Why doesn't citrus fruit from the grocery store taste as sweet these days?

Why doesn’t my citrus fruit from the grocery store taste as sweet as it did years ago?

It’s not your imagination!  There IS a difference between most retail fruit and how sweet  you remember the fruit was in the by-gone days.  It’s called  “Tree-Ripe”.  It seems like a no-brainer, right? They look ripe?  Nice and shiny and bright? Sometimes they even look “flawless”, just like a magazine ad? Have your taste buds changed? Is it just the charm of the childhood memory?

That’s not it.  In a world where we mechanize and diversify and work back in the grocery “supply chain”, the longer it takes for fruit to make it from the tree in the grove to your table.  Much of the non-local citrus fruit left the tree as long as a month before it is purchased (and it may not even have been quite ripe when it was picked). It has been cycled from the field bins it was picked in to a commercial packing line, where it is mechanically washed, sanitized, chemically treated for color and waxed for preservation, then stored in coolers for days, weeks, sometimes even up to a month.  It is kept cool by refrigeration all along the way, to the time we purchase from the grocery bin. 

We pride ourselves on our excellent standards for food safety.  We are blessed with some of the most efficient means of food distribution in the world. We have the means to feed our cities by mass production from the groves to the bin at the grocery stores, all at the most affordable prices in the world.  We should never forget how our country is the foremost in the world in feeding our people. 

Those sweet satsumas and other Florida citrus fruit? The local produce is still there, but it’s not so easy to come by if you don’t live in rural America or you have no local produce stands in your town.

At Tangerine Dreams Grove, we work to make it possible, for a few weeks every year, to get for ourselves and family gifting, Florida satsuma tangerines that taste just like you remember.  To make those memories a reality again for the Christmas season. We ship tree-ripe fruit, hand picked and packed for shipping within two days of the time it left the tree, then delivered to your family within a few more days by U.S. mail.  Every Christmas Season!  Beautifully boxed for shipping as gifts, for the holiday table or simply enjoying this time-honored tradition from a box under your Christmas tree.  Enjoy!