Winter

What’s picked in winter

Winter is the high season for citrus and the best time of year to order. The cold nights in the Ribera are exactly what makes oranges and mandarins taste the way they should, and that can’t be imitated in a cold store or hurried along with anything.

The cold, which is what concentrates the sugar

Citrus builds up sugars while it’s on the tree, and the swing in temperature between day and night speeds that up. That’s why an orange picked in January and eaten the same week is nothing like the same variety cut too early or kept for two months: the sugar is where it should be and the acidity has dropped.

Oranges and mandarins, variety by variety

For oranges, Navelina runs to January and Salustiana, the winter juicing orange, comes in during December. From January to March Navel, Navelate and Sanguinelli overlap, and Lane Late starts in February. For mandarins, Clemenules carries on until January, Hernandina fills January and February, and in January Clemenvilla and Ortanique come in, lasting until May. It’s the stretch when most people order the mixed box.

Persimmons bow out

Persimon persimmons finish in December. If you didn’t try them in autumn, the first weeks of winter are the last chance until October the following year.

The winter market garden

December brings the artichoke, the winter vegetable of the Ribera. Alongside it come Chinese cabbage, roasting pumpkin and butternut squash, which bows out in February. It’s all in vegetables.

Keeping fruit in a heated home

It sounds contradictory, but in winter many people keep fruit worse than in summer: a kitchen at 23 degrees with the heating on is worse than a closed balcony at 12. Best is somewhere cool and airy, away from the radiator, not piled up. If you’re short of space, the bottom of the fridge works, but take the pieces out a while before eating them: cold kills half the aroma.

Orders around the holidays

December is the month with the most orders of the year and, at the same time, the one with the most bank holidays. Since we cut to order and delivery takes 24-48 hours, leave some margin if the box needs to arrive on a particular day: a long weekend in between can push the delivery back. If it’s a gift, say so in the order notes.

When to order

Because we cut to order, there’s no stock that sells out by mid-afternoon: either it’s in season or it isn’t. What does change is the quality within the season itself, so if you’re especially fond of something, order it in its good weeks rather than at the end, when it’s already on its way out.

Between cutting, packing the box and the courier leaving, 24-48 hours go by, in mainland Spain and the Balearic Islands. You can put several things in the same delivery: tell us in the order notes how much of each you’d like.