Thank you all for you guesses and comments in yesterday’s post. While a member of the squash family was the predominant guess, this peculiar looking item is called Buddha’s Fingers and, are you ready? Wait for it.tada, drumroll . . .
. . . it is a lemon.
This citrus fruit originates from China, or at least that is what the online sources indicate. The one I encountered at Whole Foods was from California. It grows on a thorny tree and is mainly used for its zest and its fragrance! Check out the pictures at the website below to see what the inside look like.
They are pretty expensive, but, if you only used them for the zest and needed a lot of lemon zest, I guess they might be worth the cost and you wouldn’t waste the juice.
The young man stocking the produce section told me some lady used them for candle holders. I just shook his hand – Buddha’s, not the employee’s – and went on my merry way, smiling a little at the fun I had shopping and discovering something new while on a brief errand for some organic apples in the middle of a very anxious week.
Have you come across any unusual produce lately?
“…the fun I had shopping and discovering something new while on a brief errand for some organic apples in the middle of a very anxious week.” That’s a Beautiful sentence.
And a lemon like “creature.” What a fun thing to discover. I do miss Whole Foods. It makes shopping an experience.
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Thank you, Teresa.
It is rather like a creature, isn’t it? We have two Whole Foods that are close by – just wish they weren’t so expensive.
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A lemon?! That I would never have guessed, Penny. To a Briton it looks more like a bunch of parsnips which for some reason have grown together 🙂
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It was pretty exotic to me when I saw it, Perpetua. I had fun trying to figure it out and the young man impressed me. Does look a bit like mutant parsnips, now that you mention it.
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Pardon?
A lemon? It looks like one of those creatures that inhabit deep oceans! I would hazard it has its own light source!
Well, I learned something new, Penny. A Chinese delicacy: who’d have thought it?
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Ha! A sci-fi sort of thing I suppose.
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Somehow I missed yesterday’s post, but at first blush, I would have put this into the “pepper” family . . . some mutant version of banana peppers? ? ?
But then I MIGHT have remembered an episode on Food Network (I think it was on “Chopped”) when the competing chefs pulled these from their baskets as of one the ingredients to be included in a specific type of dish (and I doubt it was a dessert) . . . They are certainly one of those lessons to those of us in small places; we who never see the “exotics” on our produce counters! 🙂
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That’s an interesting guess, Karen.
I wish I’d seen that on “Chopped” and how they were used. These lemons are very expensive, at least in the midwest. I think it was at least $10 for just one when I saw it. Too rich for this gal’s budget, though it is fun to come upon such “exotics”.
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Well, I certainly got my punctuation and my words a bit twisted in that comment! Guess my meaning is clear enough w/o correction, but gads!!!
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Clear enough – especially for Buddha’s fingers!
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Wow! I’ve never seen anything remotely like it! Or heard of this! What a great challenge, though, to take a look around the produce section and see what else may be a stand-out! Have a wonderful weekend, Penny! Hope you find some more signs of spring! 🙂 Debra
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It certainly caught my eye, Debra. It is such fun to find such things when we least expect to, isn’t it? It was way too expensive for me to justify buying it, but, had fun in the discovery just the same. You too! We’re planning a walk in the woods a bit later. Who knows what we’ll see?
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Shows where my memory is….if you posted before about it, I probably said the same thing and didn’t remember the correct answer, would never have thought it would be a lemon. Thanks for refreshing my memory…
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Hehehehe. I thought you either forgot, or were just playing along with the game – and doing a very good job. Let’s go with that as we both know how my memory needs refreshing as well, Sharon. Funny thing is that I’ve never seen one at that Whole Foods since then.
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Amazing! I have never seen a lemon that looks like that! I loved hearing about your garden tour on your recent comment on my blog. What a nice event that will be! Our garden tour raises funds to restore and maintain the historic property of Robinson Gardens which dates back one hundred years. Like you, I love gardens and enjoy working on this event.
Have a wonderful weekend!
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Isn’t it different? Our event is quite lovely, Sunday, as I’m sure yours is. I did click on to the Robinson Gardens. Oh my. How beautiful. A worthy beneficiary of all the hard work that goes into your event. Enjoy working on it and then the end result.
