Favorite Citrus Fruit

[Junglekeeper]

Lemon: I like its shape, bright color, refreshing fragrance, and taste in lemonade.

[mr.shep]

Oranges: The Sweet and Blood Oranges
are my favorite of all Citrus for fresh eating,
for juicing, for canning (marmalades), for
confections (candied Orange wedges) for
cooking (Blood Orange viniagrette) and for
desserts (Orange sherbet, Blood Orange
gelato and sorbet).

Jim

[Daniel Mosquin]

Blood oranges all the way - I anticipate the flavour surprise, from traditional orange to blackberry.

[Eric La Fountaine]

I love anything with lemon flavour. I drink lemonade almost every day. And the clear tart flavour can enhance so many other foods.

[Millet]

CaraCara Navel Orange. Because of the balance between the soluble solids and the T. acids it has an awesome taste. Also good pulp color. Page Mandarin, believed by many of the citrus experts to be the finest tasting citrus variety of all. - Millet

[Daniel Mosquin]

I should mention that if I could vote for a second favourite, it'd be limes. I always eat the pulp after adding lime juice to salads (PS lime juice, feta cheese and cracked black pepper is all one needs for a great salad along with some leafy greens)

[mr.shep]

It is hard to pick one Citrus over the other as we
all have our favorites for different things such
as fresh eating and for a variety of uses for the
juice. I think it is better to compare one type
of fruit such as a Page Mandarin with a mixed
heritage from a cross of Clementine (Algerian
Tangerine) with a Minneola Tangelo and have
it match up to a Fairchild that is a cross from
a Clementine and an Orlando Tangelo. The
current trend is to like the sweet-tart taste
as in some cases these two "Mandarins" can
be a lot sweeter than a Dancy or even a Satsuma
can be grown in the ground. From my own
experience I like the Page Mandarin better
from container grown plants but I prefer the
Fairchild when grown in the ground. I prefer
the Orlando Tangelo over the Minneola Tangelo
for the same reason as both the Orlando and
the Fairchild will sugar up better for us here
than the Page and the Minneola will. That
may not be the case grown in Riverside,
Santa Cruz or in a greenhouse. A lot depends
on what we want and who grew the fruit, where
the trees are grown, were the trees grown
indoors or outdoors and what particular uses
do we have for them.

Let our old form of Meyer Lemon get ripe,
ripe right on the tree and you can fresh eat
it without your mouth puckering. There
is enough sweetness to overcome the
acidity but people may not be able to
witness such an event with trees grown
in a container or grown indoors in a home
or from a greenhouse.

Millet, I have a suggestion for you why not
start a thread with a little background of your
greenhouse growing operation. I'd like to
know what 52 types and varieties of Citrus
you are growing also (just like I'd like to
know which Citrus the UBC Botanical
Garden has). You have a lot to offer
people for information on indoor growing
that the people in Ontario kept mum about
to the rest of Canada until recently with the
advent of the internet. You can help some
of the people that essentially got this Citrus
forum to come about in the first place.
Without their interest in Citrus there would
not have been a forum for you to come in
from elsewhere and start posting some very
good and informative posts. You and I are
coming from two different worlds as I am
a container grower as well as a production
grower. I grow these things outdoors, so
we may have a few areas in which we may
not totally agree on but I have also grown
some Citrus in containers in a greenhouse
but that was for selling purposes in a nursery,
not for production purposes though..

Jim

[Junglekeeper]

Too bad we don't have citrus festivals in these parts that would allow us to taste the many varieties - we have apple festivals instead (not that there's anything wrong with that). ;)

[Daniel Mosquin]

Originally Posted by mr.shep

I'd like to
know what 52 types and varieties of Citrus
you are growing also (just like I'd like to
know which Citrus the UBC Botanical
Garden has).

Jim - we don't have any that would be a fruit crop (at least not yet). We've about 6-7 ornamental genera of Rutaceae, but these are genera like Zanthoxylum, Skimmia, Tetradium and Choisya.

[mr.shep]

Ouch, I was way overzealous then for thinking
the Botanical Garden may have a few forms of
Citrus growing. Sorry about that.

Jim

[Daniel Mosquin]

Gregn (Greg) is advocating that we try some hardy varieties, which I've duly passed along to the horticulturist in charge of the Food Garden, Tony. Tony's a bit of an experimenter, so I imagine we'll be planting some in the next few years.

[Junglekeeper]

I like it - The Citrus Corner at the Garden. Tours in 2007? Reserve a spot for Trifoliate Orange and its display of fruit in winter.

