Sexy, Sensual, Sanguine - The Blood Orange

OK, my Cinnamon Gelato is completely frozen with it's dense deliciousness...
Yes, when I pulled it from the freezer this evening, it was hard as a rock. Simply because it contains no air like ice cream, this is another reason that Gelato is served 10 degrees warmer than ice cream. To make it scoopable... This is just one of those things that you have to endure in order to enjoy the divinity of Gelato. Unless there is a Gelateria nearby.

Top my frozen nectar of the gods, I chose the Blood Orange, perfect with Cinnamon and the spicy notes of Mexican Vanilla. I will be demonstrating 2 applications of the sanguine fruit. Which is GREAT because that means I get 2 helpings of Gelato!

No worries, remember, Gelato is lower in fat than Ice Cream... woo hoo! But first, the coulis must be made.

Coulis di Arancia Sanguinella (Blood Orange Coulis)
1/2 cup Blood Orange Juice
1 tsp Lemon Juice
5 TB Water
1/2 cup Sugar
1 TB Orange Blossom Water

1 1/2 tsp Gran Marnier or Canton (ginger)

Put the juice of blood oranges, water & sugar in a pan

Simmer for about 7 minutes until it thickens just a little bit

Stir in Orange Flower Water

Hit it with Gran Marnier or Canton
Leave to cool.


Serving #1
Place the coulis into a in a squeeze bottle and Squeeze over your Gelato or simply spoon it over.

~OR~

Serving #2

You can dig out your Culinary Chemistry set... Muah ha ha ha

I promise this does not involve "Lay-zers" <----insert finger quotes here

Calcium Chloride (used in Cheese Making)
Sodium Alginate (from Brown Algae)
Calcium Citrate (used in Calcium Supplements)
a Scale in Grams to the tenths

This is all going to be done in metric because it is more exact. You are going to need a 1 - 1.5% Alginate solution to drop into a 5% calcium Chloride solution. What that? OK

Take 100 ml of the coulis
Weigh 1 gram of the Sodium Alginate and sprinkle it into the coulis.
Whisk it in and then add .3 grams of the Calcium Citrate.
Let this mixture sit for at least 2 minutes to gel.
Run through a strainer to ensure there are no undissolved algin granules.
In a separate container, preferably an 8x8 glass baking dish, pour 400 ml of water.
Add 4 g of the Calcium Chloride and stir until dissolved.
Fill a syringe with the Alginate solution and drip it into the Calcium Water.
Let it set for a minute or two

Then scoop out with a fine mesh strainer.
This didn't work to well for me.... it's painfully slow and the drops were uneven.

Luckily I had been shopping earlier this week at Chef Rubber, and I picked up one of these gizmos.

Attach the syringe, place the pipettes in the alginate solution

Draw on the Syringe to fill about 2/3 of the way.

Hold it over the Calcium solution and gentle press on the syringe to drop out about 96 little drips.

Let set,

Scoop out

and wash off the calcium chloride.

YEAH! That was a heck of a lot quicker!

Serve as Cinnamon Gelato with Blood Orange "Caviar"


Tada!!!!

Personally, I think the next time I do this, I will not use coulis. In this application, I think straight blood orange juice would have been better. But it still looks really cool and it was fun to play with a few harmless chemicals in the kitchen to create something different.

After all, this IS Culinary Alchemy. ;)
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