A to Z Challenge – U is for Ugli Fruit

This morning I was stymied. This is the day for the letter “u” and I couldn’t think of a single thing in nature that begins with that letter. I could always fall back on the most obvious “U is for Umbrella” and write something about rain, but that would be so…. obvious and boring.

So I did a Google search and came up with several things beginning with the letter “u”. One I’d actually heard about before but had forgotten, the ugli fruit. My daughter had picked one up at a Whole Foods market and shared it with me some years ago. I’m surprised I forgot about it. It really is an ugly little fruit, but it tastes good.

Inside of Ugli Fruit

Here is some of what I found on Wikipedia. UGLI is the trademark of Cabel Hall Citrus Limited and under which it sells its Jamaican tangelo, a citrus fruit created by hybridizing a grapefruit,   an orange and a tangerine. The fruit was first discovered growing wild, possibly having developed in the same way grapefruit was created, in Jamaica where it is mainly grown today. It has an unsightly appearance with rough, wrinkled, greenish-yellow rind, wrapped loosely around the orange pulpy citrus inside.

The light green surface blemishes on the ugli fruit turn orange when it is at its peak ripeness. The flesh is very juicy and tends towards the sweet side of the tangerine rather than the bitter side of its grapefruit lineage, with a fragrant rind. The taste is often described as more sour than an orange and less bitter than a tangerine. The fruit is seasonal from December to April. It is distributed in the United States and Europe between November and April, and sometimes is available from July to September.

I found images and more information about the ugli fruit on this website.  

Have you ever eaten an ugli fruit?