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This Week’s Fruit:
Emerald Beaut Plum
Frog Hollow Farm, Brentwood, CA
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.
Red Flame Seedless Grapes
Frog Hollow Farm, Brentwood, CA
Enjoy these out of hand or try them in green salads, chicken salads, or fruit salads.
Hosui Asian Pear
Frog Hollow Farm, Brentwood, CA
Hosuis are very sweet with a mild pear taste, their round shape and beautiful golden hue make them ideal for presentation! They have a rougher skin than the other Asian pear varieties we grow. They have a flesh that while still crunchy has a more melting mouthful, making the texture combination when eaten out of hand spectacular.
Fuji Apples
Frog Hollow Farm, Brentwood, CA
Fujis are a cross between Red Delicious and Ralls Janet, an heirloom apple dating back to Thomas Jefferson. They are one of the sweetest variety apples around making them a household favorite.
Warren European Pear
Frog Hollow Farm, Brentwood, CA
This is Frog Hollow Farm’s signature pear and for good reason. Too difficult to grow for most farmers to consider it’s never caught on commercially but Farmer Al has never shied away
from putting the time and effort into a fruit that tastes so good. It has a classic European texture, very soft and juicy with a silky sweetness that avoids the typical grittiness found in most pears.
…all varieties are subject to change…
A Note from Farmer Al:
Dear CSA Members,
The weather has finally returned to normal after the hottest summer in the history of California. So all within a single year, we had the wettest winter and the hottest summer. Frog Hollow Farm has survived, but not thrived. The harvest is mostly done, but what a struggle it’s been. We’re now in recovery mode, happy not to be striving, doing battle with heat in a race to pick the fruit before it shrivels or drops to the ground.
The tree team is pruning again. Right now it’s the Warren pears. Remember, last year we werevery worried about the Warrens and we adopted some unusual and painstaking pruning measures to
overcome what appeared to be a severe compatibility between scion and rootstock. Well, it worked and we had the best Warren pear crop we’ve ever had! I’m breathing a big sigh of relief and actually rejoicing a bit. The irony is that what seemed to be a looming disaster last year is now emerging as the only bright spot in an otherwise disappointing year.
It feels great to be pruning and preparing for the next year with two very dark clouds of uncertainty removed: the Warren problem and drought! That still leaves us with one nagging and critical issue: the labor uncertainty. But we still have 6 months to solve that problem. Right now I’m just happy to be getting caught up with weed control!
All the Best,
Farmer Al
