As an East Bay real estate agent, I often joke with my buyer clients that it is mandatory to have a lemon bush in the backyard, as it is actually rather difficult to find a home that does not have one. The popularity of the Meyer lemon is well-known, but few may know from whence came this sweet lemon variety prized by celebrity chefs for its delicate, not-too-tart flavor. As a kid growing up in El Cerrito, I made money selling fresh-squeezed lemonade in Dixie cups to construction workers on summer days during the 1950s building boom, unaware that my Dad’s Meyer lemon had such an interesting history. It all begins with Frank Nicholas Meyer, a man with a passion for exploring the farthest corners of the earth on foot to discover plants of economic value.
Thanks to Daniel Stone, a National Geographic editor and author of a new book called The Food Explorer, I just learned all about Frank Meyer and his outlandish and unbelievable adventures which resulted in the “discovery” of what we now call, the Meyer lemon. The first thing learned is that all cultivated citrus comes from Asia. It turns out that Frank Meyer is to lemons what Johnny Appleseed is to apples… a total nut who gave pet names to plants and talked to them as if they were able to converse. Did they have lemon drop martinis then? That would explain a lot. Evidently Frank walked everywhere, particularly all over China in the early 1900s, encountering bandits and bears, tigers and tyrants along the way, until he had that “bingo” moment in a small village outside of Beijing in 1907.
As the story goes, he spied a small tree with bright yellow fruit in a family’s doorway, but was told by the owner that it was purely ornamental. Nevertheless, he tested it to be sure and discovered it to be sweeter than a lemon, but more tart than an orange. Frank sent cuttings back to an agricultural field station on the outskirts of Chico. With propagation, it made its way in a few decades to the groves of Florida, Texas and southern California, and soon thereafter to Bay Area nurseries where it was clearly a major hit. Meyer’s introduction of Chinese soybeans resulted in a larger and more profound economic impact on US agriculture, but the sweet lemon remains the living monument to his passion. Before his untimely and mysterious death one night on the Yangtze River, he promised his family, “I will be famous one day. Just wait a century or two.” How prescient, if lacking humility, but perhaps said with humor.
Since those days of my youth and fresh-squeezed lemonade, as good as it was, I have graduated in my adult life to a more adult lemon-based beverage, so to celebrate Frank Meyer’s discovery and honor his passion for the citrus that now bears his name, I conclude by sharing with you my current preferred version of the lemon drop martini.
Tom’s Lemon Drop
For two small, but potent martinis:
3 oz. Grey Goose vodka
1 oz. Cointreau
Juice of one large fresh-squeezed Meyer lemon
1 heaping teaspoon granulated sugar
Ice cubes
Shake 40 times and serve in sugar-rimmed martini glasses.
Thanks, Frank.
Article written by our very own Tom Knight ~
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