Organic Citrus Seasons
It takes time to wrap your head around the many citrus fruit varieties available organically throughout the year. When are they actually in season? With this guide, you’ll begin building a solid foundation of understanding Homegrown Organic Farms’ organic citrus availability. An important note, our citrus varieties may change as the years go on. Change is never easy but we promise, it is for your benefit! Our growers are always looking for the tastiest, most desirable fruit that you’ll love to bite into. We intend to keep this guide up-to-date as our fields and acreage evolve.
Winter Citrus
Being our largest category, we offer many citrus varieties with availability that spans throughout the year. The type of citrus you’re able to purchase will depend heavily on the time of year. Grab a pen and paper, you’ll want to remember this! Luckily for you, there is an overlap between seasons on certain varieties. This means that even though navels begin in winter, they remain available through the beginning of spring. In reality, seasons are a handy way of categorizing when the fruit will be available, but they’re certainly not bound by them. Let’s begin! Winter citrus includes organic limes, blood oranges, lemons, pummelos, navels, mandarins, grapefruit, and cara caras navels.
Spring Citrus
There are many reasons to love spring and the continuation of, and addition to, our citrus availability is the cherry on top (even though we’re talking about citrus). Spring welcomes organic gold nuggets and valencia navels while many winter favorites continue to be available.
Summer Citrus
Summer is when citrus (both organic and conventional) begin to slow down in order to make way for other categories of fruit (hello, stonefruit). The summer is easy because we know that the staples: organic limes, Valencia oranges, lemons, and grapefruit are readily available. Just be sure to enjoy your freshly squeezed orange juice early in summer because, unfortunately, Valencia oranges have the shortest summer season.
Fall Citrus
Fall is when citrus begins to ramps back up for the year, marking the beginning of organic mandarins and specialty organic pummelos. Also returning this time of year are organic navels! Fall always teases the fabulous availability of winter organic citrus.
The trick is organizing this information in a way that works for you. For some, that may look like simple tables of information while others will enjoy a calendar system or even a spreadsheet! Another great tip is to ignore the fruit you wouldn’t purchase and track only those that you and your family enjoy. The goal is ease. We hope this helps you on this ever-changing organic citrus adventure. Be sure visit our recipes page for inspiration on how to use your seasonal organic citrus!
Join the Homegrown Organic Farms family on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest!