Big Squeeze

Some 35,000 people attended last year's festival, put on by the Greater Dade City Chamber of Commerce. They came to enjoy live entertainment (all local performers, including youngsters from the area school of dance), cheer on the children's parade, admire the quilt contest entries (official rules state that they "must reflect the citrus industry in some way"), participate in a 5K run, see the crowning of Miss Kumquat Festival and her court, and ooh and aah over the recipe contest creations-cakes, breads, meat dishes, salsa and even a kumquat and pear chutney that was the talk of the festival.

Chamber executive director Phyllis Smith cautions festival-goers to come early for the kumquat pie. "We have thousands of pieces," she says, "but we always sell out by 2 o'clock."

Set in the rolling pasturelands of northeastern Tampa" target="_blank">Pasco County, Dade City, population 6,400, has been the center of Florida's kumquat industry since the early 1900s. Its elevation-200 feet above sea level, practically a mountain by Florida standards-its sandy soil and proximity to the Gulf of Mexico make growing conditions ideal.

According to Greg Gude, fourth-generation manager of a fruit processing company called Kumquat Growers, a Dade City resident by the name of Christopher Nathe spied a kumquat tree in the plant nursery where he was working and brought it home.

"When he grew this pretty fruit, he ate it and liked it," says Gude. Nathe's wife made a delicious marmalade from the rinds and the rest, as they say, is history.

At its height in the 1950s, some 100 acres of kumquat groves dotted Dade City. Today, 10 growers tend 40 acres. At an average 108 trees to an acre, they produce some 15,000 bushels of kumquats, which are shipped all over the country and to Canada, Europe and the Middle East.

Festival-goers can tour the Kumquat Growers processing plant and hear a more detailed history of the fruit.

Smith, who has lived in Dade City most of her life, says the Kumquat Festival is a wonderful way to introduce people to the community's many charms, including its wealth of antique shops.

"My husband is in real estate, and he's had many people say, we came to the Kumquat Festival and saw the rolling hills coming into Dade City and now we want to move here," Smith says. "They're not mountains, but to Floridians they're pretty high hills."

Ilene Denton is managing editor of Tampa Bay Homebuyer.