Orange (Citrus sinensis [L.] Osbeck)

The Indo­nesian term jeruk may equally apply to various citrus fruits (lemon, lime, orange).

Fruit peel (peri­carp); the fruit juice is also a valuable food additive. Candied orange peel (orange succade) is prepared from the thick-skinned bitter orange, a closely related species (see below). Extracts and distillates obtained from orange blossoms play an important rôle in perfume industry. Orange blossom water (neroli water) is an aqueous distillate popular for flavouring sweets and drinks.

Rutaceae (citrus family).

The peel is strongly aromatic, with a pleasant, sweet odour, but a bitter taste. The fruit juice is mild, balanced sweet–sour. Orange blossom water does not resemble ripe oranges much, yet its strong fragrance is very pleasant.

The Sevilla orange, also known as bitter or sour orange, has a diverging taste that is more acidic and also slightly bitter, comparable to grapefruits. See mango for more on sour spices.

The pericarp contains max. 2.5% essential oil (mainly limonene and citral) and several bitter flavone glycos­ides: Neo­hesperidin and naringin, whose sugar component is neo­hesperid­ose, and rutin (see also rue), erio­citrin and hesperidin, whose sugar component is rutinose. Both sugars are di­saccharids of glucose and rhamnose (6-desoxy­mannose).

Furthermore, orange contains the triterpene derivative limonin, which is contains in the plant as a tasteless monolactone. Its slow reaction to a bitter dilactone is the reason why orange juice turns bitter after some time.

Carotenoids are responsible for the orange colour of the fruit skin.

The dark red colour of the so-called blood orange (Citrus sinensis cv. Sanguinelli, Citrus sinensis cv. Moro) is due to pigments of anthocyanin type (delphidin and others). Blood oranges were first grown in Sicily around 1850 from plants imported from China; even today, they are hardly grown on commercial scale elsewhere.

Orange leaves contain an essential oil in which the two terpenoids linalool and β-elemene were found as main constituents.

The essential oil from the flowers (neroli oil; only 0.2%) is of much more complex composition: Linalyl acetate (up to 20%) is the main component, furthermore limonene, several terpene hydrocarbons and terpene alcohols and the terpene ketone jasmone have been identified.

As with most other citrus fruits, the descendance of oranges is not known exactly. Despite the earlier belief that assumed a Chinese origin, it is now generally believed that oranges originate from Northern or North Eastern India.

Most names of orange in European tongues ultimately derive from Sanskrit nagaruka [नागरुक] or naranga [नारंग] which was trans­mitted via Arabic (naranjah [نرنجة]) and Persian (Modern Farsi narenj [نارنج]). The word is, however, not native to Sanskrit, but has been borrowed from some other, unrelated tongue; it has been speculated that the ancient source language belonged to the Austro–Asiatic language family, but another explanation tries to establish a link to a Dravidian root fragrant. Compare Tamil narandam [நரந்தம்] bitter orange, nagarukam [நாகருகம்] sweet orange and nari [நாரி] fragrance.

Some names for orange in modern languages of North India still are very similar to the Sanskrit term, e. g., Hindi and Urdu narangi [नारंगी, نارنگی]. However, the common term for orange in Hindi is santara [सन्तरा].

Ilkas und Ullis Kochecke: Orange (rezkonv.de via archive.org) Ilkas und Ullis Kochecke: Pomeranze (rezkonv.de via archive.org) Chinese Herb Database: Unripe Orange Nature One Health: Sweet Orange chemikalienlexikon.de: Linalool Floridata.com: Sweet Orange University of Florida: Sweet Orange Citrus Online Buch: Die Apfelsine Citrus Online Buch: Die Pomeranze Orange (purdue.edu) Sour orange (purdue.edu) Mandarin orange (purdue.edu) Sorting Citrus names (www.plantnames.unimelb.edu.au) Transport Information Service: Oranges Transport Information Service: Mandarines Transport Information Service: Clementines Recipe: Au Larm (recipes.chef2chef.net) Recept: Au Larm (lekkeroosters.nl) Recipe: Sauce Maltaise (discoversandiego.com) Recipe: Off Tapuzim [עוף תפוזים] (Israeli Orange Chicken) (www.recipehound.com) Recipe: Homemade candied orange or lemon peel (www.vinetreeorchards.com) Recipe: Orange Marmalade (ppewww.ph.gla.ac.uk) Recipe: Sauce Cumberland (www.cooks.com)