Grapefruit, July 31st, 2008

Brand: Sundance Natural Foods (Grateful Harvest Organic)
Variety: White
Growth location: ?
Bought in: Trader Joe's

After weeks of bitter--sometimes standoffish--grapefruits, we strike upon a beauty. My transition from red rubies and such red and pink grapefruits to whites (how I shall miss you, lycopene) brought little flavor change; all have been bitter.

But today, I stood before a fruit that was different. A subtle, almost orange-like fruit. It peeled reasonably. Though it was not bitter, it was not particularly sweet, except one surprising slice. Making up for these seeming inefficiencies, it tasted of citrus, a flavor that apparently has been so bred out of grapefruits today that it's rarely found. This grapefruit made me happy. This grapefruit was a winner.

Grade: A-

Grapefruit, July 12th, 2008

Brand: Unknown
Variety: Unknown
Growth location: Florida
Bought in: some extracheap supermarket in Apex, NC, or something

You see before you the mystery fruit. My coworker gave it to me, and it was fairly tasty, but jeez, what was it doing? As you can see, the fruit had a large black splotch. Beneath that splotch there was no discoloration, no bad spot. Mystery.

In another spot, the peel was proving hard to remove. It turned out that beneath the skin, amidst the white stuff, was a...clot? This hard spot stuck firmly to both skin and meat. It was about the size of a dime. It was the color of a ruby red grapefruit. I did not dare putting it in my mouth. But again, beneath it, once i had scraped it away, the fruit was unaffected. Mystery.

But on to the meat and, perhaps, the point. I believe it to have been a white grapefruit, for its color was pale, but also somewhat dim or faded looking. It was not a particularly appetizing color. Thankfully, it had no strange taste issues, with a reasonable level of sourness but, unfortunately, no sweetness. Nothing special, but my coworker reports these are very cheap out there in the mysterymart. I'll give it a small grade boost for its unique experience.

Grade: C+

Grapefruit, July 6th, 2008

Brand: Sundance Natural Foods
Variety: Red Ruby
Growth location: California
Bought in: Trader Joe's

Dear lord, this grapefruit was obdurate.

Its somewhat-wrinkly skin peeled terribly. The skin would just not pull off. Thus, additional force was necessary. Well, I apparently punctured the fruit, causing juice to leak all over my plate and table.
What that effort yielded was a very small fruit. In opening it up for eating it in slices, a procedure in which I stick my thumb into the middle of the fruit and pull out to the side, causing it to hopefully break at a reasonable slice division, it disintegrated. I held in my hands two hunks of mangled grapefruit flesh.
What was I to do but gnash wildly at these bits? I consumed the grapefruit in the course of perhaps two minutes. In protest, it stung. Its surprise attack of acidic flavor surprised me... but delighted.
If only every grapefruit could be so dedicated. To what? Anything, really. A grapefruit that does only one thing, so consistently maintains an apparent viewpoint, is to be rewarded. Thank you, July 6th grapefruit.

Grade: B+

Grapefruit, July 1st, 2008

Brand: Sundance Natural Foods
Variety: Red Ruby
Growth location: California
Bought in: Trader Joe's

This fruit wins the Ugliness Award. I have never seen such a strange deformity in a grapefruit before, but nature does strange things if given the chance. Perhaps it being "organic" is somehow responsible for this. Also note its dirty looking texture.

Despite the reputation of ugly grapefruits to taste excellent, I was not hopeful with this one. It was hard to peel and rendered a small fruit within full of worrisome color gradations. The slices collapsed in my hands as I tried to peel them free. But perhaps that did the fruit good--I had more direct contact with the juicy flesh of the fruit and less with the pith.

And I should not have doubted that such an ugly fruit would turn out tasting fine. It was on the sweet side and had an intensity of flavor that, again, I should have expected, given its size.

This one came from a bag of Sundance grapefruit, unlike the previous Sundances reviewed here. The whole bag looks to be small fruit, but all of the skins (excepting this one) look nice. Too bad.

Grade: B-

Grapefruit, June 25th, 2008

Brand: Sundance Natural Foods
Variety: Deep Red (possibly a kind of Star Ruby)
Growth location: California
Bought in: Weaver Street Market

Ain't she an ugly one? The by-far worst looking one of this batch of fruit turned out to be not unenjoyable, though. It was seriously sour, but had just enough sweet to go along, adding up to an experience that held my interest and was far from same-old. As a plus, none of the slices had that funkiness problem. My common recommendation for grapefruit holds: aim ugly.

Grade: B