From what I can tell the pink marsh and Duncan varieties aren't red grapefruit and I don't care for the non-red varieties as much. I'll leave the plant in a pot and see what happens I guess. Four Winds Growers says they can tolerate as low as 28 degrees. We get that cold, but not too often. If I just throw a sheet over the plant on nights when it dips below 35 or so will that be good enough? If it stays halfway small I could bring it into the garage every night.

Before I ever heard of Garden Web: 8 pints apricot jam 6 pints apricot preserve 12 half-pints sour cherry jam 14 pints and 14 half-pints strawberry jam 8 pints raspberry jam After I found this discussion board: 3 pints mango chutney 5 pints plum chutney 4 pints plum sauce After I bought Christine Ferber's Book on August 31 and a whole new world opened up to me: 12 half-pints green tomato with cinnamon 24 half-pints blackberry chocolate orange jam 15 half-pints raspberry chocolate jam 15 half-pints Vanilla bosc pear jam with pine nuts and walnuts 12 half-pints peach jam with black rum 5 half-pints peach melba jam 4 pints mango lime marmelade 5 pints plum jam with anise 12 half-pints Anjou Pear jam with Thai spices 5 half-pints spiced peach jam 4 half-pints of rhubarb jam with honey and rosemary 4 half-pints of white nectarine jam with rosemary 5 half-pints of quince jam with ginger 6 half-pints bartlett pear with balsamic vinegar and spices I lay my obsession at the doorstep of anyone who ever mentioned Christine Ferber on this website. I haunt the Farmer's Market. I am trying to get my hands on crabapples even this late to try to make my own pectin. I have made my plans for all the jams I can make in the winter - after all, grapefruit, oranges, mangoes and coconut are never/always in season in Calgary. I bought new wooden spoons to be used only in jam making. I went to Williams Sonoma on my way home from a nasty root canal one day in September and found a hand hammered copper confiture pan, imported from France. I'd never seen such a thing before. It has style and substance. I was feeling mightily sorry for myself, and thus, it now belongs to me. Everyone I know is enabling me, because of course, they will be the recipients of all this bounty. Is there a 12 step program? Anyone?

For instant gratification, you can't beat homemade salad dressings. It will probably take you longer to get the ingredients out on the counter than to actually make a dressing, and it will improve the taste of the salad as much as using a garden-fresh tomato instead of a hydroponic one! Since they're quick, inexpensive and usually keep a long time, it's definitely practical to have several on hand if everybody in your family prefers a different 'flavor'. If you have kids who won't touch a salad, try making ranch with a little less milk or buttermilk than called for so it's thicker. Tell them it's a dip, and even picky eaters can usually be coaxed into trying it with something that's raw and good for them. And I can almost guarantee that the next time you have company for dinner, somebody will say, "Ooh, your dressing is so much better than mine! What brand do you buy?" It's priceless to see the looks on their faces when you say, "Well, actually..." lol Of course, salad dressing is a small item in the grand scheme of things, even though making it should give you a lot of positive reinforcement. Ruthanna made such a good point about identifying the "big offenders" so you won't just be spittin' in the wind in your efforts to eat healthier meals. If you're a working mom juggling an insane schedule, chances are that casseroles are a mainstay, so one of the huge culprits is soup. (Cream of ______, anybody?) Learn to make a white sauce instead, seasoning it with various herbs and spices and adding different cheeses for infinite variety and insanely improved taste! It's easy as can be, I promise. Also, as so many others have said, make your own broth. There are some superb tutorials, with lots of pix, on recipezaar for chicken, vegetable and shrimp stock. (I apologize again for not figuring out links here. Just click on "Communities" at the top of the recipezaar home page, then scroll down to the French Forum.) There was an amazing post here the other day about beef broth. You have to babysit a little since it must simmer for several hours, but the 'hands on' time is minimal, and it's so simple to assemble that a 3rd grader could do it. (Well, maybe a 6th grader, since a knife is involved...) So don't be intimidated when you think "homemade broth"! It's as simple and straightforward as boiling eggs. If you never bought a can of Campbell's again, it would reduce the offending stuff in your diet to an astounding degree. Then there are all those little foil packets. Fajitas, tacos, spaghetti sauce, chili, Hidden Valley ranch dressing mix... Lots of dishes are so simple if you just sprinkle in the stuff in the little foil packet. Not great, but edible. I'm thinking the junk in those little foil packets probably is about the unhealthiest stuff you buy. If you use them often, your salt intake is off the charts. The internet is such a wonderful source for recipes for stuff like Creole/Cajun seasonings so you can reduce or eliminate the salt. Here's a recipe I found for a substitute for dry onion soup mix. Haven't tried it yet, but I plan to soon. Lipton Onion Soup Mix Sub 4 t. beef bouillon granules 8 t. dried onion flakes 1 t. onion powder 1/4 t. celery salt Mix well to blend. Can be stored for up to 6 months. Equivalent of 1 envelope dry onion soup mix. With pre-teen or teenaged children, snacks may be the single biggest problem you need to address. There is nothing in the frozen food section you can't do better and cheaper at home, using far less sodium and preservatives. But there's a big trade-off of taste vs. time. Maybe you could organize a OAMC group of moms, preparing dozens of after-school snacks to be frozen? Or just call your sister and demand that she come over to help? :) The main thing, I think, is to keep a sense of balance. Healthy is wonderful, but all of us must have our "Cheetos" in one form or another. If your family hates one of the substitutes you come up with, give it up. There are other ways to introduce healthy foods that they will enjoy. If your kids are miserable without their Oreos, preach moderation instead of denial.

Patty, i was surprised too for the exact reason you describe. Of course it is possible that the individual tree was less tolerant. It was vigorously (and successfully) roaring back after a bout of root rot a year earlier. I was on Four Winds web site a while back and noticed that on their comparison chart that they list protection temperature for Oroblanco at 32F and Melogold (and their other grapefruit) at 28F. From what i have seen in two northern California locations, the Oroblanco is more fragile than the MeloG. Actually, nearly as fragile to feezes as the Tahitian Pumelo. I say nearly only because the TP was totally killed while the OroB was killed to 1" above the graft. - similar to my PinkL. For Santa Rosa / wine country the frosts and freezes are common and so cold resistance should drive the choice [unless adequate protection is guaranteed]. My best performers in wine country after last December's nasty freeze are (in order) Okitsu Wase Satsumas, Page Orange, Navel oranges, then Orangequats and Fukushu 'quats. My Meyer on Cuban Shaddock was 5 ft. tall, but latent cambium freeze damage set in and now its barely 2 ft - and the CS rootstock split badly. The other Meyer on Macro has been badly whacked (branches split, cambium dead in multiple areas) by the last 4 years of freezes but still produced a couple dozen tasty and juicy cocktail ingredients. The Macro rootstock was not damaged. :-) Below is a picture of the young [Napa] Cocktail in January 2014, about 6 weeks after the bad freeze. It did eventually lose about 50% of its leaves. The OroBlanco 10 feet away (to the right) was killed to 1" above the graft!