citrus

Citrus Family Drama: Meet the Original Citrus Fruits

By Erin Mittelstaedt on March 19, 2025

For the last few months, our team has been working with fruit experts at the University of California, Riverside to create a Citrus Family Tree. It turns out the oranges, grapefruits, and tangelos we …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, seasonal fruit

Market Update: How 2024 Hurricanes Impacted Fresh Citrus Fruits

By Lex Flamm on March 14, 2025

In the fall of 2024, back-to-back hurricanes Helene and Milton made landfall in Florida and tore through its orchards of fresh citrus fruits. High winds stripped trees of their leaves, knocked oranges …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm

Where Do Citrus Fruits Come From? Check the Family Tree!

By Lex Flamm on March 7, 2025

Our team at The FruitGuys is chock–full of fruit experts. We can talk your ear off about Ojai Pixie tangerines, wax eloquent about the difference between a mandarin and an orange, and discourse for …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, winter fruit

March Produce Update: What to Expect in Your Fresh Fruit Delivery

By Erin Mittelstaedt on March 5, 2025

We’re still a few weeks away from the vernal equinox (the official beginning of spring), but in California, it's starting to feel like a new season. The hills in San Francisco are finally green again …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, seasonal fruit

Ojai Pixie Tangerines: An Epic Crop Is on the Way!

By Lex Flamm on March 5, 2025

When The FruitGuys called farmer Emily Ayala of Friend’s Ranches on February 20, her team was gearing up to harvest an enormous crop of Ojai Pixie tangerines. “It’s more than twice as big as last …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm, fresh fruit

The Surprising Health Benefits of Eating Fresh Fruit Daily

By Erin Mittelstaedt on February 26, 2025

When people find out that I work for a fruit company, their next question is often, “So what are the health benefits of fruit, really?” It’s easy to talk about the physical benefits: Fruit boosts our …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, health benefits, healthy office

Kings River Packing: This Fresh Fruit Farm Made Orange History

By Lex Flamm on January 31, 2025

Drive through Fresno County, California, and your wheels will kick up dust onto row after row of orange trees bearing bright green leaves and glowing fruit. There are more than 19,500 acres of them …

Filed Under: Profiles Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm, fresh fruit

Healthy Habits in the Workplace for Cold and Flu Season

By Harrison Berry on January 24, 2025

It usually starts with a sore throat. Cue the runny nose and a cough. Is it the flu, or just a cold? Tens of millions of Americans fall sick with one, the other, or both annually and spend days in …

Filed Under: Health and Fitness Tagged With: citrus, employee wellness, healthy office, workplace wellness

Good Fortune Fruit: Lucky Picks for Lunar New Year

By Jonanna Widner on January 23, 2025

For centuries, fruit has played a central role in Lunar New Year celebrations in China and other Asian countries. According to a recent Time article: Since at least the Qing dynasty, Chinese …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, tropical fruit, winter fruit

Should We Rename Fresh Blood Oranges?

By Lex Flamm on January 10, 2025

In 2023, a post circulating on the social media platform Reddit kicked off intense citrus discourse. The photo, captioned “Raspberry Oranges,” showed a peeled orange with flesh so dark red it was …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: california farms, citrus, fresh fruit, fruit delivery

Meet Your Finger Lime Farmer: Megan Shanley Warren

By Lex Flamm on December 20, 2024

“Farming is scary. Farming is beautiful. You get your crop and you get to enjoy it and see other people enjoy it. And farming is extremely unpredictable.” Scary, beautiful, and unpredictable—that’s …

Filed Under: Profiles Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm, fresh fruit, small farms

Tasting the Seasons: Apples, Pears, and the Art of Ripening

By Erin Mittelstaedt on September 18, 2024

My youngest son took a bite of an apple the other day and scrunched his face like he had just sucked on a sour candy. Being only three, he opened his mouth, stuck out his tongue, and dropped the piece …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, fruit delivery

Goodbye Valencias, Hello Navels! A Quick Orange Update

By Erin Mittelstaedt on September 11, 2024

Why did the orange stop? It ran out of juice! Bad toddler jokes aside, our supply of Valencia oranges really is slowing down. We source Valencias for our boxes from late spring through summer, …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, fruit delivery

Easy Mango-Orange Fruit Popsicles

By Stephanie Araujo on July 19, 2024

I live in New York City where the summers are very hot and humid, so my top priority is finding ways to cool off. When I was a kid, my family stayed cool during 90-degree days by heading to the park …

Filed Under: Recipes Tagged With: citrus, fresh fruit, New York

My New Favorite Kumquat Mocktail Recipe

By Erin Mittelstaedt on May 1, 2024

Last week, FruitGuys staff had the pleasure of participating in nearly a dozen different Earth Day events across the country. We brought a dancing banana man to an office lobby, ran a local honey …

Filed Under: Chief Banana Tagged With: citrus, healthy office, sustainability

Farmer of the Month: Emily Ayala of Friend’s Ranches

By Lex Flamm on March 11, 2024

Emily Ayala’s voice is both exhausted and euphoric. “We’re starting the harvest of Ojai Pixies today!” she told The FruitGuys over Zoom on Feb. 28, grinning into the camera. “I’ve been up since …

Filed Under: Profiles Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm, farmer of the month

Farmer of the Month: Bianca Kaprielian of Fruit World

By Lex Flamm on February 23, 2024

At 9 a.m. on February 3, 2024, swimmers lined up on the shore of the San Francisco Bay. The chilly water beckoned, droplets leaping up and causing shivers. Then — splash! They dove in and surged …

Filed Under: Profiles Tagged With: California, citrus, farmer of the month, farmers, small farms

Farmer of the Month: Vince Bernard of Bernard Ranch

By Lex Flamm on January 30, 2024

It can be tough to get a farmer on the phone during their busiest season. But when The FruitGuys called Vince Bernard of Bernard Ranch to check in on how his family farm in Riverside, CA, was doing, …

Filed Under: Profiles Tagged With: California, citrus, family farm, farmer of the month, sustainable farming

Winter Citrus Guide

By Pia Hinckle on December 8, 2023

Winter is the peak of the citrus season. Officially beginning on the winter solstice (December 21), the bright shades of orange, red, pink, yellow and green of citrus add brightness and light to the …

Filed Under: Fruit Tips Tagged With: citrus

How to Dry Orange Slices: A Step-by-Step Holiday Guide

By Lex Flamm on November 24, 2023

It’s citrus season! As we write this, thousands of navel oranges, mandarins, and lemons are ripening to their brightest and most beautiful colors, begging to be picked. One of our favorite ways to …

Filed Under: Recipes Tagged With: citrus, sustainability