Susanna riffs on kumquats, bitter orange and some other strange citrus fruits
by Dr. Susanna Hoffman
So standard are the selections in our markets, we rarely see some of the hundreds of varieties of citrus fruit that grows about the world. But every now and then, a sample of one of the ancient or very new sorts comes our way. Some are:
Kumquats - are a small citrus fruit, looking rather like orange fingerlings, that grow on a bushy shrub with dark green shiny leaves rather than a tall tree. They originated, were eaten, and admired in China and were unknown in the West until they were brought to England in 1846 by Robert Fortune, a specimen collector for The London Botanical Society. He envisioned them as a landscaping ornamental, not an edible, and that was how they first spread across Europe and to the Americas, as a garden shrub. Their bushiness is useful in creating boundaries and privacy, plus they are pretty and when blossoming, fragrant. They also taste wonderful, raw or cooked like powerful, but tart little oranges. In cooking they soften up. They are only available for short seasons once or twice a year.



