As there are many ways to skin the proverbial cat and there are also many ways to candy fruit. In the quest for understanding, I've decided to test two recipes. The first is from the Repressed Pastry Chef and the second is from Brownie Points: a good girl's notebook of her culinary world. The Repressed Pastry Chef's method is quicker. It's as simple as dissolving some sugar in water, adding the orange slices, reducing the liquid until you are left with beautiful gem-like candied orange slices, which you can enjoy au naturale or dipped in dark chocolate. However I was also intrigued by Brownie Points' idea of immersing the orange slices in sugar syrup and lovingly adding 100g of sugar daily over two weeks. So to determine which method is best, I'm pitting Candied Orange Slices against Candied Orange Slices and here is how part one played out: 
Brownie Points Immersion Method: Some lovely Valencia Oranges, sliced and then halved. 
Brownie Points Immersion Method: Blanching the orange slices in boiling water. I then cooled these in iced water before transferring them into an air tighter container and immersing them in sugar syrup.
Repressed Pastry Chef Method: After dissolving the sugar in water, I added the orange slices.
Repressed Pastry Chef Method: This is my favourite stage. When the liquid has dissolved you are left with gorgeous translucent orange slices.
So at the end of the Candied Orange Slices Battle: Part One, the Brownie Points Method embarks on its two weeks of immersion, while the Orange Slices subjected to the Repressed Pastry Chef method have been rolled in sugar and stored in an air tight container. Which Candied Orange Slices Method will rein supreme? Return in a couple of weeks to find out!
While we're waiting, I'll introduce you to Miss
Baci. Miss
Baci is an attentive kitchen assistant, who would just love me to drop something edible.
It is the awesome Carmen's birthday and I thought I would surprise her by baking her something. But the challenge is that Carmen's brother is a super star chef who has worked in top restaurants, Quay and Urbane so I am weeing myself slightly. What could I make? Cake? Biscuits? Slices? I ended up thinking back to Australia Day where the lovely Renee made an awesome Easy Vanilla Slice. They were morish and I hoped that mine would be even half as neat as Renee's offering. The photo above is 1/2 cup custard power, 1/2 cup caster sugar, 1 cup of cream, 2 cups of milk and a 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract placed in a saucepan, stirred over medium heat to thicken. 
I then layered one pack of Arnott's Lattice Biscuits in a tray with the glazed side down. 
Once the custard is warm, spread the mixture over the biscuits. 
Layer another pack of the Lattice Biscuits over the custard. If you have cut some of the biscuits in half like I have, ensure your top and bottoms line up, otherwise it will be difficult to cut. Chill for 30 minutes and prepare the icing. The recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups of pure icing sugar and 2-3 tablespoons of passionfruit pulp but I honestly thing you could cut the icing ingredients by half. 
Here is the finished result that I plan to take to work tomorrow. This Easy Vanilla Slice is great for barbecues, morning teas etc as they are so quick and easy to make, this might actually become a part of my regular food offering.
