and simmer until you get the minty flavor you desire.  Fish out the spice bag.
    7. Working quickly, fill sterilized jars with grapefruit segments leaving 1/2 inch head space
    8. Ladle the boiling syrup over the segments leaving a 1/4 inch head space.
    9. Use a chopstick to remove air bubbles, wipe rim with a damp towel, put the lid and ring on the jar, and place jar in your canning pot.  Ensure that you have at least 1 inch of water covering the jars.
    10. Process for 5 minutes.  Shut off heat and let the jar sit in the hot water for 5 minutes.
    11. Check seals after one hour; if they have sealed, place in fridge immediately.  Label sealed jars and store.

    Kitchen Tactics: Segmenting Citrus

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    Segmenting citrus is not my idea of a good time, however, for the sake of quality it is very important to segment citrus for canning (and for some recipes in general).  Keeping the membrane on any citrus will turn your canned product into an overly bitter item that is uneatable and, trust me on this, when you spend time canning a product it sucks to throw it out because it’s unpalatable.  Also, there are  some citrus that have very thick membranes (like grapefruit and pomelo) that just ruins the flavor of the fruit because it’s just too chewy to enjoy.  I love grapefruit but I hate cutting it in half and eating it with a spoon (I know, I’m high maintenance) so when I buy grapefruit, I will segment 2 or 3 of them at a time and then eat them within a few days.

    For the sake of example (and because I have 8 pounds in my fridge),  I will show you how to segment citrus using a pomelo.  Pomelos are a very big grapefruit.  In fact, they are  considered the grand-daddy of grapefruit.  Their rind is thick and their pith is extra thick and super spongy.

    You will need a boning knife, a bowl, a cutting board, and your beautiful citrus!  Make sure you sharpen your boning knife before hand; the sharper your knife the easier and quicker segmenting your citrus will be (just be sure not to cut yourself)!  Make sure you wash and scrub your citrus and dry it.

    First, you will cut the top and bottom of your citrus so that you can lay it flat on one end.  You want to make sure you cut low enough so that you expose the fruit.

    My picture taking is questionable in general but this is where my picture taking gets uber-questionable. 
    I only have two hands, people!
     

    You’re going to slice down the citrus, following the curvature of the fruit.  Your goal is to just get rid of the membrane.  You will lose some citrus in the process but if your knife is sharp enough, it will be neglible.

     

    Once you finish slicing around the curvature of the citrus, it will look like this.

    It’s depressing to see how much fruit is actually inside all that rind.
     

    Now, this is where a sharp knife is important and where I ran out of hands so I have no pictures to show you how to do this particular step.  Sorry!  Holding the fruit over a bowl, you will slice down between the fruit and the membrane down to the core, repeat on the other side of the segment of citrus.  You should be able to scoop out the fruit and let it fall into the bowl.  Hopefully the following picture shows you the gist of what we are trying to do.

     

    The first few times you segment a citrus, it will take you a while to do it and you will be cursing me to the high heavens for even talking you into doing it.  However, with practice, you get really quick at it and something juicy and not fibrous, like a lemon, will be super easy to do.  You’ll work your way all the way around the fruit and will end up with just the core and membranes.

     

    Give it a good squeeze into the bowl and toss it out.  You’ll end up with a bowl of lovely segmented citrus!

    Lemony Seafood Pasta

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    I love seafood like it’s nobody’s business.  I would eat seafood every day if I could.  Moving to Maryland was one of the greatest things I did for my gastronomy because the seafood is so cheap and plentiful out here!  It’s amazing!  I think I ate seafood straight for a month or two when I first moved here (partly because I didn’t realize that it’s here all the time!)  One of my favorite products to buy is the frozen mixed seafood bags.  They are fairly cheap and you get a lot of meat for the price so they are a great deal.

    No! No! No! Don’t turn your nose up!
    I promise, we have something great planned!

    I’ve made several dishes with mixed seafood medley but the one I’m going to share with you is one that I turn to the most.  It’s a quick, nutritous meal and I’ve added whatever is in my fridge to the mixture.  I’ve added spinach, kale, tomatoes, squash, basically anything that looks like it won’t last another day, I’ll throw it in there.  Tonight I just made the basic recipe and that includes only onions and garlic (I’m running low on food since it’s the middle of March.  Spring veggies can’t get here soon enough!). 
     
    I’ve noticed with seafood, many people *think* they don’t like it and I’ve found that it’s because they have never had it cooked correctly.  Seafood is a very fragile meat and most people treat seafood like they would any other meat.  Don’t do that. Overcooking seafood turns it into a rubbery flavorless mess.  Seafood (both fish and other kinds) need to be cooked at high temperatures for a short time.  Because of this, I cook this specific recipe in my wok.  You want a fire-hot pan, warm oil, and cold seafood (DO NOT DEFROST THE SEAFOOD BEFORE YOU COOK IT!).  Since this is going to cook at such a high temperature, you want to get everything prepared before you start the cooking in the wok.  Seriously, this will take you about 10 minutes from start to finish once your ready for the wok part.
     
    The very first thing you want to do is zest a whole lemon into 1/4 cup olive oil.  You want the lemon zest to infuse the olive oil.  Juice the lemon and set the juice aside.  Cook some pasta; I do about two handfuls of quinoa spaghetti.  Reserve about a 1/2 cup of pasta water before you drain the pasta.  Chop an onion and 3 (or 5!) garlic cloves.  Make sure you have sea salt, freshly ground pepper, and red chili flakes available.  That’s it!  Now you’re ready to cook.
     
