The Curious World of Citrus

Of zesty bergamots; funky rare Sardinian citrus fruits and an extensive family tree

Welcome to our fresh new Cabinet of Curiosities, the source for your monthly food digest and discovery of all things curious about the world of Italian food culture!

This year, alongside the newsletter, you’ll find short Morsels of stories and insights on Instagram. Both the social Morsels and the newsletter will follow a monthly theme that has the purpose of focusing our narration and uncovering even more in-depth stories.

The sheer vastness of our world’s biodiversity we very often take for granted. This month, we’ve chosen to write about the citrus fruits, in all their complexity and zest, and the role they play in this. A plethora of fascinating varieties, shapes and flavours lies beyond the most common citrus fruits we know, such as lemons and oranges. Keep reading to discover two very unique citruses as well as the intricate story of how, it turns out, citrus fruits all stem from the same three original fruits!

Illustrations by Chiara Palandri

Bergamotto, citrusy Calabrian pride.

by Francesco Pellegrini: wine lover, obsessed with NY cheesecake and nature photography fan.

What is a bergamotto? No, he is not related to the lampredotto, much less a funny and chubby gentleman from Bergamo.

Few will have eaten it, but many have certainly smelled it and know that we are talking about a citrus fruit, which has found "its place in the world" in southern Italy, particularly in Calabria.

The production of bergamot - DOP since 2001 - comes almost exclusively from the Ionian side of the Reggio Calabria province (the tip of the boot, so to speak): we are talking about around 90% of world production concentrated in an area of ​​1500 hectares for around 20 thousand tons of fruit harvested annually.

Much of the production is used for the extraction of the aromatic essence, used in cosmetics: many of the best-known perfumes boast the essence of bergamot within them.

By consuming it as it is you can benefit from the many properties it possesses: it is rich in vitamins C and A, excellent against cholesterol and blood sugar and is also a powerful antioxidant... miraculous!

There are different varieties, with smooth and yellow skin, wrinkled skin of an intense green, but they all have in common an intense aroma and a sour and bitter taste, like lemon: if used moderately in cooking, its juice or zests give dishes  that “touch of freshness” that everyone craves on a hot summer evening.

Sardinia is home to one of the world’s rarest (and ugliest) citrus fruits

By Bruce McMichael: Also known as The Lemon Grove, food writer and citrus aficionado.

Across northeast Sardinia, between white sandy beaches and rising limestone mountains lies the Baronia coastal region and the ancient town of Siniscola, now the focus of the island's tiny pompìa crop. 

Weighing up to 700g each, some say this knobbly, wrinkly fruit, both sour and bitter in flavour, is the ugliest of cousins within the sprawling citrus family. They are occasionally considered the 'monstrous citron', somewhat unfairly, though. Too dry, acidic, and bitter to eat straight off the tree, pompìa rewards the patient cook.

It is beloved by growers and cooks for its flavours that seep into sweets and marmalades, playing a central role in the cultural life of the Sards, the people of Sardinia. Further south towards Muravera, you'll find sweet oranges and lemons, but it’s only around Siniscola that you will find the rare pompìa. The fruit is now supported by Slow Food International, helping growers and farmers in saving it from the brink of extinction.

Easily spotted across the scrubby sun-bleached wilderness and beyond the fences of carefully tendered gardens and orchards, pompìa grows slowly, absorbing what moisture and nutrition it can from the stony ground. 

Hidden within its sunglow colour and thick, wrinkly skin full of essential oils, the insides are used to flavour liqueurs and traditional sweets such as Sa Pompìa intrea and s’Aranzata. 

The taste of pompìa is unique and complex. The rind is slightly bitter and tangy, while the flesh is mildly acidic and less sweet than other citrus fruits. The overall taste is a blend of bitterness and tartness with a hint of sweetness. Scratch the skin, and you'll be hit by a spritz of citrusy aroma with an appealing note of lemon. 

The outer skin is reserved for essential oils and herbal remedies, while the thick white pith layer just underneath is used to make sweets and marmalades or s’Aranzata, made by crystallising pompìa zest with honey and toasted almonds. Tradition demands the sweets are given out on festival days such as weddings and baptisms. 

Image via Cookist

The Citrus Family Tree

By Alberto Trame: Passionate about Italy’s gastronomic and wine heritage; curious about every story in the realm of food culture.

What if I were to tell you that all the oranges, lemons, limes, and grapefruits you've ever eaten are descendants from just three ancient species?

Citrus fruits have been cultivated for at least 4000 years and a series of subsequent crosses since then have generated at least 25 different species.

The origin of citrus fruit dates as far back as seven million years ago to the Miocene epoch. The 2009 discovery of certain fossilized citrus leaves in China suggests so. Their cultivation most likely began in Asia with the first written documents mentioning citrus fruits being the Chinese text “Tribute to Yu” (2205-2197 BC) and the Indian text “Vajaseneyi sambita” (800 BC).

While the genealogy of these fruits remained mysterious for a long time, the recent sequencing of the genome of some citrus fruits made it possible to partially reconstruct their complex family tree. And this leads us to the most surprising discovery  that almost all citrus fruits cultivated in the world are the result of crossings of only three species, those being: citron, mandarin and pomelo.

Citron (Citrus medica) was the first citrus fruit to reach Europe. Most likely originating in India, it has been cultivated in Southeast Asia for thousands of years. It was introduced to the Mediterranean from Persia and Greece by Alexander the Great around 300 BC.

There are many different species of mandarin (a term referring to the small, sweet and easily peelable fruits) on the market today: the ancestor, originally from China, is the Citrus reticulata. Although mandarins have been grown in Asia for millennia, they were not introduced to Europe until the 19th century.

The third species is the pomelo. It looks like a large pear-shaped grapefruit and can measure up to 30cm in diameter with a lot of inedible, spongy pith. Native to South-East Asia, it was introduced to Spain by the Arabs, around 1000 AD.

So how did we arrive at what we have today?

Sweet oranges (Citrus sinensis) don’t exist in the wild as they are the result of  a cross-contamination that occurred 4000 years ago, between the mandarin and the pomelo. We don't know if the crossing happened by chance or if it was guided by humans, but it is certain that the sweet and juicy fruit was immediately appreciated and cultivated. 

Bitter oranges, (Citrus aurantium), also called Seville oranges, are not the ancestors of sweet oranges, as many believe. They are also the result of a cross-contamination between the mandarin and the pomelo.

Bitter oranges crossed with the cedar generated the lemon (Citrus limon). In fact, we can say that lemons are the grandsons of mandarins!

Lime (Citrus aurantifolia), which arrived in the Caribbean and Mexico in 1500 thanks to Spanish explorers, is a cross between a cedar and Citrus micrantha, a wild variety.

Today we see the history of citrus fruit as an ever expanding family tree, and a  truly astonishing one at that. With their vibrant colors and zesty flavours, these versatile fruits can boost our health, enhance our meals and refresh our spirits!

Have you enjoyed this issue of The Cabinet of Curiosities? Would you like to share your thoughts on the world of citrus fruits? Leave us a comment below!