Around the second week of January I bought a 2 kg bag of Navelina navel oranges in a store. Soon after I left for a 4-week trip and left the remaining 1 kg in the vegetable compartment of my fridge. They were of excellent quality, thin skin, very juicy and good sugar content. Quite my favourite things as far as oranges go. They had the typical somewhat ovate Navelina shape with a distinct protruding navel.

After my return I took an orange one evening and ate it while watching TV. I did not look at it before putting a slice in my mouth and I said to myself "Funny, I don't remember buying blood oranges". I went back to the fridge and took out the bag and it said Navelinas from Spain. But here's the funny thing. During the four weeks in the fridge they had developed pigment in the skin on the under side of each fruit as they lay in the vege compartment where the temperature is around 6-8 C. You would not see the pigment by looking at them in the fridge. But after taking one out and turning the fruit around you could see the clear dark red colour. There was no real blood pigment in the fruit. The colour had turned slightly reddish orange with small red spots here and there, less than in a semi-blood orange. But the taste was definitely blood orange.

Any comments?