Chupando Naranjas

Hands down, my kids' favorite Ecuadorian treats are the naranjas. Yes, the oranges. And specifically chupando naranjas, which, translated literally means "sucking oranges". Their orange predilection isn't particularly surprising; all three tend toward fruititarian, and their daily fruit consumption on any given day is impressive. Ecuador is a wonderful place for fruititarians to call home; tropical fruit is abundant, delicious, and more often than not, growing somewhere nearby.

It is the end of orange season in La Josefina; lucky for us, there are actually two orange seasons per year; a new fruiting season will begin in November. The eight or so orange trees on our rental property still boast plenty of delicious oranges from the current season, though most of the edible fruit are way up on the highest spine-filled branches and require acrobatic prowess to get to them. To loop you in on our fun, I will walk you through the process for harvesting and consuming oranges.

First, you have to learn to spot the oranges in the trees. This seems a simple task if you are imagining bright orange navel oranges on groomed green-leaved Floridian trees, but these are not navel oranges, and the trees tend to be tall, spindly moss-filled and pretty good at camouflaging the greenish-yellow fruit that adorn their branches. And they're tall.

Okay, once you've spotted a ripe orange, you have to actually get it down from the tree. This step entails using a very long stick called a gancho -- 9 or 10 feet long -- which has tied upon its end another stick with an upside down "v" or "y" shape at the tip. One person reaches the gancho up over their head semi-blindly, with their neck in full-extension, attempting to hook the orange where it is hanging from the branch with the end of the gancho, while two or three people stand below with a jacket or food sack to soften the fall of the orange to the ground. There is a lot of yelling "Alli, alli!" and "No, mas alla, mas alla!" until the orange is successfully plucked from the tree and, if the standers are decent at their job, it doesn't hit the ground and split open, but rather gently lands in their waiting sack.

Depending on how many oranges you are going for, you must repeat the aforementioned steps multiple times.

Once the orange is in hand, you need either a machete or a knife. And a person who can peel the thin-skinned orange with said device. If done skillfully, it can easily (ha ha) be peeled in one perfect spiral, leaving just the white pith of the orange visible, like an orange sitting in his undies. When done correctly, the white pith has no defects, and the orange juice never leaks a single drop onto your hand or the groud. Per locals, this peeling is essential for two reasons: first, the oranges tend to be mossy and dirt-covered, and no one wants to suck on moss or dirt; second, even if you wash the oranges before consuming, sucking the orange peel commonly causes around-the-mouth irritation. The peeling in a single spiral is a matter of pure honor.

Okay, so picture the orange naked, white pith, perfectly peeled and ready to be sucked. The next step is to use the knife to slice the top off and go for it. Voila! It's simple! But wait, be sure you slice the top in the right orientation and the right level to leave a perfect mouth opening space to eat it. The hat-like top part should be sucked first. When you are ready, the entire orange is now a self-contained cup of freshly squeezable orange juice. You squeeze and suck and squeeze and suck, occasionally spitting out a seed or two, but mostly enjoying the refreshing taste of freshly squeezed orange juice as you walk through the countryside of Ecuador. Yum!

If you are anything like my children AND you have access to kind and talented locals who carry ganchos and knives around, you can easily consume five such oranges in a mere 30 minute walk back from the finca. Five oranges times 8 people. That's a lot of orange juice.

Buen provecho.

PS. Paul is working on his spiral peeling technique and reports that every time he gets it a little better, Brynna gives him a display of love and burst of confidence that makes him confident that one day he will master the trade.

PPS. I always imagined that my kids would fall deeply in love with the mangoes, but it's not mango season . . . yet.

For those botanists out there, this is actually an avocado tree, but the harvesting technique is exactly the same as orange picking

Lucia, our principal orange peeler

Brynna with her "friend" Alice