[Sca-cooks] Re: Grapefruit...

[david friedman]

someone wrote:

>>Except that grapefruit are not period, O Great One.

and Muiredach responded:

>They aren't???  They weren't growing *anywhere* in our time period?  If
>not, where were they developped?  When?

I read what looked like a very careful piece on the history of citrus
a while back and summarized its conclusions in a post here. I can
repost it if people like (though I expect Stefan has it) but in brief:

Citrus are native to southern Asia and the Malay Archipelago. A fruit
called the pummelo, which is the size of a grapefruit but has a very
much thicker skin, is mentioned in China around 2200 BC. This had
made its way across Asia into the Arab world by the 12th c. AD and
was introduced by Europeans to the West Indies by the 17th century.
The grapefruit is first mentioned  in 1750 from Barbados and is
believed to be a mutation from the pummelo.

Elizabeth/Betty Cook