If only you could smell what I show you here, I would have made your day.

For the last four or five weeks, Mallorca’s orange trees have been busy flowering. Should you happen to have an orange tree in your garden, you are probably already familiar with the heady scent of orange blossom. The perfumed smell of the blossoms of oranges, lemons, mandarins, tangerines, satsumas, limes or grapefruits is simply divine. Sadly, you can’t buy these blossoms in the shops here on the island, as far as I know. After all, this is not the Middle East. If you want to bring the intriguing smell of orange blossom into your house you will have to gather it yourself, by hand, just the way we have done recently. With the blossoms, you can make infusions or potpourri, or you can use it for cooking or for baking. You can make your own orange blossom water but this, you can also buy in some Mallorcan shops or in one or the other Moroccan shop, here on the island, sold as Agua de Azahar. Why not give it a try?

And, with Easter coming up, let’s not forget about Passover. The Passover Orange Blossom Cake is a traditional dessert in the Jewish or the Sephardic cuisine.

Shalom Passover.

The photo was taken in Felanitx, Mallorca, Baleares, Spain. The date: April 13th, 2011. The time was 19:26:12.