Tree Gold
When I was growing up my dad always said, “Money doesn’t grow on trees.” Dad was a machinist, not a farmer. As all parents know, their children are parrots, repeating advice that’s been drilled into their heads during their formative years. But then I moved into the middle of an avocado and citrus orchard while living in southern California. The rule of the ranch was anything lying on the ground was fair game, but while it was still on the branches it was the orchard’s money.
“Just think of those avocados as dollar bills,” my landlord told me as he frog-marched a pair of lost hikers, each with a backpack filled with the fruits, off the property. I still have one of those backpacks. It was a nice one, perfect for a weekend on the trails. It also held close to 200 avocados when it was confiscated.
Come to think of it, that held true for fishing trips through the apple orchards of my childhood when Dad would pull the station wagon over to the edge of the road and tell me to get out and pick up a bag of apples off the ground as he pulled the ever-present wadded up plastic bag from his pocket. Fallen fruits filled the pockets of his fishing and hunting vests, too—a true hunter-gatherer.
But fruit on the trees was off limits. We had to pick the stone fruits and pay for them or at least try as his uncles shooed away offers of cash and aunts instead handed us a slice of fresh pie--cherries {pronounced chur’ eez} for the Fourth of July and a progression of apricots, plums, peaches, and nectarines.
Stone fruits, so named from the hard pit in the center of the flesh which holds a seed, are proof that summer has arrived.
Last week as I got in my shopping before market opened and the crowds arrived, one of the perks of being a fellow vendor, I happened to catch one of the orchard vendors schooling their workers on the names and flavor profiles of their staff as well as showing them examples of which fruits were to be removed as seconds due to over-ripeness and imperfections due to mishandling or nature’s damage. Also explained was how to educate patrons about free stone versus cling. They are two different types of fruit. When the fruit’s flesh clings to the pit it does not mean the fruit isn’t ripe or there’s something wrong with it. That’s why it’s designated as a cling variety.
NOTE: Here’s a pro tip for market shoppers. Don’t handle fruit you’re not going to purchase. Your vendors are offering the best they have and excessive handling quickly damages the ripe flesh. The stuff you get, even at premium grocery stores, was picked early for better transport and shelf life. That’s why the fruits from the farmers markets will always taste better. They are picked at the height of ripeness. That means when those lovely French manicures touch the fruit, it will bruise.
Similarly, smaller stone fruits such as cherries, apricots, and plums are boxed instead of loose. Don’t rearrange fruits within boxes to get fruits of similar size, shape and color for a picture perfect tart recipe or root through a box to guarantee none of the fruits are blemished. That’s part of the business—salespeople are always picking out the blemished produce.
A bit of advice to the jam and jelly makers who want seconds for canning. Call ahead. Ask your vendor for the following week’s seconds instead of showing up first thing and demanding a crate of blemished fruit. And if they send you home with a crate instead of a box, give it back.
The absolute best part about stone fruit season at the farmers market is the variety. You might see an unusual variety from a small block of trees or even a single tree one or two weeks and then it’s gone, unlike grocery stores which have an ongoing supply of a single variety.
While we are blessed to have an amazing assortment of stone fruits in the mid-Atlantic region, I do miss that same nuance between different cultivars in varietals when it comes to avocados and citrus.
Like good investors, wise orchardists know a diversified portfolio offers better returns because for them, their money does grow on trees.