How do you eat your orange?

Winter; time for loads of vitamin C. Kiwi’s, clementines, mandarins, oranges, clemenvillas, grapefruit, pomelo’s; each asking for their own way of eating. To practice working with the Schmincke paints some more, I used some oranges, cut in all the different ways I eat them.

When in a hurry, I roll an orange under my foot, cut a hole in the top and suck the juice loudly and slurpingly, until the opening cracks and forces you to tear it open completely and attack the remaining flesh with your teeth. Aftwards you have to lock yourself in the batroom with lengths of floss and a stack of toothpicks. I struggled with this sketch and I can’t even blame it on the paint…pure lack of skill! I can’t get away from having it look like a chamber pot. Done in pencil, pen and Schmincke WC and still using my handmade sketchbook from Marta.

An orange cut into quarters takes me back to my netball years, when a tray of orange quarters were passed around during halftime. I always played goal attack, which allowed me three quarters of the court to run and also shooting goals. Man, I was good!…except for those days when my goal shooting failed… Done in pencil, pen and Yarka WC in my handmade sketchbook.

My mother always peeled the orange with her sharp little knife and with me on her lap, she would cut round slices from the top…one for me, one for her, one for me… We would have a go at about four to six oranges this way. Hartman also peels an orange and when I move closer with some puppy-eyes, he might just hand me some broken off segments. Done in pencil, pen and Yarka WC in my handmade sketchbook.

And lastly, when I’m fancy and making a salad or dessert, I’ll cut them with my big knife – first slice off both top and bottom, then place the orange on one cut side and slice the peel off from top to bottom by following the contour of the orange, turning it after each slice, making sure that you also slice off all the white pith. Take the peeled orange in your left hand and cut out each segment between the “skins”. Messy, but pretty. Done in pencil, pen and W&N WC in my handmade sketchbook.

EDIT: I received this comment from Desiree and want to share it with you:

“I used to roll them and suck out the juice too. When my kids were little I even had a contraption that fit inside the hole and was a straw to make it easier. I have eaten oranges in so many ways but there was this one time. It was after work, I was tired and hungry and all of us piled onto the train that took us home faster, passing all the traffic on the freeway. As I sat just zoning, being lulled into a commuter trance there was a women in the seat across from me, eating an orange. I found it really interesting, her style of eating this orange. It was cut into neat segments with the skin attached. She carefully ate the orange flesh and then proceeded to eat all of the white part next to the skin. She first nibbled at it then dragged it across her bottom teeth until the orange skin was the only thing left. It was so thin, it was almost transparent. She was neat, very careful but determined to not let one bit of that orange go to waste. She made me so hungry for an orange. I always eat the white part now, she made it look too good to pass up. This is also a good lesson on “We don’t really know all the people we influence!”

…So, how do you eat your orange?

18 thoughts on “How do you eat your orange?”

FABULOUS JOB! I don’t know which I LOVE BEST — all of them!!!!! I SO LOVE YOUR PAINTERLY STYLE, RONELL!

Love, love, love these!

These are great! I love the thought process; funny oranges are one of the few things that we eat raw so many different ways. The looseness of your paintings are so fluid also, beautiful!

Your oranges are dripping all over my laptop! so juicy and beautiful!!

my mum used to peel each section and give them to us as kids. i havent enjoyed oranges, as much, since i left home 😀 all three look wonderful.

Beautiful intense color – and the drawings are wonderful.

Lately, I’ve been eating Satsuma Tangelos instead of oranges – easier to peel and faster to eat! but your paintings make me crave a good old-fashioned orange. Your paintings are simply gorgeous. I love the one cut in quarters – especially that little bit sticking out of the one on the right, like a feather in a cap – and the circles like flowers in the one peeled like your mom used to do. Love the way the rich blue and orange vibrate – such passionate color – it’s beautiful.

Beautiful , beautful colors as always Ronell.

I never really put a lot of thought into this before.
But now that I do, I have to say I peel the same way my grandmother does. Scoring the orange w/ a knife then peeeling off the skin. It brings back great memories of our breakfasts. Thanks!!

These are just gorgeous. I love the intensity of the colors, they look so juicy and brilliant.

So good, Ronell! Very nice work! …And I eat my orange as you described it in the last picture!,-))

Great post. I cut an orange into quarters and then loudly such at and eat each quarter…..

I love your artwork. I ate one of those cuties today – it’s like a tiny tangerine. It was delicious. Very cool site.

I never thought much about how I eat them, but now that you ask I have to say that I just peel them and eat the wedges. I really think that rolling them and sucking the juice sounds much more enjoyable though. I have lots of floss so I will give it a try.
Wonderful paintings, but my fave is the second one.

How I love your stories! This little adventure in eating and painting oranges is so charming. And my favorite color pairing is orange and blue, so this post is a double treat for me!

Oh I love your blog, and your writing and your sketches! You make me laugh and think about silly stuff, like how do I eat oranges. I used to roll them and suck out the juice too. When my kids were little I even had a contraption that fit inside the hole and was a straw to make it easier. I have eaten oranges in so many ways but there was this one time. It was after work, I was tired and hungry and all of us piled onto the train that took us home faster, passing all the traffic on the freeway. As I sat just zoning, being lulled into a commuter trance there was a women in the seat across from me, eating an orange. I found it really interesting, her style of eating this orange. It was cut into neat segments with the skin attached. She carefully ate the orange flesh and then proceeded to eat all of the white part next to the skin. She first nibbled at it then dragged it across her bottom teeth until the orange skin was the only thing left. It was so thin, it was almost transparent. She was neat, very careful but determined to not let one bit of that orange go to waste. She made me so hungry for an orange. I always eat the white part now, she made it look too good to pass up. This is also a good lesson on “We don’t really know all the people we influence!”

I’ve only just found your gorgeous orange eating extravaganza, Ronell. I had to laugh at your first method, long a favourite of mine but I thought it was my own personal style. Drat! I’ve since moved on to try all these various methods over the years. Now I’m back to a childhood favourite – cut the unpeeled orange into segments, suck the flesh out and then terrorise the dogs with my orange false ‘teeth’.
Wonderful watercolours! Have you thought of framing them as a montage? The last two are my favourites.

I love the artwork! So inviting. As a matter of fact I found this WHILE eating an orange and it never occurred to me to question how I ate it. I dig my teeth into the top (where the orange attaches to the branch until I have an indent, then use my fingernails to work a circle around the top, then pull carefully until the inner sect comes loose, then I peel away the sides in pieces until I reach the bottom where again I pull the bottom sect away carefully. I eat each separate section whole. I love seedless navels best, the ones with the really thick skin from Southern California. I’ve never eaten the pith, but it does sound pretty good to me now!