I read about this tip a while ago and completely forgot about it until now....who knew the benefits of the frozen lemon?!
Now we've all heard about the positive effects of lemon juice on the body (drinking a glass of warm water with lemon juice in it every morning aids digestion, balances pH levels in the body, boosts your immune system....the list goes on!) but this tip utilises the whole lemon, not just the juice.
It turns out that lemon peels contain as much as 5 to 10 times more vitamins than the actual lemon juice and lemon peels are also rejuvenators in eradicating toxic elements in the body - and this is the part that we've been throwing out all these years! Now there's only one person I know who actually enjoys eating lemons exactly as they come (yes I'm talking about you Miss Fox!), for the rest of us it's not an idea we immediately warm towards. With this tip though, any worries about munching your way through a pile of lemon peel can be eradicated, all you have to do is freeze your fruit!
Here's what to do....give your lemons a good wash and place the washed lemon in the freezer whole. Once the lemon is frozen, get your grater and shred the WHOLE lemon (peel and all) and you're ready to sprinkle this powdered wonder food on top of your foods!
Now, health benefits aside, you might ask why would you want to shower your food with frozen lemon crumbs? The answer is simple - outside the world of the culinary elite, it's a little known fact that lemons are as crucial a flavour enhancer as salt. While salt is a mainstay in even the worst stocked pantries, lemons are often overlooked. Lee Havlivek, a food writer on www.slate.com recently noted that the best way to use lemons in the kitchen is to use them in, well, everything. She describes how salty and sour flavours work much the same way on the tongue, and both draw out the natural flavours of food. She said,
"Lemons brighten up a tomato sauce and add more complexity to baked goods. They can turn a plain yoghurt into a sauce for pork or chicken and turn an average summer berry pie into a true stunner."
Lemons draw out the natural flavour of produce, making a meal you've eaten a hundred times taste completely different, taking flavour to a new level. Sprinkle the frozen lemon onto your yoghurt in the morning, on your salads, straight into your glass of water! It can be put onto ice cream, salads, soups, cereals, desserts, noodles, spaghetti sauces, rice, fish dishes...the list is endless!
One thing to bear in mind at this point is the importance of using un-waxed lemons for this tip. There's no point freezing your lemons to then sprinkle a mouthful of wax over your salad! You can obviously buy organic lemons that come without the spray on coating of wax that fruit producers tend to spray on the skin of citrus fruits to keep them looking fresh and protecting the skin during transit after harvesting. Although the wax is considered safe for consumption, most people would prefer not to ingest it if possible. But there is an easy way to remove the wax coating if you don't mind doing it yourself (a big thank you to Nigella Lawson for this tip!)
Put the fruit in a colander and pour over water from a recently boiled kettle or rinse the fruit under a hot running tap. Scrub the fruit all over with a stiff brush, such as a vegetable brush, under a cool running tap but try not to use a brush or scrubbing sponge that you use for dishes as this could cause some soap residue to get on to the fruit. Rinse the fruit thoroughly with cold water and leave to dry. Now you're ready to freeze!!
I plan on doing all of this today and embarking on a frozen lemon adventure to see if all this chatter about frozen lemons really is what it's made out to be. Who's with me?!
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