Not Sure What’s In Your Fruit Delivery? Try These Detective Tricks

As my youngest son leans over the open fruit box, his face scrunches up. He’s trying to hold one eye shut and use the other to peer through his magnifying glass.

“What are you finding me, love?” I ask.

“Lots of orange juice!” he replies.

He’s in full fruit detective mode, leaning over our family’s box from The FruitGuys and trying to name all of the fruits inside.

What’s Through the Magnifying Glass?

Bananas and apples are easy. The brown fuzzy thing (a kiwi) he’s seen before but can’t name. Then he gets to the “orange juice.” It’s what he calls all of the round, orange fruits because he knows we can make orange juice out of them.

We take all of those orange-colored fruits out of the box and lay them on the table. There are small round ones (several varieties of mandarin oranges), baseball-sized ones (navel oranges), and a few that look like navels from the outside, but aren’t.

Now it’s time for the real sleuthing. My son swaps his magnifying glass for a knife, and we cut each orange fruit in half to get it ready for juicing. The first one looks as expected: It’s a lovely orange color on the inside, and nice and juicy. But when the second one opens, my son looks confused. The inside is pink, not orange!

“This is a Cara Cara orange—one of my favorite citrus fruits,” I explain as he picks it up.

He sniffs it and, before I can stop him, sticks out his tongue and licks it.

“Let’s not put that one in the juice,” I say.

How to Be a Fruit Detective

Whether you’re 5 years old or 50, it can be hard to tell different citrus fruits apart, but there are a few ways to play fruit detective once your mix from The FruitGuys arrives.

Option 1: Use Your Senses

Take a close look at the fruits in your mix. What do you see? Sometimes blood oranges have a deeper red blush to their skin, and you can usually spot Kishu mandarins by their tiny size. But navel oranges, Cara Cara oranges, and even mandarins and tangelos can look very similar.

If you can’t tell them apart from the outside (or get the details on their stickers), you can try to peel them, cut them open, or take a taste and look for clues. Do they peel easily? You may have a mandarin variety on your hands. Are they orange-sized and pink inside? That’s a Cara Cara! Do they have a sweet-tart zing and a bump at the top? Odds are you’ve found a Minneola Tangelo.

Option 2: Check Our Handy Guide

If you’re still in doubt—or just want to tell your coworkers what’s in your office’s mix without a taste-test—you can always check This Week’s Mixes to see exactly what’s in your box.

Whichever option you choose, I hope you enjoy the feeling of discovery!