I’m here in Tucson, Arizona for the first time to hunt kumquats.
Well, no. I’m also here to visit family, rock climb and explore the restaurant, farmer’s market, wine and cocktail scenes. And perhaps most importantly to become the temporary grapefruit picker for the apartment complex where my mom’s older friend has a giant tree, the bounty of which she shares with all the residents. So every few days I’ll be scrambling up branches and a wall holding a long pole with a claw at the end to tear down the biggest, juiciest, white-fleshed grapefruit.
The irony is that I can’t eat grapefruit right now. Or, at least I can’t eat much grapefruit. The fruit is high oligo-saccharides, which means I can only have a little on my FODMAP diet (the diet isn’t permanent, but every time I incorporate new foods, there’s a testing period to see how I react). I’m being well behaved with regards to grapefruit thus far, but I’m certainly devouring way too many oranges – in the same way that a dieter eats too many low-fat frozen yogurt desserts because he or she mistakenly think it’s better than having just a single scoop of high-fat ice cream.
Foolish, I know. So I’m switching to kumquats (even though the FODMAP-friendly serving is four single fruit). I just love how exotic the little nuggets are. In Montreal, they’re so expensive, and I’d never had them freshly picked from the vine. The rule here, according to another one of my parents’ friends, is that if the tree is leaning over the wall of someone’s apartment, it’s fair game. So I followed her directions to the kumquat tree across from the fire station nearby, where a single kumquat tree bends over a tall wall adjacent to the sidewalk. I do climb mountains, but I also climb walls. So I jumped up to a narrow ledge, pushed my toes onto the backs of a couple nail ends sticking into the wall, pulled up to some holes in the wall and then hefted myself up to the top of the wall, pulling my feet up to stand on the wall while being safely nestled (let’s call it stuck) in the branches. From there I pulled kumquat after kumquat from the branches – but only the ones on the exterior of the wall, so as to follow the unwritten urban fruit foraging rule.
Fortunately, getting down was easier. And I had a bowl of kumquats to show for it. People make marmalade with them, but fresh ones are best eaten raw, in my opinion. The first bite is sour from the bitter essential oils in the edible peel, but the more you chew, the more sweet jam-like flavour – and even texture – comes out of the fruit, thanks to the natural pectin inside (that’s my theory anyway).
Marmalade without the work.
Here’s to three more weeks of kumquat hunting. Oh, I also grabbed a couple mandarines on my way to the kumquat tree. And there are apparently some tangerines around…
Leave a Reply