A Yuzu by any other name...

I'm in love with the yuzu (ユズ, 柚, 柚子). One of the most distinctly Japanese of fruits, it is commonly grown in Japan and used in much of Japanese cooking (teas, flavoured shoyu, garnishes on food, salad dressing, as traditional perfume, as a bath during winter etc.)

Yuzu is a fruit associated with winter (to bear in mind when/if writing haikus*: yuzu on the ground/the snow is falling fast, and/i mull over tea.) and has also soothing and medicinal properties for colds and flus (one reason probably on its popularity in winter). The peel, juice and pulp are all used to make drink/food.

Anyway, getting to the seed of the matter: I came back from Tokyo recently raving about Yuzu only to be asked multiple times on what yuzu is. Not knowing the equivalent English translation of yuzu (and convinced that there wasn't one), I described as, "A Japanese citrusy fruit that tastes zingy, kind of like a Mandarin orange but not really exactly a Mandarin orange, and you make it into drinks, flavour all kinds of foods, even perfume... (giving up) it's just Yuzu LA!" Obviously friends assumed that what I meant to say was "Mandarin orange" and continued to pester me to prove my case, or improve my description.

It was not only until the famous, trusted worldwide and accepted in over 140 countries internationally Wikipedia came to my rescue today. Yuzu is a different species of citrus (Citrus aurantium, formerly C. junos) than the Mandarin orange (Citrus reticulata) although it has (and I quoth) "overtones of Mandarin orange but it is rarely eaten as a fruit".

So, I hate to say this but I love being proven right (and proven also to be an anal-retentive, detailed-oriented b***h armed with a photographic memory). But Wikipedia really does have a very comprehensive (tic) analysis of Yuzu vs. Mandarin Orange to check out. I'm also armed with a huge bottle of yuzu jam that some swear to taste like marmalade.

I leave Japan of course with a highly ratified view that the country like their fruit, language and people, is distinctly unique, full of richness, flavour and sensitivity, and possessing so delicate a sense of balance and taste it is unsurpassed by many other cultures in the world.

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I have also discovered by accident that if deprived of yuzu in Europe and Singapore, Bunalun's Vodka Lime Marmalade tastes (even dissolved in water as a drink) remarkably like yuzu - and, if consumed in adequate proportions, may even give you a certain buzz that yuzu alone may not provide...


* Side note on haikus: it is a rule that haikus must contain an indication of the seasons, eg: yuzus in the winter, frogs on ponds in spring, rainy seasons in summer, falling leaves in autumn... that type of thing.