Kirin, and Kumquats, and Pomelos, oh My!

Happy Spring folks! Longer, brighter days are ahead of us and I’m finally here with an update!

I know I said in my last post that I hoped to blog at least once a month, but then I blinked and it was April! Plus sometimes I struggle with what to write about. It’s true I can ramble about pretty much any old thing, but that’s also something that holds me back sometimes. Maybe I should let my fear of the ramble go and unleash it upon the internet for the few who kindly come to read what I have to say? (Something I might thank myself for in the future perhaps?)

While I have been working on most of the goals I set out in my last post, today I want to focus on the most fun one by far - trying as many new kinds of fruit as I can!

A kind reader (and coworker), Gord, has been a huge help in this department! In fact, three of the four new fruits I tried were left on my desk at the office by him!

First, we have kumquats. These small orange fruit are a citrus native to China. They were really tasty, I just washed them, removed the little stem and then ate the whole thing. They’re sweet and citrusy. Gord said that they’re great in a gin and tonic, but I never got around to trying that - but it’s definitely something to keep in mind for the summer ;)
Verdict - would definitely eat again

Next is the pomelo. It kind of looks like a giant grapefruit, which makes sense, since it kind of tastes like one too. It’s also native to Southeast and East Asia. The one I tried was a golden, or yellow pomelo. As you can see in the picture below, it has a very thick pith around the fruit. Gord warned me to make sure that I removed as much of the white pith as I possibly could before eating, as it was extremely bitter (can confirm) and then peel the segments to enjoy the fruit inside. Now, I’ll be honest, I’m not a huge grapefruit (the fruit) fan. I really like grapefruit-flavoured things, but I find the fruit itself a bit too sour to enjoy on its own, so for me pomelo was like the most ideal version of grapefruit! All the grapefruit-ish flavour, none of the bitterness (unless you got that pith)! It was also mentioned that pomelo was really good in salads, which I can totally see, so I’m looking forward to trying some in my summer salad season.
Verdict - would definitely eat again

I went to Seattle at the end of February for Emerald City Comic Con and while we were in a Whole Foods grabbing some snacks, I came upon this guy: the sumo citrus, or dekopon, so I picked one up to try. These are oversized mandarins from Japan that (according to their website) are known for their sweetness, size and ‘top-knot’. Since we were staying in a hotel, I didn’t have a sharp enough knife to get a nice cr0ss-section or a big enough surface to take a nice picture once it was peeled. It feels silly to say it was a disappointment, but after the kumquat and pomelo - which were both new flavours, it was a bit of a let-down since it just tasted like an orange. I didn’t even find it particularly sweet, just like a mandarin that we would eat at Christmastime, with a harder-to-remove peel.
Verdict: wouldn’t go out of my way to buy, but would eat again

My final new fruit update for this go-round is the kirin (also courtesy of Gord), also known as a yellow dragonfruit. It’s a cactus species that’s native to South America, and slightly smaller than the ‘normal’ pink dragonfruit most folks are familiar with. Apparently this can sometimes be confused with other yellow dragonfruit cultivars that aren’t actually related to the kirin (such as the Aussie Gold - one to add to the to-try list) but I digress. It’s full of fibre and vitamin C, but more importantly, it was DELICIOUS. I cut through the skin to reveal the distinctive white with black specks interior and then just cut it into discs to eat, peeling the skin off first. The flesh is succulent and sweet with a nice floral-y vibe. If these weren’t so dang pricey (I looked it up ‘cause it so good) I think I would eat them quite often.
Verdict: 100% would eat again!

I already have a few more fruits to try, so I’ll be back with more updates on this one soon. This is, by far, one of the most fun to do ‘goals’ I’ve set for myself in a long time, I wish I could thank whichever random person on IG I found the idea from! Do you know of an interesting fruit I should try? Let me know!!

And one last time, huge shout out to Gord for being my new fruit enabler ;)