     
    Set your wok over high heat.  Once the wok is nice and hot, add about a tablespoon of olive oil and swirl it around.  Throw in your onion and garlic and caramelize.  Once the garlic and onion are caramelized to your liking, add the lemon juice and olive oil with the lemon zest.  Bring this up to a boil.  Once it’s at a boil, pour in the whole 1 pound bag of frozen seafood, stir it up, add salt, pepper, and chili flakes to taste, and cover.  Shake the woke while it’s covered a few times.  Keep stirring until the seafood is just about cooked through but not all the way.  Add your pasta and shake the pasta vigorously with tongs within the sauce.  The starch from the pasta will thicken the sauce.  If you need a little more liquid you can add some of the pasta water.  Cover, cook the seafood through, divvy up into bowls, top with parmesan and dinner is served!
     
    
    Lemony Seafood Pasta
     
    1 onion, chopped
    3 cloves garlic, chopped
    1/4 cup olive oil
    Zest and juice of one lemon
    Salt
    Pepper
    Red chili Flakes 
    1. Cook pasta, reserve 1/2 cup pasta water, drain, and set aside.
    2. Using a rasp, zest the skin of one lemon into 1/4 cup olive oil
    3. In a very hot wok, add 1 tablespoon of olive oil (about one turn around the pan).  Add onions and garlic and caramelize.
    4. Add lemon juice and olive oil with lemon zest, bring to a boil.  Add frozen seafood, salt, pepper, and chili pepper to taste.  Stir and cover.
    5. Once 3/4 cooked through, add pasta and shake vigorously with tongs to thicken sauce.  Add some reserved pasta water if it needs more liquid.
    6. Cover and cook the seafood through
    7. Serve with parmesan cheese and crusty bread.

    Bar Top: Brown Sugar Whiskey Sour

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    I was never an imbiber of whiskey sours before.  Every time I tried one, they were just…very disappointing.  Maybe it was the premixed sweet and sours that bars use in their drinks.  YUCK!  Once I started really getting into setting up a home bar, however, a whole new range of drinks that I didn’t like before, were suddenly delicious!  Using quality ingredients in your drinks will turn any drink from blah to amazing…you won’t even need the highest top of the line liquor either!  I’ve made this whiskey sour with rye whiskey and bourbon.  Both of them are excellent.

    This whiskey sour takes whiskey sour to a whole ‘nother level.  I present to you:  The Brown Sugar Whiskey Sour:

    Brown Sugar Whiskey Sour

    Adapted from The Vintage Mixer

    Yield:  1 cocktail

    Juice from half a lemon
    1/4 oz Brown Sugar Simple Syrup (recipe follows)
    1.5 oz Straight Rye Whiskey

    1. Pour 1/4 oz Brown Sugar Simple Syrup in a rocks glass, add juice from half a lemon, add Whiskey, stir, add ice.  Enjoy.
    2. Add more brown sugar simple syrup or whiskey to suit your taste.

    Brown Sugar Simple Syrup

    3/4 cup brown sugar
    1 cup water

    1.  Mix sugar and water in a small pot and simmer until brown sugar dissolves.  Turn off heat, pour into a jar and cool.  Store in the fridge.

    Candied Lemons

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    Remember when I told you to keep the lemon peel from the lemons we juiced for the canned lemonade concentrate?  Well, wait until you try these homemade candies!  Making homemade candies makes my heart sing with joy and candied lemons are fantastic.  There is just so much you can do with them and I plan on posting recipes in the future. 

    Take the peel from 10 juiced lemons, remove the pulp of the lemon, and pick out any rough pith.  If the skins are really thick, you may have to cut off some of the pith.

     
    


    Now, slice the peel into long strips.  Place the peel in a large pot and fill with cold water.  Put on the stove and place on high, bring to a boil, and boil for 20 minutes.  Drain in a colander.  Repeat this process 2 more times for a total of 3 times.  The last time you drain, dry the pot, then put in 6 cups of sugar and 3 cups of water.  Bring this up to a boil and when the sugar just starts to brown add the lemons.  Simmer the lemons in the sugar until the lemon peel turns translucent.

    Place silpat or wax paper on two cookie trays and layer the trays with sugar.  Once the candied lemons are ready, using a fork scoop out the peel and layer them on the cookie trays in a single layer and try to make it so they don’t touch.  Sprinkle them with sugar to cover.  Let them dry overnight.

    Once they are dry, store in quart jars with the sugar they dried in.

    You can eat them like this, wrap them in cellophane and give them as gifts, or my favorite:  dip one side in dark chocolate.  Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm…

    Candied Lemons

    Yield:  2 Quarts

    Peel from 10 lemons
    6 cups sugar
    3 cups water

    1. Remove the skin of the lemon and remove as much pith as possible.  Cut the peel into strips.
    2. Put lemon peel in a large saucepan with cold water to cover, bring to a boil over high heat then drain in a colander.  Repeat this process 2 more times for a total of 3 times.  Drain lemons in a colander
    3. Whisk the sugar with water.  Bring to a simmer and cook for 8 to 9 minutes (if you took the temperature of the sugar with a candy thermometer it would be at the soft thread stage, 230-234).
    4. Add the peels and simmer gently, reducing heat to retain a simmer.
    5. Cook until the peels get translucent, about 45 minutes.   Resist the urge to stir the peels as it will introduce crystals into the syrup.  If necessary, swirl the pan around to move the peels around.
    6. Remove peels with a fork and place on a sugar covered cookie sheet lined with a silpat or wax paper.  Sprinkle the lemons with sugar.  Let them dry overnight.
    7. Store them in their sugar.