When life gives you lemons...

You make lemonade, as the old saying goes. But what happens when life gives you a lot of lemons? We're getting lots of spring plants in right now but I thought for this post I might focus on a few of our own individual projects.

For the past two years we've been nurturing a couple of lemon trees and a key lime tree in the greenhouse. We weren't sure how well they were going to do in the upstate NY climate but I'm happy to say that we now have lemons!

There have been mini-tragedies along the way. (Last year we accidentally froze one of the plants-but thankfully it came back after we cut it way back). But other than that it has been relatively painless. We put the trees outside during the summer (after the threat of frost has passed) and then drag them back in for winter.

We have two types of lemons: Meyer and Ponderosa. (The top image shows the Meyer lemons and the bottom one is the Ponderosa tree.) Meyer lemons are famous for their sweet taste while Ponderosa lemons are known for their gigantic size. I'm talking bigger than a softball. Everybody that comes in thinks they're grapefruit.

So far we've made lots of lemonade and used them in dishes like baked fish and roasted chicken. The lemonade made out of the Meyers had a really sweet, unusual flavor. I still have 5 Meyers left so this weekend I'm thinking I'll make a lemon tart or maybe this amazing lemon crepe cake I saw in the most recent Martha Stewart Living magazine. (The recipe isn't available online yet but the link shows you a picture.) I'll let you know how it turns out.