You Can’t Go Wrong With A Minneola

Ok, this is not a paid piece of advertising from the Florida or California citrus industry.  No, it is a simple testimony to encourage you to try a splendiferous fruit—the minneola tangelo.

If there was a minneola tangelo tree in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve could have avoided a lot of heartache by sampling a minneola instead of succumbing to that other tree.

Sadly, there was no minneola around during Adam and Eve’s time.

According to several reliable sites, the minneola was given a public debut in 1931 from the USDA Horticulture Research facility near Orlando, Florida. The minneola is a cross between a Duncan grapefruit and a Dancy mandarin. The fruit is named after Minneola, Florida, a town in Lake County with a population just over 12,000.

The minneola has an unusual shape. On the stem end there is nipple/neck which gives the fruit a bell shaped appearance. For this shape, some Florida packing houses call the minneola a honey bell.

I reached out to a citrus organization in Florida via e-mail asking some questions about the minneola. But, no one ever responded back. Maybe, they are too busy marketing, packing and shipping, or eating minneolas. 

Every January, I anxiously await the arrival of the minneola in our local grocery stores. And thankfully, they keep showing up. Apparently,  minneolas have an availability from December into February. 

The cold, bleakness of winter usually gets a bad rap. But in truth we also, moan, groan, and whine about miserable humidity and heat in the summer.

But, if you have the winter blues, I have a cure.  Go buy some minneolas. I promise you that the sweet, tart taste of a minneola will brighten the most dismal gray, frigid winter day. 

This citrus fruit is worth making the drive to the grocery store. 

You will not regret it. 

Don’t wait. 

Go now, before I selfishly beat you to the store and buy more.