...Mr. A and I made lemonade!
First I got after the grapefruit sized lemons, I so am not exaggerating, with a zester. Wait, that was the second first. First I scrubbed them with a vegetable brush. (Why isn't it marketed as a fruit brush?) Southern Living's recipe called for a tablespoon of lemon zest.
We saved the seeds from these because my Grannie saved seeds, but also because I thoroughly intend to grow my own grapefruit sized lemons here at The Ponderosa. These were grown just a few miles from here on Madison Highway, so I'm going to search for, hope and pray for, a sweet spot here where citrus will thrive.
Grannie used to sing a little song to me "Gonna Be A Farmer's Wife" and I didn't find that a very appealing prospect, but now, with any luck, *I* might be the farmer. A gal's gotta find something to do after the kiddos fly the coop and the front porch and back deck are full of flowers.
Have you ever seen a contraption like the one upper right? My mother gave this vintage juice squeezer to me from her mother's kitchen collection. Put the fruit segments in the cup, pull the handle down and pour the juice from the spout into the Pyrex measuring cup until it reaches the 1 1/2 cup mark. The recipe called for approximately 13 lemons, but it only took five of these gargantuan lemons to yield that amount.
Mr. A did the squeezin', of the lemons that is, while I boiled a half cup of water, then added the tablespoon of lemon zest plus 1 1/2 cups of sugar, boiling until all the sugar was melted. I poured this mixture into a pitcher, added 7 cups cold water, stirred, and we had us a batch of lemonade that made Mr. A pucker up!
He said it needed more sugar, but no can do! I set it in the refrigerator and once it was shonuff cold, it was quite tolerable to taste, tart-sweet.
I still have aplenty of these luscious lemons, so next stop, lemon bars! Or lemon pound cake with lemon curd. I love anything lemon--except cars and appliances.
Pucker up and kiss the one you love!
Mrs. A
