Lemon Trivia
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38 free Lemon trivia questions with answers — food & drink quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
45 free lemon trivia questions with answers. The lemon is not a wild fruit at all but a hybrid, and almost everything about it is a little stranger than it looks: it reached Rome before the year 200, crossed the Atlantic with Columbus, cured a disease that killed more sailors than battle did, and gave a name to bad cars and good advice. This quiz runs 38 questions from the easy end (what vitamin is a lemon famous for, what liqueur is made from its zest on the Amalfi Coast) up to questions for produce nerds and food historians: which USDA plant explorer brought the Meyer lemon out of China, why California destroyed most of its Meyer trees, what a 13th-century Egyptian lemon drink was called, and how much the heaviest lemon on record weighed. Every answer has been checked against an encyclopaedia entry or the primary record, and the source is shown under each question once you have answered, so it works for a kitchen quiz night, a classroom food-science warm-up or a themed round at the pub.
30 of 38 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01A true lemon is a hybrid of the bitter orange and which other citrus fruit?
Citron
Citron. Linnaeus classed the lemon as a mere variety of citron; it is now known to be a separate hybrid species.
Q 02Some evidence suggests lemons first grew in what is now which country?
India
India, though the exact spot is unknown; botanists have long linked the lemon to Himalayan valleys where its wild relatives grow.
Q 03Which company switched from European citrus to mould to make citric acid?
Pfizer
Pfizer. The fermentation skills it built making citric acid later let it mass-produce penicillin for Allied soldiers in World War II.
Q 04Lemon juice keeps cut apples from browning by slowing what?
Enzymes
Enzymes. Cutting an apple lets polyphenol oxidase turn its phenols brown in air, and lemon's acidity slows that enzyme.
Q 05Botanically, a lemon is a hesperidium, which is a modified form of what?
Berry
Berry. Linnaeus named the citrus group Hesperideae after the Hesperides of Greek myth, who guarded a tree of golden apples.
Q 06The word 'lemon' reached English via Arabic from which language, where it named various citrus fruits?
Persian
Persian. Arabic laymun came from Persian limu, though the word may go back further still, perhaps to a Malay word for citrus.
Q 07Who brought lemon seeds to Hispaniola in 1493, introducing the fruit to the Americas?
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus. The same voyage carried sugar cane, which grew into a major Caribbean crop.
Q 08The lemon spread across the Mediterranean between roughly 1000 and 1150 during which historical movement?
The Arab Agricultural Revolution
The Arab Agricultural Revolution carried crops west across the Islamic world; lemons reached Iraq around AD 700 and were spread around the Mediterranean by 1150.
Q 09Which gas can packers use to turn green-picked lemons yellow faster?
Ethylene
Ethylene, though cool storage alone can also turn green lemons yellow.
Q 10A grandmother's words about turning lemons into lemonade are heard on which singer's 2016 album?
Beyoncé
Beyoncé, whose album Lemonade arrived without warning as a 'visual album'.
Q 11Which naval surgeon's 1747 trial found oranges and lemons the best treatment for sailors with scurvy?
James Lind
James Lind. Yet he never promoted citrus as the single cure, and his treatise had little impact at first.
Q 12On which ship did the famous 1747 scurvy trial take place while it patrolled the Bay of Biscay?
HMS Salisbury
HMS Salisbury. Of the two sailors given oranges and lemons, one was fit for duty after six days, when the fruit ran out.
Q 13Which nickname for Britons grew out of the Royal Navy's daily anti-scurvy juice ration?
Limeys
Limeys. The ration started as lemon juice in 1795, but limes later took over, and the nickname spread from sailors to all Britons.
Q 21Which lemon-lime soda once carried the words 'Lithiated Lemon Soda' in its name?
Seven Up
Seven Up, whose early name advertised lithium; no one knows for sure why the name includes a 7.
Q 22Which golfer's name is given to a drink of iced tea mixed with lemonade?
Arnold Palmer
Arnold Palmer, who said the name caught on after a woman heard him order the mix and asked for the same.
Q 23In 1676, vendors in which city sold lemonade from tanks carried on their backs?
Paris
Paris. One of its lemonade sellers, the Sicilian Procopio, went on to open Le Procope, where writers such as Diderot later gathered.
Q 14Scurvy, the disease that lemon juice prevents, is caused by a lack of which nutrient?
Vitamin C
Vitamin C, chemically ascorbic acid, is the missing nutrient in scurvy; the name 'ascorbic' literally means 'anti-scurvy'.
Q 15On his 1499 voyage, which explorer lost 116 of a crew of 170, mainly to scurvy?
Vasco da Gama
Vasco da Gama lost 116 of 170 men on his 1499 voyage, mostly to scurvy; Magellan fared even worse two decades later, losing 208 of 230.
Q 16Who won the 1937 Nobel in Physiology or Medicine partly for isolating ascorbic acid?
Albert Szent-Györgyi
Albert Szent-Györgyi first isolated it from adrenal glands, then found that Hungarian paprika was rich in it.
Q 17The Meyer lemon is a cross between one of the original citrus species and a hybrid of which two fruits?
Mandarin and pomelo
Mandarin and pomelo. The Meyer's thin, tender skin made it hard to ship, so for decades it was mostly a backyard fruit.
Q 18In which country did Frank Meyer collect the Meyer lemon he introduced to the US in 1908?
China
China, where it was grown as an ornamental pot plant, long before American chefs made it a prized ingredient.
Q 19Most US Meyer lemon trees were destroyed because they were symptomless carriers of what?
Citrus tristeza virus
Citrus tristeza virus. Virus-free 'Improved Meyer' trees, released by the University of California, later replaced them.
Q 20Which chef is credited with rediscovering the Meyer lemon as a food item?
Alice Waters
Alice Waters, founder of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, put the Meyer lemon on restaurant menus; its popularity climbed further when Martha Stewart began featuring it in recipes.
Q 24One story says pink lemonade was invented in 1857 using water that had rinsed a circus performer's pink what?
Tights
Tights. Pete Conklin's lemonade was mostly water, sugar and tartaric acid, with a single lemon he kept using all season.
Q 25In a lemon battery, where does the electrical energy actually come from?
The zinc dissolving into the acid
The energy comes from the zinc dissolving into the acid: zinc atoms give up electrons at that electrode, while hydrogen ions from the juice take them up at the copper.
Q 26A lemon battery works like which inventor's 1800 'pile'?
Alessandro Volta
Alessandro Volta. Napoleon was so impressed by the pile that he gave Volta honours including the title of count.
Q 27Writing done in lemon juice turns brown and readable when exposed to what?
Heat
Heat. In World War I, British censors caught spies who had written secret reports in lemon juice.
Q 28Lemon peel is used commercially to manufacture which gelling agent used in jams?
Pectin
Pectin. Jam from low-acid fruit can get extra lemon juice, because pectin needs acid to set.
Q 29Lemon juice in fish marinades neutralises which compounds responsible for fishy smells?
Amines
Amines. Fish smells largely of volatile trimethylamine, and acid keeps such amines from evaporating, so the odour fades.
Q 30Preserved lemons, brined in salt and lemon juice, are a signature condiment of which country's cuisine?
Morocco
In Morocco, preserved lemons flavour tagines and salads; it is the softened peel rather than the pulp that cooks prize.