‘Jersey Royals are easy-peelers and I don’t fancy one in my stocking,’ said my husband, lapsing into sense.
I had been complaining about supermarkets labelling all little orange citrus fruits ‘easy-peelers’. We have called oranges oranges since the 14th century. The bitter orange became known as the Seville orange. Both Thomas Nashe and Shakespeare joked at the end of the 16th century about being civil like an orange.
In contrast, the sweet kind was known as a China orange. Pepys was pleased to get hold of some China oranges in March 1666, but by the days of the racehorse Eclipse (foaled during the solar eclipse of 1764 and living till 1789), this fruit came proverbially in betting terms to stand for something of small worth, as in ‘All Lombard Street to a China orange’. I don’t think anyone says that now, though they might recognise the saying.
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