Oranges...

I have learned a lot about orange growing the last few days. For instance, if your orange tree is producing sour oranges all you need to do is spread Epsom's salts on the ground around the tree base. The minerals in the Epsom's salts are minerals the tree is lacking and thus why your oranges are sour. I guess in principle it is the same reason why you put salt in sweet baked products liked cookies - to enhance flavor and bring out sweetness.

When you pick a honeybell orange from the tree, the small ones are full of juice and thus the best for squeezing. The larger ones that have a shape more like that of an anjou pear are better for eating. The small ones have a very thin skin and are heavy with their juice-filled flesh, while the larger ones have a much thicker skin with larger pores and a sweeter flesh (that is still super juicy - don't be fooled - you might have to eat it with a lobster bib!) Honeybells aren't seedless (at least the ones off the 'rents tree aren't), but the seeds are probably a welcome blessing which keeps you from inhaling the whole orange at once - it is that good!

Gone is my need to travel to the grocery store and pick out the most perfectly round, perfectly orange, orange I can find. I have realized that just like most of the other home grown fruit/food, what comes out of the garden hardly resembles what is purchased from the store. Oranges are a fantastic example. Picked right from the tree, the ripe orange can be any shade of color from a dark lemon yellow to rich orange, or a wash of all those colors in between (picture an apple washed from every tone between lime green and maroon). They may or may not be round and they may or may not have little sand marks from the wind blowing on them. All these things give each orange a character all its own which allows you to realize that each piece of fruit is unique just like each different human who consumes them.

Go ahead - enjoy an orange - preferably one right from someone's tree - picked around 3pm when the flesh and juice will be warm! YUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!