lemons & limes, now & then

When a drink calls for the juice of one squeezed lemon & one squeezed lime does that mean the natural sized l & l?
In my head lemons are usually larger than limes. How much larger? What are the yields of one lemon and lime squeezed?

I made a few olde timey drinks to'nite. This last one needed one lemon & one lime squeezed. How does one know if their lemon is smaller than my lime?

Where is my government now!!!

Well, Sherman and I set the Way-Back machine to 1946 to try and find an answer for you. We had a small adventure but do to a mix-up in the shipping and receiving department your samples may not arrive yesterday........

Through much research and experimentation involving large quantities of citrus and even large quantities of liquor your best answer is this:

figure 3/4 to 1 ounce of juice for a lime. If you like tart, start with 1 ounce and work backwards. If you like sweet, go the other way.

figure 1 1/4 to 1 3/4 ounce of juice for a lemon. 1 1/2 ounce is just about right for a lot of drinks, at least for me that is.

The only way to really get it right is to mix a few drinks and try various measures of juice. The average is 1 ounce for a lime and 1 1/2 for a lemon. In california, in season, you will probably get more juice from your fruit, in drought years or off season, maybe a bit less.

If your still unsure, go to your local bar and ask them for a lemon and a lime. Bars are buying in bulk from where ever bars buy fruit in bulk and it is a safe bet that bars have been doing that same kind of buying for a long time now..... ergo the bulk boxed citrus available then is of similar quality as bulk boxed citrus now.

I offer the standard disclaimer: your mileage may vary, offer not valid in all 50 states, prices subject to change without notice, professional driver on closed course, batteries not included, produce is packaged by weight and settling may have occurred during shipping.

I forgot the most important part.....

share with us what you find in your experiments.

Even better, invite us over and we'll experiment with you!

I invite you over without a finding!
Depending on when we run out of citrus Sat & Sun is the swapmeet or farmers market. Mon to Fri is the grocer. Somes fruits are bigger than others.

On 2009-11-08 18:06, Mr. NoNaMe wrote:
When a drink calls for the juice of one squeezed lemon & one squeezed lime does that mean the natural sized l & l?
In my head lemons are usually larger than limes. How much larger? What are the yields of one lemon and lime squeezed?

I made a few olde timey drinks to'nite. This last one needed one lemon & one lime squeezed. How does one know if their lemon is smaller than my lime?

Where is my government now!!!

I've asked this very question over at egullet before. Just since the time that I was a kid I've noticed that lemons & limes have gotten much larger. Limes are as big as lemons used to be and lemons are big as some oranges used to be. I wonder what citrus like 50, 60 or 100 years ago (in the golden age of the cocktail)? Old recipes that list 'the juice of one lemon' vex me; I want to know exactly how much juice to mix.

I'm glad to see this thread as I've been wondering this myself lately. The so-called "bartenders lime" would seem to indicate by its very name that it is the right lime to use, especially when a recipe calls for "juice of one lime." And bartenders limes, which I believe is also the key lime, are considerably smaller than the usual lime you find in the grocery store. Trader Vic's Mai Tai calls for juice of one lime, and I think I may have been adding too much lime juice when I've made it because I've been using the large lime.

On 2009-11-10 08:26, arriano wrote:
The so-called "bartenders lime" ... I believe is also the key lime

Key Limes are a unique animal and are not interchangeable with other limes as far as measuring is concerned.

Key Limes are much more tart and pack a lot more citrus tartness in the same amount of juice. I remember reading somewhere that an ounce of lemon juice has something like 8 grams of ascorbic(sp?) acid (the tartness, an ounce of lime juice has 18 grams, and an ounce of key lime juice has 32 grams. That would give you just about a half-ounce of Key Lime juice equaling the same tartness as an ounce of lime juice. If you made your Mai Tai with 3/4 ounce of Key Lime you would risk turning your mouth inside out from the tartness.

"Back in the day" people actually enjoyed a drink because it tasted like alcohol. Sharp and/or tart drinks were de rigueur and anything less was unacceptable to most drinkers. These days, however, there are far too many recipes for drinks designed to hide the taste of the alcohol, far too sweet overall.... the so called Modern Palate.

It comes back to the original premise of testing and tweaking the recipe to fit your palate and expectations. I like my drinks to taste like drinks, I like them tart, I like the taste of the alcohol. I am unlike most of the drinkers at my local watering holes. And I like that fact.

As always, your mileage may vary.

Ah, this explains why so much of what I made from the 'bum's books I found to be too tart, and I learned quick to halve or 3/4 the lemon/lime element. Same for drinks made from my vintage recipe books.
Not surprising, tho', the way our tastebuds have 'evolved', when just about everything we buy from the store nowadays has plenty of sugar/sweeteners added to it.