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THIS WEEK’S FRUIT
Emerald Beaut Plums
A freestone plum, the Emerald Beaut is a delicate green that turns golden with a hint of a blush. It has a firmer texture than the Santa Rosa with a crisp almost crunchy mouthfeel. One of our most hardy fruit, the Emerald Beaut just gets sweeter and sweeter without losing texture as it ages.
Flavor Heart Pluots
The Flavor Heart gets its name from its distinctively tapered shape. Its meaty, pale yellow flesh is very low in acid and the sweetness and color contrasts strikingly with its dark purple almost black skin.
Dapple Dandy Pluots
Playfully called the “dinosaur egg” pluot, the Dapple Dandy has marbled pink and green skin over delicate white flesh threaded with rose. Kids especially love this pluot for its distinctive coloration and the lack of tartness in the skin.
Hosui Pears
Hosui have flesh, that while still crunchy has a more melting mouthful, making the texture combination when eaten out of hand spectacular. Very juicy and sweet with a milder pear taste, their round shape and beautiful golden hue make them ideal for presentation with a distinctively Autumnal feel.
Shinseiki Pears
Asian pears are also known as “apple pears” as they’re often described as having the texture and shape of the apple but with the smooth sweetness of a pear. Botanically, they’re true pears and are native to China and Japan. The Shinseiki is medium-sized pear with smooth yellow skin. They’re nicely crisp with a sweet white flesh that’s refreshingly juicy.
Shinko Pears
The Shinko is a large pear with its round shape slightly flattened. The skin is bronze with brown russeting and its juicy, creamy white flesh has a subtly rich flavor. One of the last pears to pick, it comes off the tree with a butterscotch note to its sweetness. Shinkos are harvested in mid-September.
Hass Avocados
Abounding Harvest, Los Gatos, CA
Creamy in texture, nutty in flavor, with a small to medium seed. The Hass skin is easy to peel and darkens from green to purplish-black as it ripens. Store on the counter out of direct sunlight.
A NOTE FROM MARLENE
Marlene here, cleaning the dirt from under my fingernails to type up a little update on the garden project. Fall is quickly approaching, and the tomatoes and peppers are slowing in their production as the days shorten. However, Anna is still busy in the kitchen experimenting with new recipes to use these delicious veggies. Anna and I have been working together for the past few months to create a system for using fresh vegetables that I’m growing for new projects.
Anna is a great partner to have. We are both very passionate about growing healthful food and not letting food go to waste. We produce enough food and calories to feed everyone on the planet, but much food goes to waste, especially in the developed world. Even though we are working on a very small scale here in the vegetable garden, both Anna and I bring the mentality of not letting good food go to waste to what we do.
We have been brainstorming what vegetables have multiple uses: fresh, preserved, pickled. This will allow us to use as much of what the garden produces as possible. Take cauliflower for example. It is nutty and tasty fresh, but can also be roasted and made into soup. And you can even pickle it! Multiple uses that have a different shelf life.
I’m excited to be a part of something new. One of my favorite things is working in a greenhouse and watching seeds sprout and grow. Whether it is a plant or an idea, I love watching things grow and flourish. Here we go!
