Tangerines rewards a little know-how: how to choose them, cook them, store them, and substitute in a pinch. Browse 17 recipes to cook with them.

What are tangerines?

A tangerine is a small, easy-peel orange citrus with loose skin and sweet, juicy segments. The flavor is bright and a little tart, more vivid than a regular orange.

Pull one open and the skin comes away in a couple of pieces, no knife needed, which is half the reason they end up in lunchboxes and Christmas stockings.

Tangerines are a type of mandarin orange. That's the source of a lot of grocery-aisle confusion, so it helps to sort the family out.

Mandarin is the broad category, and tangerine, clementine and satsuma are all members of it. Tangerines tend to be a touch more tart with a deeper red-orange skin. Clementines are usually smaller and sweeter, and they're seedless. The names overlap enough that stores use them loosely.

How to Use Tangerines

Most of the time the best use is the simplest: peel and eat. The fruit segments cleanly, so it's a natural for tossing into things raw, the way Mixed Greens with Tangerines & Fennel and a Mixed Citrus Salad use the segments for a sweet-tart pop against savory leaves.

In desserts, the segments hold their shape and sweetness well. They get poached in Tangerines with Honey-Lime Syrup and folded into a Raspberry-Tangerine Mousse, and they're a classic on top of cakes.

Don't waste the peel. Tangerine zest carries intense fragrant oils that perfume batters, marinades and sugar.

The juice is sweeter and less acidic than orange juice, which makes it excellent in glazes and sauces, the savory move behind a sticky Tangerine Chicken.

One prep note: most tangerines have a few seeds, unlike seedless clementines. If you're segmenting them for a salad or dessert, flick the seeds out as you go.

Pairing and a Common Mistake

Tangerine's sweet-tart brightness plays well with fennel, bitter greens and avocado on the savory side, and with chocolate, almond, vanilla and warm spice on the sweet side. It loves the company of other citrus and pairs naturally with poultry and duck.

The most common mistake is cooking the juice too hard. Tangerine juice is delicate, and a long hard boil drives off the fresh top notes and can turn it flat or faintly bitter.

Add it toward the end of a sauce, or reduce it gently, to keep that just-squeezed brightness.

A second slip is reaching for the bottled stuff. Tangerine flavor lives in fresh juice and fresh zest; the candied or artificial versions don't capture it, so squeeze your own.

Substitutes

The closest swaps are other easy-peel mandarins. Clementines or satsumas step in almost perfectly, just a little sweeter and milder, so you may want a squeeze of lemon to restore the tang.

Canned mandarin segments work in baking and salads when fresh aren't around, though they're softer and packed in syrup.

For juice or zest, a regular orange is the everyday stand-in. It's larger and more acidic and less perfumed, so use a touch less and consider adding a little sweetness to match tangerine's character.

Buying and Storing

Choose tangerines that feel heavy for their size, with glossy, deep-orange skin that gives slightly when pressed. A little looseness between skin and fruit is normal and even a good sign of ripeness. Pass on any that are rock-hard, light for their size, or marked with soft mushy spots.

Tangerines are a winter fruit, at their peak roughly from late autumn through midwinter, which is exactly when they show up in holiday traditions. That short season is part of their appeal.

They keep about a week at room temperature and up to two weeks in the refrigerator crisper.

Don't seal them in a tight bag, which traps moisture and speeds mold; loose in the drawer is best. Zest can be dried or frozen, and juice freezes well in an ice-cube tray for later.

Quick facts

In Chinese

蜜桔

British (UK) term

Tangerines

en français

mandarines

en español

tangerinas

Recipes using tangerines

There are 17 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 17 recipes