A dozen years ago, in La Crau, a small town located between Toulon and Hyères, the horticulturist Christian Blanc gradually abandoned the cultivation of flowers to devote himself to that of rare citrus fruits, primarily combava and lemon caviar. His daughter-in-law joined the adventure in 2019 and created Lemon Story with the aim of promoting the family citrus harvest, until now offered to exotic fruit resellers.
Marion Laperche first endeavored to make chefs aware of the range of taste subtleties offered by the plantation’s citrus fruits, today enriched with yuzu, Buddha’s hand, Tahitian lime, citron, kalamansi, tangelo, bergamot and other Meyer lemons. Then, in 2020, with the idea of enhancing these hand-picked fruits, the young woman conducted jam tests: “I wanted lamb’s lettuce, with pieces, like in English marmalades, and not too much sugar. »
Initially, there was no question of producing them herself, but, with the pandemic, she finally got down to it in the premises formerly dedicated to flower packaging, converted into a kitchen-laboratory. “The process to obtain the candied fruit aspect is carried out over three days, with maceration in sugar and several boilings”, she explains. Some recipes highlight a single variety of citrus fruit – yuzu, kalamansi or tangelo… –, others combine tangy notes, still others combine citrus fruits and fruits from neighboring producers: strawberries from Provence and citrus zest, apricots and combava…
“I couldn’t make a collection of jams without revisited classics”, claims the entrepreneur, who at the same time developed a series of five limoncellos with the creator of rums Hugo Randazzo, in Peypin (Bouches-du-Rhône). Before opening the first Lemon Story boutique, on the Butte Montmartre, in Paris. At the end of the year, the dapper stall, where crates of fruit sold by weight are stacked, is preparing for the holidays. Honor the kalamansi lemon, pimped with spices in the filled shortbreads and incenseed, just like the yuzu, in a homemade gingerbread recipe with jam and citrus peels. Yuzu from La Crau is also popular with the chef of Septime, Bertrand Grébaut, who combines it with fig leaf for the Yule log in his Tâpisserie pastry. An airy dessert with subtle tangy and vegetal notes.
Lemon Story, 1, rue Garreau, Paris 18th.