<p>Who has had good fortune while shopping at the fruit stand/produce section this spring and now early summer? I haven’t.</p>
<p>I love fresh fruits, but consistently since May I have encountered nothing but unsweet and unripe fruits, despite paying top-dollar for them.</p>
<p>Bad (sour) peaches, bland cherries, tart grapes and tasteless watermelons. Watermelon is a fun part of summer. At first I was prepared to blame the bad watermelons on Mexico, as many of our early season melons in the northeast come from south of the border. Have to give our southern neighbors a pass on this one. I read the label on one of the worst- tasting watermelons I purchased recently; “Grown in California.”</p>
<p>Incidentally, another problem I found just yesterday; cherries placed under a sign at my nearest megamarket that stated “northwest cherries” in bags that were unambiguously marked “Grown in California.”</p>
<p>Here in CA it’s been a great fruit year. Abundant cherries, many varieties, are just ending with the amazing Bings. The peaches, plums and nectarines have been excellent. It’s early for the great melons but melons now are good enough. Even getting local tomatoes now.</p>
<p>I’ve lived all over the country, it’s hard for me to buy produce most of the year outside of CA now. It just looks anemic.</p>
<p>We have had a shortage of Indiana strawberries and our other berry prices are higher. We also didn’t enough pumpkins this year. Just keeping our fingers crossed for a healthy sweet corn season.</p>
<p>I have been so disappointed by the watermelon the past couple of years. The melon is missing that yummy flavor it’s always had; now it all tastes like the rind. Anyone know why? No idea where ours comes from. Our 4th of July seed spitting contests are not the fun they used to be :(</p>
<p>What amazed me when I first moved to CA from the midwest was how long produce would keep (as it hadn’t already spent a week on a truck). The first time I went to the Irvine Ranch Market I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. (Of course, the option of having a nice glass of wine while I pushed my cart around helped with that.)</p>
<p>In PA everything is coming in a couple weeks early because of the warm weather we’ve had, no global cooling here. I would already be eating my own tomatoes if the bunnies weren’t getting them first. (I am willing to share and will wait for those higher on the plant.)</p>
<p>There was a problem with last year’s pumpkin crop. I remember not being able to buy it canned in the spring and enquired about it.</p>
<p>In my corner of California, I’ve been underwhelmed with the nectarines so far, which I like sweet and acidic. Cherries have been excellent, ditto apricots. One of my favorite stands at the farmer’s market makes apricot jam that makes your taste buds burst into the hallelujah chorus. Not a lot of plums/pluots yet. Strawberries, as always, are wonderful. Tomatoes are good but not great, and I’m not seeing many heirloom varieties yet.</p>
<p>Southern California here. Our peaches and nectarines are pretty good , at least in the better markets. Berries have been good for awhile. The melons aren’t too great, though. Watermelons have no flavor and cantaloupes are pretty hard. Honeydew are ok, and red grapes have been great.
I’ve been making a fruit salad every night with blackberries, strawberries, raspberries, peaches or nectarines and orange. Sometimes I’ll throw in banana.
