Lemon Tree Very Pretty

If anyone were to ever ask me what the one thing that can always be found in my pantry or refrigerator, the answer would definitely be lemons.  I love them!  As I was admiring my Meyer lemon tree this morning and the number of beautiful yellow globes waiting to sacrifice themselves for my enjoyment, I began wondering what I was going to do with all of them.  So I threw this question out there for my friends, "If life hands you lemons, make...?"  I got the expected answers; lemonade, a picatta dish, limoncello (very expected from this particular friend), furniture polish, wait...what?  Well, he was right.  Besides being delicious in both savory and sweet dishes, lemons have so many other uses that we may not think about.  Need your cutting board cleaned? Rub it with half a lemon and some course salt then rinse.  Sore throat?  Mix lemon juice with some warm water and honey and you've got a soothing fix for it...bourbon optional.  Heck, when I was a teenager here in Florida, we'd rinse our hair with it for a more blonde effect.

My fondness for this sour yet sunny delight started early when I used to just grab a lemon slice and siphon the juice right out of it.  Okay, I'll admit that at times I just did it for effect.  Oh the looks on the faces of the adults around me!  Perhaps they enjoyed the look of my scrunched up little face just as much.  Whatever the motivation, the taste stuck with me and has become one of my favorite ingredients to use in the kitchen.

I think my best bet for using up this particular crop of lemons is to preserve half of them to be used in the future, then use the other half over the upcoming holidays to add a little zip to liven up my recipes.  Preserved lemons are typically found in Moroccan cuisine, but they can be used to stir into tuna or chicken salad, vinaigrette, marinades, stews, etc. and are very easy to make. Here's a quick recipe for you:

Preserved Lemons

• 10-12 lemons, Meyer lemons do best because they are sweeter and the rind is thinner
• 6 lemons for juicing
• kosher coarse salt
• Large glass mason jar

Directions:

Wash and dry 12 lemons. Quarter the lemons, yet leaving the lemon in tact at the stem. Basically, you want to cut, leaving 1/2 inch of the bottom of the lemon uncut.

Sprinkle 1-2 tablespoons of coarse salt inside the lemon and reshape the fruit. Repeat with remaining lemons.
Juice six remainder lemons.
Place about 3 tablespoons kosher salt in the bottom of mason jar. Add a layer of salted lemons, then sprinkle kosher salt, ten another layer of lemon. Repeat until the jar is 3/4 full. Add lemon juice to fill jar, leaving a little space to account for the lemon juice that will come from the salted lemons.
Seal jar and store at room temperature. Place upside down every few days. Allow lemons to remain in jar for about a month before use. Lemons are ready when rind in soft.

They'll keep in the refrigerator for about 6 months.

Always rinse lemons before use.