Lemon score!

[Jenise]

Absolutely gorgeous Meyer lemons, 4 lb bag, at Costco for $6.59 yesterday. Especially nice for a season that has, so far, disappointed me where tangerines and clementines that we usually go thru quite a bit of at this time of year are concerned. The fruit's been either tasteless or frostbit or both.

That's awful Jenise, my navel orange tree gave me a bumper crop this year and this is the best-tasting year so far. My Lisbon lemon had a bumper crop as well and I am sucking the juice out of the wedges every morning. I am juicing my third batch this morning and now need to wait for my picker to finish picking both trees . My baby lime gave me three limes this year, which were awesome. My next-door neighbor came over with a bag of 2 dozen limes for me as he knows I use many of them in cooking. His tree is much older than mine and he also had a bumper crop.
However, this was the first year I had some oranges split, and so far about a dozen limes were dry when I cut into them....weird. I also wanted to add that before my oranges ripened I was getting Satsuma mandarins that were lovely, then when those were gone, I bought the Cuties and the Halos at grocers, all great.

[Jenise]

I'm so envious of your citrus trees, Karen!

Speaking of halos and cuties, I've bought 3 bags so far at different outlets--all dismal. The cara cara oranges and these Meyer lemons have been the only bright spots so far.

I've been experiencing the same thing with citrus fruits: flavorless. And no sweetness.

My late uncle had lemon and grapefruit trees in Phoenix. Best I've ever tasted. Almost like candy.

[Jenise]

Larry, exactly. Flavorless.

Where are all these fruit grown, anyway? I grew up among the citrus groves of Southern California. They're gone now. All coming from Mexico?

Larry, exactly. Flavorless.

Where are all these fruit grown, anyway? I grew up among the citrus groves of Southern California. They're gone now. All coming from Mexico?

Seems like I haven't had a good blood orange in years. And the cara caras haven't been as delicious either. But grapefruits still really good (FL or TX) and various CA oranges still good here in Nyc. But am shocked that even in season they are still stocking Chilean citrus right now.

[Jenise]

Same re blood oranges. I have some on hand right now, and was sorry I bought them. None I've had in ages have been anything close to the delightful Spanish blood oranges that were my original experience back when I lived in England.

I've had better luck with the cara caras than you have. Just bought more, they're quite good. But overall it's a downer to my fruit schedule to have such poor luck with the clementine/tangerine family that I usually live on right now. Oh, and I haven't had any good blueberries. Opened yet another box this morning where I'm throwing away one for every two edible (not soft) ones. We're having to eat more apples to make up the deficit.

I remember that sometime back in the late 1960s I was with my mother shopping at our local supermarket in Wethersfield, CT. In the produce section was a bin of oranges. They weren't the usual perfect, uniformly orange-colored fruit you saw in supermarkets. These were blotchy with a few patches of green, and with some black spots. Most of the customers were ignoring them. When my mother saw them, her face lit up with delight and she exclaimed, "OMG! Real oranges!" She bought a couple dozen of them.

My dad had joined the Navy when he left college and his fleet was stationed in Pensacola, Florida. My mom had grown used to driving to the local orchard and getting oranges picked fresh off the tree. When my dad left the Navy and we moved back to Connecticut, my mom had been spoiled and could barely tolerate the mass-produced supermarket oranges--picked before fully ripe and spray-painted orange. Somehow the supermarket had taken delivery of true, fully ripe oranges. Boy, were they good!

-Paul W.

I wish we had planted a red grapefruit tree. The Citrus take a few years to start producing, so kind of late for me to do that now.

I wish we had planted a red grapefruit tree. The Citrus take a few years to start producing, so kind of late for me to do that now.

But if you don't plant one now, and if you're alive in a few years, you'll be a few years older and still without a red grapefruit tree.

[Jenise]

Paul, Valencias meeting your description were the stuff of my childhood. I never cared for Naval oranges, not enough acid.

But hey, bought two Sumos at the market yesterday. Ate one--delicious! My experience with these has been recent, very limited and only marginally successful. First Sumo I ever tried I liked a lot. Bought another, and it was low-acid/flabby. Yuck. This one wasn't as sweet as the first one but it had the acidity the second one lacked, so it's actually pretty good. I love peeling and eating them in sections, membrane and all. However, the price: $4 each, essentially.