I just got back from visiting my daughter on the east coast, so I can’t complain. </p>
<p>What really have been wonderful are our vegetables. After visiting a Whole Foods in the Boston area, and comparing it to my local Whole Foods, I can understand why people outside our state are not happy with the produce. I had to throw away almost an entire bunch of celery because it was rotten inside when we got it back to her apartment. Maybe it’s the humidity, but things looked so much more wilted and lacked the freshness I’m used to.</p>
<p>Growing my own tomatoes again in So Cal this year. Lots and lots of little green tomatoes. Looks like a bumper crop that will all come ripe in another 3 weeks. You (and Eric Ripert) are all invited to TOMATOPALOOZA at my house at the end of July.</p>
<p>***keeping my fingers crossed on Erics arrival, and need to send H on a little trip away if that happens.( I can dream, can’t I?)</p>
<p>I blame my alma mater, UC Davis, for being one of the leaders in degrading the fruit over the years. They focus tons of research on creating fruit varieties and growing/harvesting methods designed to maximize production and appearance at the expense of taste. </p>
<p>Case in point: strawberries. The ripe strawberries of my youth were red all way through and tasted great. Today, almost anywhere you go, the strawberries look great. But when you cut into them they turn out to consist of only a thin layer of red coating a white center. The white parts of the strawberry are hard, dry, and have little taste. Where can I get some of the berries of my youth?</p>
<p>Well, well…you Californians are beating your chests quite loudly aren’t you? LOL. I didn’t mean to knock California produce. Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, I have great memories of mother keeping delicious California navel oranges and peaches in the refrigerator.</p>
<p>California cherries can’t compete with Bing Cherries from Washington. This year thus far, the California dark cherries selling here in the northeast have been quite bland if not downright sour. My experience with watermelon is the same as Momlove’s; all the red flesh tastes like the rind. BRING BACK SEEDED WATERMELONS!!!</p>
<p>Oh, the Georgia peaches I ate with lunch a few moments ago weren’t bad. Not great. Can’t wait for the sweet corn season to begin in full.</p>
<p>Sorry musica - our Costco has been smuggling your perfect CA fruit into WA. The Tuscan melons I bought at costco the other day were amazingly jucy, sweet and flavorful.</p>
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<li><p>Not so much local fruit here yet, but the peaches from the south have been great, as well as the California cherries and apricots. I have had some bad watermelons the past few years, but the two I have purchased so far this year have been yummy.</p></li>
<li><p>But what we do have right now in my neighborhood is the annual 2-week wild raspberry season (which is two weeks early this year). There are abundant wild raspberry bushes everywhere, with great fruit, but it’s hard to stay ahead of the birds. By the end of next week, either the people or the birds will have taken everything. The wild blackberries are a few weeks behind the raspberries, but there are far fewer bushes.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The wild berries are also ripening in PA; I have a hard time staying the course when I run by them on the trails. My usual strategy is to return when I walk my dog. Of course, then I have to fight him for them. He is very particular, plucking only the ripest one in each cluster. It is really funny to watch him snuffling along the side of the path; I wish we could train him for morels.</p>
<p>Our local strawberries are just like the ones I grew up with. They are half the size of grocery store berries and the season is short, but oh so sweet.</p>
<p>Strawberries that are red inside and those that are white are different varities. Both can be sweet and wonderful, problem is they pick them too soon when they sell them at stores. The ones I get at CA farm stands and farmer’s markets are perfect because they are picked ripe, but they only last 2 days tops.</p>
<p>In CA, although things are much better in stores than elsewhere, farmer’s markets are the way to go.</p>
<p>On the central coast of Ca. My apricots tree did not produce much fruit at all. And the few apricots it did produce are ripening much later. My plum tree is ripening early with a fair amount of fruit. I think one problem I had this year is that we had a really early warm front and the fruit trees all blossomed early. With the rain the next month I think the fruit season was doomed.
I am finding the strawberries to be really good this year. Had some good peaches and nectarines from the farmers market last week. I agree the red grapes have been good even from the regular market. I gave up on watermelon a few years ago when I found we were consistently getting bland flavor.
My vegetable garden is in a standstill. I planted my tomatoes a few weeks late and now June Gloom is in full bloom and my tomato plants are not getting any sun. I had friends for dinner last night and had hoped the sun would come out by 5 pm but it never did. We joked that we needed a fire.</p>
<p>redroses, I learned a great method for keeping strawberries for longer than two days. Take a tupperware type container, and line the bottom with paper towels to cover. Put a single uncrowded layer of unwashed berries on top. Cover with paper towels. Repeat layers, ending with paper towels on top. Put on the lid, put in the fridge. I’m able to keep the berries for a week, if not more.</p>
<p>It seems to me that it’s the first time in a couple years that strawberries have been good. I haven’t seen many WA strawberries in stores, it’s still CA strawberries. Apricots are okay, as are grapes, plums, and pluots. I’m waiting for more local (WA) fruit to come to market, but that might not be for another week or so. Either way, the quality and selection year-round seems to be quite above what I see when I’m at school in the south. Since I really enjoy eating fruit, I may have to check the farmer’s markets more often.</p>