It’s small, it’s bumpy. It’s yellow or a pale green. The rind is thick, the inside pulpy.
What is it? Why an etrog, of course. This mysterious citrus is an essential part of Sukkot, one of the “four species” along with palm, myrtle and willow.
The etrog (or ethrog, athrog, esrog or citrus medica) is also one of the “original” citrus fruits, along with pomelos and mandarins. Most of what we know as citrus fruits are hybrids designed by people over many years of cultivation. Your standard orange is the result of years of breeding, basically a hybrid of a mandarin and pomelo. But an etrog is unsullied by science.
Etrogs come from Asia, like all the original citrus fruits, yet somehow the etrog became a ritual object in a Middle Eastern religion. According to Sefaria, the original Torah text on Sukkot obligations doesn’t say anything specifically about an etrog, but rather mentions the fruit of the “hadar” tree, meaning beautiful. In defining just what was meant by a beautiful tree, the rabbis tried a few different answers but eventually settled on an etrog, meaning that generations of Jewish people in the diaspora must now answer the question of where to get one.
For Bay Area Jews in 1941, the answer was Fresno.
As we wrote at the time, “The Temple Beth Israel at Fresno provides a constant source of interest not only to the temple congregation but to the entire community at large because of the exotic etrog tree growing on the grounds of the building. The etrog, resembling a citron, is said to be the only plant of its kind thriving in the United States, according to Rabbi David L. Greenberg, religious leader of the temple. It was brought here as a cutting from Palestine by the late Mrs. Rose Haitler and planted in 1923.”
California has actually always been a good-ish place for etrogs, according to our paper. We mentioned in 1916 about California that here “nature is so abundant; where even the lulab and ethrog [sic] will grow with little coaxing.” In 1942, we ran a news piece on the Brits importing etrogs from California: “These articles, formerly imported by the United States, have been grown in Cuba and California since the war in quantities which, it is hoped, will be sufficient to supply the needs of British as well as American Jewry.”
In a 1985 article, Peggy Isaak Gluck discussed a private etrog garden in Novato, while in 1999 Sue Fishkoff reported on the frost that devastated that year’s California etrog crop at the only large-scale farm in the U.S.
John Kirkpatrick’s “two acres of etrogim, about 250 trees, stand blackened and dead in the field,” she wrote. “‘Of all the citrus fruits, the etrog is the most susceptible to injury from frost,’ explained Kirkpatrick, a 68-year-old, church-going Presbyterian from the small agricultural community of Exeter.”
If you can’t stop by the Fresno of 80-odd years ago, how about ordering one online? In 2002, we recommended lots of online etrog resources, including a website that told you how to pick a good one (kosher etrogs have a whole set of rules): “For example, the shape of an etrog should preferably be like a tower, wider at the bottom and narrow at the top, and even a small black dot on the upper part can invalidate it,” we pointed out.
These days it’s easier than ever to source an etrog. Congregations often sell them, Chabad centers offer them — you can even get one on Amazon.
But once the holiday is over, what do you do with this special, if somewhat unattractive and inedible fruit? In 2003 reporter Alix Wall talked to Vicky Kelman, director of family education at the S.F.-based Bureau of Jewish Education, who had some suggestions.
“Collect a few etrogim and make etrog jelly,” Kelman told us. “You can use a marmalade recipe. Turn your etrog into spices for Havdallah. Use a nail to make rows of holes about a 1/4 inch apart the long way along the etrog and put a whole clove in each hole. The 1/4-inch spacing leaves room for the etrog to shrink, which it will, as it dries. Plant etrog seeds and try to grow your own tree.”
According to 1st-century CE Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder, etrogs are quite healthy: “Citrons, either the pulp of them or the pips, are taken in wine as an antidote to poisons. A decoction of citrons, or the juice extracted from them, is used as a gargle to impart sweetness to the breath. The pips of this fruit are recommended for pregnant women to chew when affected with qualmishness. Citrons are good, also, for a weak stomach, but it is not easy to eat them except with vinegar.”
An alternative to vinegar would be this 2006 recipe by Rebecca Ets-Hokin, who suggests infusing your etrog into vodka.
Ingredients:
- 1 etrog
- 3 cups vodka
- 1 ½ cups sugar
“Peel the etrog and place the peels in a large container with the vodka and the sugar. Stir well to dissolve the sugar, and allow the mixture to sit in a cool, dark place for at least 1 week. Stir and strain out the peels before drinking.”
Having drunk some of that delicious etrog vodka, I’d like to end this exploration of the world of citrons with an apocryphal tale from 1957 that ran in our pages during Sukkot of that year, penned by Rabbi Saul White of San Francisco’s Congregation Beth Sholom.
“They tell a tale of a widow who sustained herself and her children partly by the sale of Ethrogim, for Succoth, who came to the rabbi with a loud complaint that he was ruining her livelihood, since when called upon to judge her Ethrogim he declared them to be of poor quality.
“The rabbi compassionately answered the woman that he could not lie about the Ethrogim, they were an inferior brand, but to save the day he recommended that when she next sold an Ethrog she give the would-be purchaser two Ethrogim to show the rabbi — which she did.
“The rabbi when asked for an opinion said to the faithful, this Ethrog is so much nicer than the other. The day was saved for the widow, and the honesty of the rabbi was preserved.”