Nerazakia

The memory of the tangy taste and image of wild orange preserves come instantly to my mind when I eat orange marmalade that I buy from the supermarket. The orange marmalade reminds me of the delicious preserves my mother used to make from wild oranges, which she called nerazakia, so many years ago. The nerazakia were slightly different in texture and composition from the orange marmalade I now get, but the taste is basically the same.

My mother's sister, Katina, lived in Phoenix, Arizona. Thea Katina's property was several acres in size with many citrus trees on it; grapefruit and orange trees. The orange trees were wild, they were not cultivated, and the fruit could not be eaten when ripe. However, the oranges did have a specific use, they were great for making nerazakia, or wild orange preserves. Evidently, nerazakia were a Smyrnaiko delicacy, familiar to anyone who had lived in Asia Minor. They were certainly a favorite of my parents' and my aunt's.

For as many years as I can remember, each season when the fruit ripened on the trees, Thea Katina would send several boxes of the wild oranges to my mother. There were two kinds, the mature, ripened wild orange, and the small, golf-ball sized, unripe green orange. My mother would make preserves from both kinds of oranges, but my favorite preserve was from the large, ripe wild orange.

My mother inevitably looked forward to receiving the wild oranges. She would exclaim with pleasure, "Katina has remembered us again!" However, when I would see the boxes of fruit arrive, I would groan, because I knew I would be a part of the crew that prepared the preserves. The process of cooking the large, ripe wild orange preserves was a tedious one, albeit the results were well worth the effort. First the fruit was rinsed. Then the outside of each orange was scraped against the teeth of a cheese grater to rid the rind of the fruit of the orange color, until the white of the skin showed. This could be a hazardous operation; a person could inadvertently scrape the skin off their fingers! I learned quickly to apply myself as a conscientious and careful worker, to observe carefully what I was doing! Next, the rind was cut in strips, oval in shape, from the top of the orange to the bottom, about a half inch thick at its widest part. Then each piece of rind was rolled up and secured by a toothpick. The meat of the orange was discarded.

The next step was boiling the rolled up pieces of rind in water, nothing else added to the container. They were put in a large pot, and boiled for an hour, the water discarded, and with fresh water in the pot, boiled again for another hour. My mother used to say, "The oranges need to go through two boilings". For the rest of the family, this step was a memorable one, because the scent of the oranges was so overpowering, and unpleasant, the memory and smell lingered in the house and in our noses for many days after.

The final step was in boiling the rinds again, this time with sugar. After that the nerazakia were ready. The toothpick was removed from the preserves. My mother would have clean Mason jars, and fill them with nerazakia. She would easily fill at least twenty jars and place them in the dining room, temporarily, because there was no room to store them in the kitchen. Jars of nerazakia would be placed on the sideboard in the dining room, with the remaining jars placed on the sills of the two windows, even behind the drapes. Now she had the task of determining to whom she would present as gifts the jars of wild orange preserves!

The nerazakia were a big hit with all our friends and neighbors, and even with guests who came to our home, particularly when we celebrated my father's name day, St. Stefan's day, on 2 December 27. In the Greek traditional fashion, my mother would prepare the silver serving tray, placing a hand embroidered doily in the center of it. On it she would place the silver cup that held the spoons, in addition a small silver dish with as many pieces of nerazakia as necessary to accommodate the number of guests, and several glasses of water. The silver cup with the spoons and the silver dish had a special meaning for our family, because they were part of a small bundle of items that our paternal grandmother was able to save when she fled her home from the Turks and became a refugee in 1922 during the Catastrophe of Asia Minor, the burning of Smyrna. She had been found wandering and dazed in the burning city, clutching her precious bundle, by family friends and rescued.

It was our custom, when my sister and I became teenagers, to serve the guests. It was a social responsibility that we took seriously, to serve the older guests first, then the women, and then the men. For us, our father's name day was an important occasion, once every year, we respected the event and behaved accordingly.

Our Greek guests knew it was customary, and the polite thing to do, to take one piece of nerazaki; that was sufficient. However, one afternoon someone who was not Greek came to our home on legal business. As was customary to show hospitality to a stranger, my mother prepared the silver tray with the doily, silver cup and spoons, the silver dish with about five pieces of nerazakia, and a glass of water. My mother instructed me to take the prepared tray and serve our guest. I did. I took the tray into the living room with my mother following me, and offered our guest the refreshments. He smiled at me, profusely thanked my mother, and proceeded to take the silver dish with the five nerazakia off the tray, picked a spoon from the silver cup, and started to eat the preserves. He ate all of them! He was not aware of the fact he was supposed to take just one piece of the preserves! He drank the glass of water, and continued with the business he had come for.

Although I have never learned the technique of preparing and making nerazakia, suffice it to say the preserves the supermarket sells are enough to stir sweet memories for me, from a happy and distant past.

© 2003 by Jennie Constantinides Vlanton

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