Grapefruits

How can a little fruit hold so much?

I love citrus fruit. I’ve always had less of a sweet-tooth, and citrus fruit makes me feel like I’m doing something right. It feels healthy; it wakes me up. I feel good.

Oranges, or more specifically tangerines, remind me of school. A Christingle in the Church at Christmas time, or an afterschool snack; the smell of the peel and the way the moisture puffs out of the pores in little clouds. I used to play a game with my friend at school of ‘sweet, sour, or medium’, where we had to guess the flavour of each and every segment of tangerine we ate. I used to peel the skin back and pop the little flecks of flesh between my tongue and teeth. Even now, my dad fills my pockets with tangerines, much like the ones that weigh the toes of Christmas stockings – though, I once let one rot in the bottom of the enlarged sock, until it went wet and brown and no longer resembled a tangerine at all. I seem to remember throwing it at a wall to see if it would stick.

On the contrary, lemons remind me of my mum; yellow like sunshine, which is her favourite. Black tea with a slice of lemon, is mum. We travelled to Sorrento together a few summers ago and there were oversized lemons everywhere. We consumed crushed ice flavoured with lemon, slurped sticky lemon sorbet out of shelled out lemon peels, as if they were cups. The street stalls were overflowing with lemons and the smell drifted in the hot air. I cut my thumb whilst slicing a lemon, for my mother’s tea, when I started university. A gesture of ‘homeliness’ and independence and I slipped up straight away; it was all I could do not to bleed on the hand of the housemate I’d just been introduced to.

A close cousin to these everyday fruits, of course: the grapefruit. Exotic and pink, this fruit is a hybrid of ‘citrus’ and ‘paradisi’ from Barbados. Paradise.

Much like I used to with green apple slices, as a child I would coat my grapefruit halves with white sugar to make the bitterness more appealing. My sister asked me recently for a grapefruit half with sugar on, and I could only liken the gritty feeling between soft, juicy flesh, to the horror of having sand in your sandwiches. I don’t know when exactly I lost this childhood joy of adding sugar to fruit, but the sensible grown-up in me cannot think of anything worse than ruining something healthy with a tablespoon heaped with sugar.

A grapefruit, in my opinion, needs nothing more than the skin that houses it; a self-serving bowl. Every morning when I split open the grapefruit, I weigh up which side is biggest. Cutting it straight and evenly is not an art I have mastered yet. I place my chosen half in a bowl not that much bigger than the fruit itself, then begin the meditative act of silently carving out each triangle with a serrated knife. The sun hits the surface of the breakfast bar. The birds are waking up outside. I remember to breathe. I dislodge the first segment with a teaspoon, often standing up – perhaps too excited to even take a seat before I taste it. It is the first thing that passes my lips, waking up my stomach with a zingy ‘hello, good morning.’

The best part, when my endorphins are buzzing from starting my day right, is scraping all the scraps of flesh together, folding the fruit bowl in half and slurping the juice from the fruit itself, like drinking tea from a small cup. The only thing more refreshing than that would be to eat a grapefruit straight from the tree on which it grows.

A few years ago, we moved into our first flat. Flats and homes are often associated with home-baking, something I have never been particularly good at. But, where a grapefruit is involved, I excelled. I loosely followed a vegan lemon drizzle recipe, switching the ‘whole lemon, juiced’, to half a grapefruit, not bothering to change the quantities of anything else (as I said, I am quite the amateur baker). Whilst the heavy liquid bubbled in the oven, I squeezed grapefruit juice into icing sugar, sliced and zested fresh pieces to decorate the sponge with. The dense, tangy but sweet cake was served when my family first visited our flat. It was served again to my in-laws when they came to watch the rugby. My stepdad, a chef, tasted it and was impressed, much more-so than when he tasted the cakes that I made at thirteen that came out rock solid and scone-like. I hid a freshly baked sponge, still warm, under a bowl when my sisters came to visit our new home; there is a Polaroid of us sharing a piece stuck onto our fridge. My family now associate me with grapefruit cake – or grapefruit cake with me.

In years to come, I can envision passing the recipe down to my kids. I can feel the heartbreak when they inevitably don’t like it; sending them to school with a heavy slice, only to find it lumped at the bottom of their lunch box, squashed like a tangerine toe. More family gatherings. Fruitful celebrations. When I am old and may no longer be able to stomach the acidity. My nan is not supposed to eat grapefruit due to the furanocoumarins that interfere with certain medications, in this case for high blood pressure.

I am not interested in a day that doesn’t start by peacefully consuming such a delightful and vibrant fruit. To me they are a symbol of happiness, healthiness and togetherness, as well as bringing to life the important moment in time where I can slow down and be completely alone.

I don’t think any hereditary condition could take that away from me. Whose to say it would, anyway? After all, my nan still eats my grapefruit cake.