CITRUS PARADISI

GRAPEFRUIT

Family: Rutaceae
Common name: Grapefruit, pomelo
Origin: Asian origin. Apparently, it is a mutation given from the citrus maxima and the citrus sinensis
Etymology: The word is a combination of Citrus (from the Greek) meaning lemon and Paradisi referred to paradise, for its fruit.
Minimum Temperature: -3º C

Grapefruit, also called pink grapefruit, is the fruit of a tree from the Rutaceae family, cultivated for its fruit. It is a hybrid, probably obtained spontaneously between Shaddock (Citrus maxima) and sweet orange (Citrus sinensis) in some Caribbean Sea plantations during the seventeenth century.

The grapefruit tree is the most vigorous of the citrus trees. This kind of tree reaches enough volume and has a rounded crown. Like all citrus trees, grapefruit varieties have the dual consideration of productive and ornamental tree.

Grapefruit contains 88% water, carbohydrates and it is low in fibre. It is excellent for weight-loss diets, mainly due to the citric acid that it contains. Eating a grapefruit or drinking grapefruit juice can even help you to burn fat from your body, and therefore to make you lose weight. For the grapefruit diet you need to eat several grapefruits a day.