February 2, 2016

Fruit Ripens: Jan-July Description: The Tango tangerine is a mid to late season variety mandarin. Medium in size by mandarin standards the Tango tangerine has a squat shape and smooth skin. It thin vivid orange hued rind is easy to peel once the fruit is mature. The Tango tangerine has an exceptionally juicy inner flesh and can be divided into 9 to 10 nearly seedless segments. Tango tangerines offer a sweet citrus flavor with mild sour notes. Its rind is rich with citrus oil and aromatic when pierced or muddled.

Fruit Ripens: Dec-Feb Description: Easy-to-peel and rich orange to deep red, Satsuma tangerines, pronounced sat-SOO-ma, have a characteristic loose and often bumpy skin. A variety of the mandarin, the exotic Satsuma is quite aromatic and less acidic than other mandarins.

Fruit Ripens: Nov-Jan Description: The Pixie mandarin has extremely sweet, seedless, and segmented flesh. Individual fruits may vary in shape and size as well as texture and juiciness. They can be rounded to ovate, with flat bottoms. Their skin is ranges in color from a golden yellow to orange, is pebbled and leathery with a fragrant, thin, and easy to peel rind.

Fruit Ripens: Late Oct-Feb Description: The Kishu tangerine is petite, globular-shaped and roughly the size of a golf ball. Its thin, glossy leathery and fragrant skin is attached tightly to its fragmented flesh, though it is relatively easy to peel. Its flesh is seedless, juicy and candy sweet.

Fruit Ripens: Jan-Aug Description: Firmer and juicier than other varieties, Honey tangerines are more difficult to peel. The fruits are seedy, with a deep, orange flesh that is very sweet. The juice offers a robust flavor and a rich dark orange color. Honey tangerines are allowed to ripen on the tree longer than any other tangerine variety, making them among the sweetest available.

Fruit Ripens: Mar-Aug Description: The Golden Nugget tangerine is an exceptional tangerine variety. It is roughly rounded in shape and exterior texture. Its skin is golden orange, aromatic and easy to peel. Its easily segmented flesh is deep orange, tender, extremely sweet and always seedless.

Fruit Ripens: March-Apr Description: Dancy mandarin traces its origin to a seedling tree growing in the orchard of Colonel G. L. Dancy of Orange Mills in 1867. Its parent was a mandarin tree, known as the Morganne "tangerine," reported to have been growing in the orchard of N. H. Morganne as early as 1843. This tree is believed to have been introduced from Tangiers, Morocco by Major At-way, the previous owner of the Morganne property. Regardless of this variety's tangled history, its reputed origin of Tangiers gave rise to the term "tangerine" which today seems to refer to any mandarin, not just Dancy.

Fruit Ripens: Feb-May Description: Algerian tangerines are some of the smallest citrus fruits, measuring less than two and a half inches in diameter. Their shape varies from oblate to oblong to pyriform; they often, but not always, have short necks. The rind is pebbled and deep orange. Combined with the Algerian tangerine's general lack of seeds, the thin and easy to peel rind makes this fruit an ideal snack food. Inside are eight to twelve separate segments of deep orange, juicy flesh. The taste is very sweet and has been described as melting, tender, and refreshing.