[Sca-cooks] bitter orange recipes

[Terry Decker]

Seville (or bitter) oranges that would have been used in this recipe are 
Citrus aurantium.  Blood oranges are a mutation of C. sinensis, the sweet 
orange, and are considered to produce the best orange juice.  Sweet oranges 
were introduced into the Mediterranean between the later half of the 15th 
Century and the first quarter of the 16th Century (I lean more toward the 
latter from the dates of the Portuguese trade with India).  Sweet oranges 
are referred to as Portugals in parts of the Middle East, so they probably 
arrived there via the Portuguese trade.  So, blood oranges occur in the 
region later than the recipe and are definitely sweeter than the Seville 
oranges for which the recipe calls.

Bear

> are blood oranges sour enough?
>
> Bonne
>
> On Thu, Mar 29, 2012 at 1:39 PM, David Friedman 
> <ddfr at daviddfriedman.com>wrote:
>
>> We made Naranjiya, from al-Baghdadi, recently, using seville oranges from
>> our little tree, which produced its first significant crop this
>> year--enough, I think, for about two recipes of naranjiya. It's not bad,
>> although I like Mishmishiya, the apricot equivalent from the same source,
>> better.
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