Grapefruit sugar

My mom grows limes, lemons, grapefruits, and orange in the backyard of our childhood home. I'm always excited when she sends me some of the bounty. Especially when I was living in Indiana, decent citrus fruit was hard to come by altogether, let alone organic citrus fruit. And even living now in California, organic citrus fruits in the markets are still coated in wax to help preserve them for the shelves. So the zest from my mom's organic, unsprayed, and unwaxed citrus fruits is like gold to me. Gold.

But it can be hard to use all the zest up before the fruit goes bad, or before I want to consume its juice or flesh. Dried zest is nothing compared to fresh zest: you lose the fragrance and the delicate oil. Frozen zest also seems to suffer; if it doesn't fall prey to freezer burn, it always manages to pick up some not-so-fragrant freezer odors, no matter how well I wrap it.

But zesting a citrus fruit into a few tablespoons of sugar seems to be the best option. The sugar preserves the grated zest. The zest perfumes the sugar. Although you might sometimes need some citrus zest for a savory dish, this method of preservation will come in handy if you're like me and love to make desserts requiring citrus zest. Moreover, the sugar can be used for tasty cocktails, alcoholic or not, fizzy or still.

Directions

Wash your fruit well. I have seen the recommendation that if you are using fruit that might be coated in wax or sprayed with a pesticide, you should scrub it with warm water and soap. I am leery of the prospect of soap seeping into the fruit's pores, but if you're not plagued with such considerations, or you're desperate, give this a try. Dry the fruit. Using a Microplane zester to grate just the zest from the fruit. Do not grate the white pith underneath the rind, as it is bitter. Mix the zest into a few tablespoons of sugar. I have stored this sugar at room temperature for up to a month without trouble.