So, there's an interesting citron fruit called Buddha's Hand. It looks like this: 
It smells like lemon candy (not quite exactly like lemons themselves), and really doesn't have much fruit at all. It's mostly rind. I did not know this when I bought it, as its heavenly fragrance and the fact that it's a tentacle fruit overrode any prior thoughts of researching it.
Upon getting home and terrorizing one of my cats with it, I googled up what exactly it's used in, and it turns out, not a whole lot. It can be used as zest, can be an ingredient in limoncello, and that was pretty much the extent of its use. Upon recommendations and further searching, I found out I can candy the fruit. Since my car had been frozen all day and I wasn't going anywhere, I decided to make it right then and there.
I have not candied anything before. My specialty, if one would call it that, is making dessert related items like banana bread, ice cream, and such things. I'm not a particularly big "foodie" type, but this buddha's hand tied together two of my favorite food types: exotic fruit and a type of dessert.
So in the end, I have a cookie sheet with what looks like bits of severed, honey-covered squid with a beautiful fragrance wafting up from it. It has a particular taste to it, as the sugar syrup and bitterish flavor of the rind-y fruit mix well together.
Thus ends another experiment with food, tentacles edition.
It's really hard to describe. Do you know Lemonhead candies? Or like any "lemon-flavored" candy, how it's not exactly lemon-tasting but it's close. Raw, it tastes like typical citrus rind, with its own off-lemon flavor. After candying, it gets a lot sweeter and fleshed out and the texture changes to being a bit gummy-like.
Ahhh, buddha hands - the farmers market's hipster-bait. Maybe they last better in Asia but the two times I've had them brought to me ("look what I found!" "At the Santa Monica farmer's market?" "...yes..." "from the vendor with the beard and the dreads?" "...how did you -" "thanks. Give it here.") they smell vaguely like citron for a couple days then start smelling like rotting citron. I think they're f'ing cool looking but the fact that you can't actually do anything with them annoys me. Try candied frut again. It's worth it. Start with something edible.
Will do! I candied the fruit within a day of buying it, does it really go bad that quickly?
No, it's just that I've never found a recipe of suggestion that involves eating it. Food is usually better if you make it from other food, and buddha hands are "almost food." The recipe I linked to works awesome for orange and lemon peel. We intended to try grapefruit this year but then we had a baby and the schedule slipped. ;-)
you can make marmalade with them. or any thing you would use a citron for. they are bred for the rind.
Now, what surprisingly worked well is the resulting syrup that came out of this! It's a nice shade of yellow, smells and tastes sweet, and has the flavor of Buddha's Hand without the bitterness or the taste of rind. I gave the bottle of it to my mother, and she has already used half of it, pouring it on strawberries and mixing it in with rice and milk. It apparently blends very well with other fruits. I had a bit myself with strawberries and it was like a fruity heaven. Very sweet and very fragrant.