This has been a great year for fruit. One Mothering Sunday, my daughter presented me with a little Meyer lemon tree. That was the start of an ever-growing collection of citrus trees, all grown in pots.
My collection isn’t keen on English weather, so I keep them in the greenhouse between September and May. Each summer, I wheel them outside in their tubs and line them up in the fresh air and sunshine.
We had some good crops from my first lemon tree until a cold, soggy winter finished it off. The atmosphere inside the greenhouse made it rot. Its successor had almost sixty fruits on it this year. Lemon curd made with eggs from our hens is a lovely deep yellow colour, and much better than the so-called lemon curd sold in shops.
As well as a lemon tree, I have a Tahiti lime, and a Seville orange. I bought a small yuzu bush earlier this year, but that’s still got some growing to do before it produces fruit.
There’s only one ripe orange on my tree, so I’ll have to buy some more Sevilles this year if I want to make marmalade!
Our Tahiti lime is fruiting for the first time. Like all the other citrus family it’s worth growing for its fragrant flowers but we’re getting plenty of fruit, too. I used some to make Key Lime Pie from Tesco’s recipe, although as our plant isn’t a Key Lime, I called ours Tahiti Lime Pie. It was very easy to make, absolutely delicious but it did my post-Christmas diet no good at all.
Here’s a Pixabay shot of Key Lime Pie. My effort looked the same, but the presentation here is so pretty I used this photo instead.
Have you ever grown anything exotic?
