If you think candy should include more hurdles in order to enjoy it, like seeds and pith, then this is the fruit for you!
Meiwa Kumquats are not your average kumquat. First of all they are round instead of oval and they are much harder to find. I suppose you could stumble upon them easily if you had access to the ever popular Kumquat Festival in Dade City. This site gives tons of information about the festival such as no date, no location, and a whopping one out of four stars rating. BUT, it is a “fun packed family event that lasts for a day”. Oh – and did I mention it is completely dedicated to Kumquats? Yeah – that’s my kind of event. Where’s my party hat?
APPEARANCE Rating: 
Small, round, orange fruit with a good number of seeds.
AROMA Rating: 
Lightly orange and acidic.
TEXTURE Rating:
Firm, almost crunchy and a bit fibrous. Not particularly juicy.
TASTE Rating:
Nice complicated sweetness with bits of sour juice and a slight bitterness in the peel.
OVERALL Overall Rating:
I so desperately want to like kumquats. They are small. You can pop the whole thing in your mouth. They kind of taste like candy with a little splash of sour and bitter grown up flavor. But then there are the seeds. What kind of tiny little fruit that is so perfectly fit for snacking, dares to include 5 or 6 seeds in each bite! GAH! I will admit that this one is sweeter and far more interesting than the more common Nagami Kumquat, but still – the audacity! (Also this claims that Meiwas have very few seeds so maybe I just got a particularly defiant batch.)
| FRUIT Kumquat |
PEAK Winter |
PURCHASED Farmer’s Market |
| VARIETY Meiwa |
GROWN Rainbow, CA |
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Mike // Aug 5, 2011 at 8:13 am
Yes indeed this Meiwa Kumquat is sweet and its meat is not much of juice. I just bought it from Mimosa Nursery in Anaheim,CA. It costs about $55 for 7 gallon tree. I had the Nagami Kumquat for 2 years now…and love it. Its yellow fruit makes my garden beautiful….I am sure that I will love the Meiwa much more. Good luck
Mike
Van Kleiner // Oct 2, 2011 at 7:23 pm
I live in Texas and cannot find a source of kumquat trees that will send to Texas.
Nick // Aug 31, 2012 at 5:49 pm
Seedless varieties exist, like the Nordmann.
Nick // Aug 31, 2012 at 5:49 pm
Seedless varieties exist, like the Nordmann nugami.
Fruit Maven // Sep 2, 2012 at 9:06 am
Yeah Nick – I’ve had the Nordmann once and you are right – no seeds. But unfortunately the flavor didn’t really appeal to me. I only got to try one though – so who knows. I’m definitely hoping to stumble across some of those again where I can get at least a handful.