[Millet]

Mr. Shep: For some years I have been collecting and growing containerized citrus trees in a greenhouse located in Colorado USA. The greenhouse is located at 5440-feet (1813-Meters). Colorado winters are much colder than the Vancouver area, however, because of the altitude the sun light is very strong. All of the citrus trees are planted in a custom growing medium,which is a blend of: 4-parts Coconut Husk Chips (CHC) and 1-part Peat Moss. I have receintly been experimenting with 4-parts CHC and 1 part Coir. I blend into this medium, STEM (Souble Trace Element Mix), Dolomite and a 23-4-8 slow release fertilizer. I also fertilize all the trees with every watering at 100-PPM-N. I am currently growing the following varieties:

Bearss Lime
Bouquet de Flores Orange (gift-Joe Lohnes)
Buddah Hand Citron (gift Joe Lohnes)
BC-2 Satsuma Mandarin (Developed by the GREAT Mr. Bonnie Childers of Texas.)
Cara Cara Red Navel
Chandler Pummelo
Ghang Shou Kumquat (gift Neal Rahn)
Clementine Hybrid
Dancy Tangerine
Ellendale Mandarin
Etrog Citron
Fallglo Mandarin
V1-498 Fina Sodea Clementine Mandarin
Flying Dragon - (Gift from Mr. Bonnie Childers of Texas)
Fremont Mandarin (Clementine X Ponkan)
Hamilin Dwarf
Harvey Lemon
Honey Murcott
Ichang Lemon (Stan McKenzie)
Key Lime
Kimbrough Satsuma
Lakeland Limequat (Key Lime X Kumquat) - Kinkoji Rootstock
Lane Late Navel Orange (Summer Navel)
Marisol Clementine
Minneloa Tangelo
Moro Blood Orange
Myrtle Leaf Sour Orange (gift Joe Lohnes)
Meiwa Kumquat (gift Joe Lohnes)
Nagami Kumquat
Orlando Tangelo
Oroblanco Pummelo (Swingle Rootstock)
Ortanique - Swingle Rootstock
Owari Satsuma
Page Mandarin (Minneola Tangelo X Clementine)
Ponderosa Lemon
Ponkan Mandarin
Pong Koa Mandarin
Red Navel Orange
Rio Red Grapefruit
Ruby Sweet Blood Orange
Sanbokan Mandarin - Swingle Rootstock
Satsuma Mandarin
Seedless Kishu Mandarin
Star Ruby Grapefruit
Sunquat (Lemon X Kumquat hybrid) - Kinkoji Rootstock
Taichang Lemon (Stan McKenzie)
Temple Orange
Thomasville Citrangequat (gift Neal Rahn)
Valencia
Variegated Calamondin
Variegated Meyer Lemon
Washington Navel
Yuzu

[mr.shep]

Millet, my goodness, an impressive list of Citrus
indeed. Thank you for listing them. I will have
to read up on a few of them that I do not know
or do not know much about.

I have a ton of questions to ask such as how one
Mandarin or a Tangelo compares to another for
you but I'll do that at another time when it is more
timely.

As more people in Canada and cooler parts of the
US and elsewhere want to try their hand to grow
Citrus, I think they will want to know more about
your greenhouse operation. I already sensed with
your elevation and coolness you will be a ton of
help for a lot of people, much more help to most
people in this forum than I probably will be.

Continued success,

Jim

[Junglekeeper]

Nice collection, Millet - something I can only dream of.

[Layne Uyeno]

Kishu Mandarin. Cause it's the only citrus tree I have...for now. I was on the hunt for a mandarin/tangerine to add to my balcony and came across this one. The nurseryman recommended this one over another mandarin I was considering. Possibly the cutest mandarin/tangerine. Easy to peel bite sized fruit. Still, I savor it by seperating the tiny tiny segments. :-)

*sigh* I can't wait till winter....

Layne

[lemon_dreams]

I'd have to say the lemon. I've yet to try a lot of varieties than the typical grocery store varieties. basic navelorange, sunkist lemon ad a few grapefruits. Though, in the past few months, I have tried others... kumquats, clemintines, blood oranges.. etc.

But... it'll always be the lemon for me. I can eat themlike an orange, love em in my water, in cooking.... so many ways. I could easily eat 5-10 a day (well, w/ juicing them too)

[BabyBlue11371]

I love eating Mandarins.. But I love cooking with Lemons and Limes..
Gina *BabyBlue*
WOW you have an great collection Millet!!!!

[82Stang]

Limes. I use them mainly in my cheesecake recipes and my father loves them in his rum and cokes. =D

[CarolineRC]

I'd have to say limes. They are great on most Thai food and even better in a rum and Coke!

[LPN]

Lime also, especially Key Lime. A fresh piece in a Corona beer, Mexican food, Key Lime pie ...

[bengy]

I would say mandarins, pummelo & lemonade for fresh eating.Limes & lemons for cooking & mix w/ drinks. Oranges & grapefruits for juicing.Sorry have so many favs...

[de bon chemin]

The citron as the progenitor of lemon, lime and some others.Let honor the elders.
And it's nice to munch on citron sticks sprinkled with Chartreuse or Benedictine (peel the flavodo first...)
The sudachy is a funny one and very practical, come in different color, taste, brix and that all from the same tree, depending the location of the fruit on the tree and the picking time.

[mikeyinfla]

red pumelo is my favorite right behind that is alemoen its a tangelo variety that looks simlar to ugly fruit but to me taste way better.there is another tangelo that is small round and sorta pink in the middle called wikiwa that is a good one mine has yet to produce fruit it is about 9 or so feet tall. than any tangelo and ruby red grapefruit. hard to pick just one

[et2007]

I like all citrus fruits, but the most is meiwa kumquat, small enough for just eat the whole fruit...