Breads: Semolina Poblano (and Marmalade)

You stumble upon the best ideas while surfing sometimes.  I was looking for a video on making orange marmalade, wanted to give it a try so that I knew I would know how to make it if the question ever came up in conversation, a conversation with whom I’m not sure.  I found several posts on YouTube and watched a couple of them.  The second how-to came from fiveeurofoods.  I left a comment on the website and the author/star of the show responded immediately with a suggestion of a bread recipe after I noted a fresh loaf would be needed to eat with the marmalade.

They used semolina (fine corn flour) and wheat flour in the recipe, claiming it stays soft twice as long.  There is a canister of semolina ready to be called to duty in the pantry, so I gave it a shot.

This is merely a substitution of a bread-machine recipe for regular old white bread.  Use half semolina and half bread flour.  That’s all.  There was also a lonely partial Poblano pepper becoming mummified in the fridge, it was diced and added to the flours destined for the machine.

The bread was delicious!  And true to the claims of its alchemist, it was soft longer than my other white breads (made by machine or oven), even the last piece had pliability left in it.  Semolina is not just for pasta anymore.

The orange marmalade was not as successful.

I bought navel oranges (first mistake) and washed them thoroughly.  Five oranges were zested to avoid the bitter pith, I removed all the bits of white and chopped up the flesh, really the membranes were the only structural parts left.  I put the chopped orange, all the zest (second mistake) and a little water into my pot to slowly boil.  Once it resembled hot mush I added sugar, and more sugar (third mistake), then added a gelatin packet (may or may not have knocked against these efforts).  It cooked, I tasted.  More sugar, it’s too bitter.

Darn zest.  Why didn’t you tell me you were going to ruin my batch of marmalade?  Hmm?  It couldn’t answer me, but I tried anyways to interrogate.

The type of orange you use is VERY important.  It’s the same with berries, the initial quality of the fruit will only be amplified in the jam.  That’s why I make strawberry jam only when local berries are available.  Force-ripened and half-frozen trucked-in strawberries will not do.  I would grow them myself if I could.

The next batch of marmalade will need better oranges.