WHAT'S IN SEASON ALMOST SPRING CITRUS EDITION

CITRUS!  CITRUS!  CITRUS!

 This is just a little mixed basket the we shared with our friend Jill from @sweetlifegarden.

The tiny round yellow green balls are our key limes.  Famous for it's sweeter lime flavor with less of the tart flavor of other limes.  Our tree is young and very healthy so we are looking forward to an overload of these in coming years.  Limes an be frost sensitive so it is planted in an area with lots of protection so that we don't have to run out to cover with frost cloth.

MUGS UP MONDAY

“WALK UNTIL THE DARKNESS IS JUST A MEMORY

AND

YOU BECOME 

THE SUN 

ON THE NEXT TRAVELERS HORIZON”

Kobe Bryant

An important thing to know about citrus is that while it is loaded with Vitamin C, that vitamin is water soluble and fragile once it is harvested from the protection of the tree.  What this means to you is that if the nutrients are important to you then you must keep these fruits cool, out of the heat and light.  Also, like eggs, citrus has a "bloom" that can be wiped off when washing.  The bloom protects the citrus from air and light getting inside and degrading the Vitamin C.  This is why when you receive citrus from us it has not been washed.  Our fruits are harvested in the cool of the morning to be as fresh as can be when you receive them, so there is no need to wax them to retain freshness and nutrition.  

Please wash it before peeling or cutting,  just to be safe.  

Then Zest, Eat, & Juice to your heart & body's content.

The deep orange with the knob top on the outer edges are Minneola Tangelo.  These peel so easily and are one of the sweetest citrus with a touch of tart.  They have few seeds.  They can be juiced but peeling is so easy we usually do not juice.

The deeply yellow ovals in the center are the Improved Meyer Lemons.  This lemon is so deeply colored because they have orange in their parentage.  The more mature they are, the closer they color to an orange.  Interestingly the color, like so many fruits, is a clue to how it will taste.  As they mature and deepen in color they begin to taste less tart and lemony and more like an orange, though never really like an orange.  Very few seeds.  Be sure to use the zest to get the most out of these lemons.

The round orange fruit in the bottom corner of Jill's basket and others like it in the basket are blood oranges.  We are growing the Cara Cara and Torroco varieties.  We chose these two after years of volunteering at the annual Maricopa County Citrus Clinics.  They have a tasting table of more citrus than you will ever have the opportunity to see in one place.  

The Cara Cara has naval orange in it's parentage and you can tell on one end how it looks like a naval.   The meat sections inside are a lovely peach color.  The flavor is sweet, not tart  and we think has a touch of cinnamon flavor to it.  The meat sections inside is firm so we love biting into them.  Few to no seeds, not the easiest or worst peeling.  They make fine juice but we prefer to et them.  

Have you tasted a Cara Cara?  How would you describe the flavor?  We love it!!!

Our other blood orange, Torroco, is the more typical deep pink to red color, from which blood oranges get their name.  Think red beet color.  Actually we have found most blood oranges varieties to remind us of beet flavor, a bit earthy.  Have you eaten blood oranges?  Do you know which varieties?  How did they taste to you?  The Torroco has not had an earthy flavor to our taste.  It's actually a similar flavor to the Cara Cara.  Our tree is young and we notice that the meat sections inside have an ombre color going on.  At one end of the orange they are an orange color deepening to the other end into a dark pink/red.  When young the have a red blush to the skin as well. Virtually seedless.  No the easiest to peel.  Fine to juice but they have such  nice firm meatiness , we prefer to peel and eat.

The large yellow balls are our Oro Blanco grapefruit.  Don't be fooled that it is not pink, which are pretty.  Oro Blanco grapefruit are so sweet they do not need sugar yet leave sticky wherever their juice has fallen.  They can be peeled and eaten as you would an orange.  We struggle to get the watering just right on these so our may have a thick pith.  No problem except the the actual fruit is smaller than what one may think due to the thick pith. 

Unseen are the tangerines, of which we have plenty!!  They are so easy to peel, make the best juice and have the most intense and sweet flavor of all of our citrus.  We have three of these trees and the flavor is similar among them.  Sometimes you get 6 seeds other times there are none.  Tangerines make addictively sweet and tangy juice.  The zest is thin but worth the effort, just be sure to be gentle.

Pictured above are the citrus we currently have available for your enjoyment.  Starting in the upper right corner are tangerine, Improved Meyer Lemon, Cara Cara blood orange, Oro Blanco grapefruit, Minneola Tangelo, Torroco blood orange

Has our description of our citrus sparked your interest in eating or planting citrus?  We hope so!  Let us know how we can help you.  If you would like to place an order for a custom harvest please contact us by email or DM on Instagram @anne_es_garden_fresh.  Sorry we are all out of Key Limes.  As the season continues and more of our fruit ripens we'll post more about our juicing oranges and pink lemons.