Living in the East Valley, you already know that when citrus season comes around, you can’t even give oranges away. With that in mind, I started looking at things to do with citrus. When one of my students requested that I do a citrus class, that also caused me to look again at our wonderful harvest.
Of course, we can make things like lemon curd and orange marmalade, but after you give away bottles and bottles of it, your friends stop answering their doors when you knock. Orange chicken is great, too, but how many times can you eat it before you say “uncle”? I love caramelized grapefruit for breakfast — but not 300 days in a row. So now you can see the dilemma we all face.
A grapefruit pound cake I came up with is a real treat, but the most unique recipe I developed for the class was mixed citrus salsa. Simply use whatever citrus you happen to have. I used grapefruit, tangelo and lime in my version. Peel the fruit, remove the pith and cut the citrus into 1-inch pieces. Added diced red onion and red pepper, chopped cilantro and some jalapeño. Add salt and pepper and, of course, some of that wonderful lime zest.
This salsa is a great topping for chicken or fish, and I think it would be great on pork. It’s pretty tasty on chips, too. Leftovers can be thrown into cooked rice. It doesn’t keep well, so make just what you will use.
How do you conquer the mounds of citrus?
• Judy A. Toth is the owner of Simply Impressive Cooking School in Mesa. Her column appears the second Wednesday of the month. Reach her at (480) 654-1981 or simplyimpressive.com.
