Mandarin Orange

A group name for a class of small oranges with thin, easily peeled skin, Citrus reticulata. Tangerine is the most common mandarin found in North America. It was named for the Moroccan seaport of Tangiers. The fruit's nomenclature is often confusing because "tangerine" is often used interchangeably with "mandarin", and all tangerines are mandarins (including the tangelo and the clementine), but not all mandarins are tangerines. They both originated under the same mandarin classification, but as hybrids, tangerines developed darker skins, which, in the end, is their only difference.

Mandarins were named for the color of the robes worn by Chinese mandarins, high-level civic officials. Mandarins have been grown and eaten in China and Japan from very early times. Mediterranean cultures were enjoying them by the middle of the 19th century. They arrived in the U.S. in the 1840s, when the Italian Consul planted them in the Consulate garden in New Orleans.

The first commercial crops were grown in Florida. The most popular tangerine is called Dancy, after an early Florida grower (Colonel G.L. Dancy), who nicknamed the fruit "kid-glove orange", because the rind peeled so easily. Satsuma is a small, Japanese almost-seedless orange. See also clementine, satsuma, tangelo.

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