The particulars
Season
Year-round
Picked
Cut green, shipped by road
Tastes of
Zest, sharp juice, a bitter edge
Field notes
Limes do not grow here, and we will not pretend otherwise. Ours come from a cooperative of small growers in the south of Spain, where the trees stand on terraces above the sea and fruit on and off for most of the year.
They are cut from the tree green and heavy, before the skin turns yellow, and shipped by road rather than air. We buy unwaxed fruit only, since the zest matters as much as the juice, and we take the small, ugly ones the supermarkets decline.
At the shed the limes are zested first, then halved and pressed the same day. Juice and zest go into the nettle infusion at the very end, cold, at three per cent. It is one of only two plants we do not pick ourselves, and the one that makes the nettle taste like a drink instead of a hedgerow.
