Orange sparkling water, three ways
The unsweetened infusion, the syrup, and the ratio that makes the finished drink.
In season: Navels November to April, Valencias April to September. The two behave differently once cut, so it is worth knowing which is in your hand.
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Infused, unsweetened
Use
Peel from 2 oranges in wide strips, plus 1 orange supremed into segments, per 1 litre
Method
Peel with a vegetable peeler and scrape the white off the back of each strip. Supreme the third orange free of its membranes. Everything into cold still water, refrigerate, and pull the peel at 3 hours while the segments stay in.
Time
3 hours for the peel, 6 to 8 hours total with the segments in
Sparkling
Still water for the steep. Orange segments shed pulp and pulp flattens carbonated water within minutes.
Keeps
2 days refrigerated, everything strained out at 8 hours
The syrup
Ratio
1 cup sugar : 1/2 cup water : peel from 3 oranges : 1 cup fresh orange juice
Method
Dissolve the sugar in the water over low heat, about 3 minutes. Off the heat, add the peel and steep 30 minutes covered. Strain, cool, then stir in the juice. Half the usual water because the juice brings its own.
Keeps
2 weeks refrigerated, 4 months frozen
Note
Juice alone makes a dull syrup. The thing people recognise as orange lives in the peel oil, so if you make one change to a recipe you already use, make it the peel steep.
The finished soda
1 part syrup to 4 parts sparkling water over ice, with a strip of peel twisted over the glass
A quarter teaspoon of vanilla extract per cup of syrup turns it into a creamsicle. Orange is the least acidic of the common citrus, so a squeeze of lemon or 1/4 teaspoon citric acid per cup fixes the flatness.
The shrub version
1 cup orange segments with 1 cup sugar, 24 hours cold, strained, then 3/4 cup cider vinegar and a 2 inch cinnamon stick. Rest 1 week and pull the cinnamon at day 3 or it takes over.
What doesn't work: Squeezing navel oranges in the morning for a syrup you finish in the afternoon gives you a bitter syrup. Navel juice develops limonin bitterness within about half an hour of being squeezed, which is why the juice industry works with Valencias. Use navels for peel, Valencias for juice, or squeeze straight into the pot. The other failure is simmering orange juice to reduce it, which gives you the flat cooked taste of a juice box left in a hot car.
Goes with: Blood orangeCranberryGingerPomegranate