chinese grapefruit - 柚子

I brought this big pomelo (also called Chinese grapefruit) 柚子 while shopping in An Dong Asian Market 安東超市. In the past I had varied success of getting a sweet and juicy ones in the US. Very often the flesh has dried out, or just lack in sweetness. I have grew gun shy in taking the risk. Whenever I visit Hong Kong I like to buy one because they are more likely to be consistently good.


That day An Dong has quite a few and they looked quite good. I picked a largest one that is not too light. If they are light in weight the flesh inside may have dried out because the fruit has been stored too long. Pomelo is the largest citric. Pomelo tastes quite similar to pink grapefruit. The taste is quite subdue and I prefer it over grapefruit. The best part of pomelo is it is not messy to peel off the inner skin with your fingers and pick out the flesh. I like the one that is sweet with mild tang.
Pomelo has a very thick outer skin. I score about 1/2" deep with a sharp knife. Fruit vendor in Hong Kong use a slight curved tool made with cow bone to make the peeling very easy. I just use a soup spoon.

this one weights in at about 3 pounds - sitting next to it is a Thai coin that is slightly bigger than US quarter

This pomelo is grown in Texas. Note to self - Texas grows great pomelos.

not having a cow bone peeler i improvise with a spatula

the outer skin - i took this picture a few days later for this post; i am air drying it for to be used to make a chinese dish

the pockets of flesh does not rupture easily and they give the special texture quite unique to pomelo

I have bought 2 of these recently and they were both very juicy and just the right balance of sweetness and tang