Sunny globes of winter

02/21/2007
Sunny globes of winter

I was three years old when I met my first blood orange. My mother and I were in Switzerland, staying with my grandmother. In her dining room on a winter's day, my grandmother sliced open an orange whose skin was blushed and striped with red. She told me its name: Blood Orange. That's the way it sounded to me: capital B, capital O, wondrous and slightly sinister at the same time. My eyes grew wide as I watched drops of deep ruby red juice ooze from the flesh. Could it be...blood? Thus was born a lifelong fascination with this orange, whose color is nothing short of incredible.



Cutting a blood orange in half is like slicing into a sunset. The colors are fiery, and no two are alike. But they all belong to the sanguine group of Citrus sinensis. Most of them are grown in Spain. Blood oranges have a flavor that is as distinctive as their color: deep, dark, and slightly spicy. Only hardy to USDA Zone 8a, the blood orange--like most citrus trees--is off limits to most of our gardens. But that is no reason not to appreciate the more exotic members of the citrus tribe, even if we're forced to buy their fruits from a greengrocer.


If I were a visitor to Earth from another planet, I would certainly marvel at the existence of citrus fruits. Brilliantly colored in all the hues of the sun, ripening in the dead of winter, and packed with the Vitamin C we so direly need during the cold season...who could imagine a fruit more perfectly suited to our needs--both physical and psychological--during the dark days of winter?


At an organic street market on a recent Saturday, I pounced on several rare citrus varieties. One was the bitter orange, essential to making orange marmalade and duck à l'orange, as well as to the production of many orange liqueurs, such as Grand Marnier and Cointreau. The bitter orange (Citrus aurantiacum) has a slightly flattened form and a dull, rough, thick skin (prized for marmalade and candied orange peel). The skin is bitter yet extremely fragrant and aromatic. The juice is bitingly acid. Together, skin and juice make for one of the most stimulating flavors in the citrus world, but they are never eaten fresh. The spiny bitter orange tree is one of the hardiest citrus species, sustaining temperatures as low as 15 degrees F.



At the same stand where I bought the bitter oranges, I spied a basket of huge, ridged fruits with an obviously very thick skin. I pounced, for these were cédrats (Citrus medica), fruits I usually only encountered at the candied fruit stand in the form of thick, pale green quarters of skin. I believe I'm correct in stating that this is sold as candied "citron" in the U.S., but unfortunately the quality of those waxy little cubes weeping sugary serum sold in American grocery stores has little in common with voluptuous candied cédrat as it is sold here. Aromatic and subtly spicy, the cédrat has perhaps the most complex bouquet in the citrus world. The huge fruits are almost all skin and no pulp, and are not only candied but also made into delicious marmalades and fabulous liqueurs. In France, most of them are grown in Corsica, as they are one of the least hardy citrus species. Their blossoms, incidentally, are the most fragrant of all citrus and prized in perfumery.



Near the cédrats was another unusual member of the citrus tribe. These fruits looked like small yellowish oranges with nipples, or like round orangey lemons--take your pick. It wasn't until I moved to France and saw these fruits in the flesh that I realized that it was this bergamote (Citrus bergamia), and not what is often called bergamote in the U.S. (Monarda didyma), that gives Earl Grey tea its unique perfume. Of course, now it made sense as I'd always been puzzled by the taste of Earl Gray tea, which contains no trace of beebalm aroma. Bergamote has an incredibly spicy skin and bland, acid juice. It makes fabulous sorbet if you grate in plenty of the peel. And its essential oil is also a prime perfume ingredient.


In Paris, you know winter has arrived when pyramids of clementines appear on greengrocers' stands. I never encountered the fruits of Citrus clementina in the U.S. But here, I've joined the clementine-gobbling French in consuming them by the kilo. Clementines are small (+/- 2 inches in diameter), with thin aromatic skin that peels effortlessly, and succulent, thin-skinned segments that burst with juice and have a perfect balance of sweetness and acidity. Here, the best ones are clémentines feuilles, so called because they are harvested by hand and sold with a bit of leafy stem attached. The freshness of the leaves is sure proof of the freshness of the fruit, which is fragile and doesn't store long. The delicious clementine tastes a bit like a tangerine, but is sweeter and more tender and aromatic.



The first clementines were grown by Father Clement, a priest responsible for the gardens at an orphanage in Oran, Algeria in the late 1800s. The clementine is apparently a sterile hybrid between the mandarin orange and the sweet orange. Today, most clementines are still grown in North Africa. Especially delicious ones also come from Corsica.



Clementines, bitter and blood oranges, cédrats, and bergamotes--and we haven't even touched on kumquats (quite hardy, with sweet skin and acid juice), calamondins, limes and lemons, Malta oranges, Jaffa oranges, grapefruits, mandarins and tangerines (from Tangier). Today, in the supermarket world of everything all the time, we tend to take citrus fruits (agrumes, in French) for granted. But when I was that three year old back in my grandmother's house in Switzerland, my Christmas stocking was filled with clementines and peanuts, both still so exotic as to be considered special treats. To this day, the thought of those two flavors instantly conjures up the magic of my grandmother's home at Christmas. Of course, I'm no longer three, but I'm still not too old to be annually amazed by the winter glory of voluptuous citrus fruits.

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