Instructions: "Kin ku" meaning golden orange became "kumquat" after Robert Fortune, a collector of plants for the London Horticultural Society, Anglicized the Chinese when he brought back kumquat clippings from China to England in

Look also for hybrids: lime quats, lemon quats, orange quats, and calamondin (kumquats crossed with mandarin oranges).

Buy kumquats that are bright orange. The peel should be consistent in color, the texture should be quite firm (think lemon firmness) and they should appear glossy.

Storage: Kumquats are more perishable than other citrus because of their thin skins. They should keep for about five days at room temperature or about three weeks in the fridge.

Cooking with kumquats: If you are putting kumquats, uncooked, into fruit or green salads, wash them (and your hands) and roll them gently between your fingers before adding. This releases some of the kumquats essential oils and thus releases some of the wonderful somewhat acidic flavor into the menu item. Kumquats can be added to stuffings, rice and couscous, and cake, cookie and muffin batter.

Or they can be used as a flavoring agent for sweet-and-sour sauces. The mighty kumquat can be candied, made into jam or marmalade, poached in syrup or preserved in liqueur.

Try slicing kumquats (thatll improve your manual dexterity) and adding them to poultry, game, lamb or seafood dishes. Not only will you be adding flavor and color, youll be adding vitamin C and potassium.

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