In recent years my relationship with citrus has grown. Lemons, limes, oranges, tangerines, grapefruit and then some. I've always loved citrus -- from quartered oranges at half time during elementary school soccer, to childhood morning's eating halved grapefruit topped with a generous pour of sugar, to fresh squeezed lemonade when lucky in the summer growing up.
What's changed in recent years is that I don't just appreciated citrus solo as in a slice of orange or a segment of tangerine -- I appreciate it as an accent, a bright contrast to everything from soups and salads, to pastas and marinades. A generous squeeze here, a bit of zest there.
Below is visual evidence of my evolving relationship. It happened around the time I found the beautiful piece of heavy aluminum kitchen equipment on the left of this photo at an estate sale. I'd been looking for one of these citrus juicers for some time because we grew up with one and it worked wonders come lemonade time as a kid. A few months after I found it, my brother and his wife bought me the new orange one. And then just weeks later I found the old stand up citrus juicer (good luck comes in threes) at a thrift store. I juice citrus so frequently now that three is indeed better than one. Do my dishes?
Anyhow, my original train of thought with this post was this:
A couple weekends ago when New Seasons Market hosted a front-of-the-store Saturday and Sunday citrus tasting I was very happy. I tried a bunch of citrus that I'd never tried before.
The best of the batch that I tried -- the tiny but oh-so-full-of-flavor Fremont tangerines. Wow -- if you haven't tried them and you love tangerines even a quarter as much as I do you better get your heinie over to New Seasons and grab a few.
They've brought me back to wanting citrus and only citrus -- no accouterments.