Day 46 -- A Bloody Good Orange

Since my vegan lifestyle focusses on lots of fruits and veggies, I've been wandering the produce aisles searching for new and intersting things to taste.  I went through eight different varieties of apples, I've eaten kale and I've enjoyed a rutebega or two.  I want to do a survey of tropical fruits and try a papaya, a star fruit and passion fruit.  But I ran across blood oranges at the store a few days ago and picked up a couple.  At 50 cents a piece this would be an affordable taste test for now.

I've heard about blood oranges  They use them on Top Chef all the time.  And an orange with blood red flesh sounded so yummy.  Kind of like Ruby Red grapefruit -- one of my favorites.

In doing a bit of research (Wikipedia), I did learn that regular oranges are all hybrids of the pomelo and the tangerine.  I did not know that.  And the blood orange is a mutation of the sweet orange.  The red pigment is called anthrocyanin, an anti-oxidant.  The characteristic color develops only during cold nights in the growing season.  The blood orange is the primary orange grown in Italy and is grown in the U.S. in Texas and Califormian.

The blood orange peeled like a tangerine and the taste was slightly different than a regular orange   Though it's small for an orange, it was a nice change of citrus pace.  And the flesh was deep red, almost a maroon color.  I hope they're still available on my next shopping trip.  I plan to buy more.