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Well, I guessed carrot, so I was waaaaaaay off. 🙂 I’ll have to run over to Whole Foods and see if we have any of these here. It looks too fascinating to not try to see up close.
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Let us know if you find one, Andra. They are much bigger than the lemons one normally sees and so interesting to see and touch.
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Dear Penny,
Astounding! Every day I learn and see new things. That’s the wonder of life, isn’t it?
“To see the world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wildflower.
To hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour.”
That’s what William Blake said over two centuries ago and he was so right.
Peace.
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Oh, indeed Dee, learning new things is a wonder and that is such a fitting quote. I will copy Blake’s words to my personal book of quotes. Thank you.
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I would never have guessed that in a million years. I went back and read yesterday’s repost first since I hadn’t read it and I wondered what ideas others had. Very interesting. I wonder if it actually tastes like the lemon we are used to? No Whole Foods within a hundred miles of us so I don’t see offerings like these.
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I think that it doesn’t taste like much, but that the zest is stronger and more flavorful. One hundred miles would be quite a distance to roam, Joyce, just for a look at a lemon. I take for granted some of these stores we have close by and need to be more mindful that not everyone has such things nearby.
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It is such fun to see them though! And to learn what is “out there”
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I love lemon tart and you could make quite a few out of that! Fascinating post. (I also loved your Davy Jones post)
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Quite a few, Nicola. It is rather large for a lemon – and now you have me craving lemon tarts. Thank you.
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Well, I go off line for a few days and just look what you get up to! What a strange and wonderful plant, and I never would have guessed what it was.
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Isn’t it fun, Juliet? I read that it is also used for its scent, though I couldn’t justify floating one in tub just for the scent. tee hee
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I never would have guessed a lemon although after you said that, I looked closely and the peeling looked sort of lemony. Well, I did some research yesterday and I learned a lot about different kinds of squash. Tee hee….So, I learned what a Buddha’s fingers looks like and I learned about many kinds of squash.
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Haha! Everything you wanted to know about squash, but were afraid to ask. Oh, I get silly sometimes . . . When I held it and after the employee said what it was, it did feel like the peel of a lemon, but, even with it in my hands, I couldn’t guess what it was, Janet. Hope you had fun in your research.
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Oh my goodness! That is astonishing, Penny. We are never too old to learn something new are we!
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Isn’t it a grand thing to learn new things even at our age, Joan? Awakens the inner child in me. The internet opens up so many more avenues (not that I’ll be buying this lemon, however).
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Back in the days before produce had scannable stickers, I more than once went to the check out stand with a new kind of produce to try and had the checker say “what is this anyway?” … it was embarrassing if I didn’t remember!
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Ha! I’ve had that happen as well, Sallie, but, the scannable stickers really got me in trouble a few years ago with a melon. I posted about it it was so embarrassingly funny. The scanner wasn’t reading the label correctly, the clerk was no help, and I ended up running up about $2,000 worth of melon. The clerk was so mad. He said it would take an hour to correct it. I’ve never scanned produce since. tee hee
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I was really surprised to read that this was in the lemon family! When I look at it all I can think of is the “Davy Jones” character from “Pirates of the Carribean” – warning, this isn’t the cute Davy Jones you wrote about a few posts back!
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://images.wikia.com/disneyvillains/images/e/ea/Davyjones.jpg&imgrefurl=http://disneyvillains.wikia.com/wiki/Davy_Jones&h=240&w=360&sz=16&tbnid=ehUGyrOqAJfO4M:&tbnh=81&tbnw=121&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dpirates%2Bof%2Bthe%2Bcarribean%2Bdavy%2Bjones%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=pirates+of+the+carribean+davy+jones&hl=en&usg=__U63Glc7cMVZ4Efk_eTzA1_MOuRo=&sa=X&ei=Di1mT92tA8LLgQec7YTyAg&ved=0CCEQ9QEwBQ
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Isn’t it amazing? That’s so funny, Janet. Between the bird’s skull and another Davy Jones . . . Thanks, and yes, it is amazing that two and a half years of blogging have passed.
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