Buddha's Hand

Friends gave us a Buddha's Hand Citron today, a fruit I had never heard of. It is an ancient citrus variety that is not grown for its flesh (it has none), but for its aroma, and for the zest. It looks spectacular, like a gnarly old lemon hand (apparently there are "closed" hand fruit that resemble hands folded for a buddhist prayer. They are used as religious offerings. Ours was an "open" handed fruit, and more resembled a lemon Medusa).

The aroma from this fruit is unbelievable. Imagine lemon scent, but more intense, and with a more flowery and perfume like fragrance. I am cutting it up and making candied Buddha's Hand from it. I will also keep the syrup to use for baking instead of sugar. I can't wait to feed some of it back to our friends!


This is one of the things I love best about growing my own food (however little part of it). What is surplus to me, and might end up going bad on the compost, is treasured by our friends. And it starts a circle of giving. My friends give me a lemon, I will invite them back over for fruit cake that I've made using the fruit... the next time, I will give them some zucchini flowers (they are ridiculously enthusiastic about zucchini flowers), and they will fill them and feed them back to everybody. It goes on and on.