I got Kinkan(kumquat).  It’s sweet.  Was it so sweet?  When I was a kid, I remembered the kinkan in the garden of my grandmother’s house.  I often ate kinkan, which grew in clusters, when I found time in the middle of play.  By the way, I buy “Kinkan throat lozenges” at convenience stores.  Kinkan is used not only for the throat but also for antipyretic, coughing and colds in Chinese medicine, and is said to be good for recovery from fatigue and poor circulation.  The skin is sweet and the fleshy part is sour and bitter, so it is a rare fruit that only eats the skin.  Fruits are produced from October to November, but now is the tast season.  It appears in many haiku, including the work of Ryunosuke Akutagawa.  However, in haiku, the fruit is the autumn seasonal word(a seasonal indicator in a haiku, such as the moon for autumn and wild ducks for winter), and the flower is the summer season word, but Kinkan hasn’t the winter season word.

金柑を頂きました。甘いですね。こんなに甘かっかな。子供のころ、祖母の家の庭にできた金柑を思い出しました。鈴なりに成っている金柑を、遊びの暇を見つけてはよく食べたものです。そう言えば、コンビニで「金柑のど飴」は買いますね。金柑は喉だけでなく、漢方では「金橘(きんきつ)」と言って、解熱・咳止や風邪に用いられ、疲労回復や冷え性にも良いとされているそうです。皮が甘くて、肉質部は酸っぱくて苦味があるので、皮だけをたべる珍しい果実です。10月から11月にかけて実ができますが、今頃が旬です。芥川龍之介の作品をはじめ、数多くの俳句にも登場します。しかし、俳句では、果実は秋の季語、そして花は夏の季語ですが、冬の季語ではありません。