Ketchup, Canned Peaches and Hot Pepper Jelly!    

Eddie assessing the Goldrush
*For what's available at market this week please see below; it includes the apple varieties now available. 
 
Canned Goods
     First off, I want to let you know that Lyn and I went down to West Virginia, finally!;how long have I been promising?, to pick up our finished products. So Twin Springs now has a huge supply of the Chipotle Ketchup many of you have been asking after, as well as a fresh batch of our Marinara Sauce. The Ketchup is even a bit darker and thicker than last year's. 
     We also had them make up quite a bit of a product we haven't had for years, the Hot Pepper Jelly some of you long time fans of Twin Springs remember from many years ago. All of you gave up in despair of our ever repeating the product, but we never forgot! We finally decided to grow peppers again, partly just so that we could have the jelly made. Try a jar; I put it on cream cheese on a rice cracker, but I know many of you had other uses and said it was the best of similar recipes they had ever enjoyed. A customer once mentioned putting it on sauteed green beans. Let me know if you have any other creative uses for any of these products.
     We also have quite a few cases, hopefully enough for the Winter, of our peak of the season Peaches in glass jars. You may remember how for many years we had them canned at our cider mill; and they had a large following. We skipped a couple of seasons as the crop just wasn't large enough to spare any for canning. This year we took down to WV some really ripe, sweet and tasty Sunhaven, which we had "canned". We feel they are a better product, with more peach and less liquid. All of the above may be purchased one by one, but at a 10% off case price you may want to consider buying in bulk. I'm just sayin'...
 
Eddie and Goldrush (Two birds with one stone)

     As I seem to be on a roll with showing, one at a time, the current four Twin Springs partners, having in the last two emails pictured my sons Michael and Jesse, it seems like a good time to get in a picture of Eddie, above, who goes right back to the beginning of Twin Springs Fruit Farm, around 1979.
     He and I are the two remaining original partners from the first days of struggle to figure out just what we were trying to do with the farm for which we had gone so deeply in debt. Farmers' markets were in their infancy as a phenomena at that time, and we were pretty clueless. Eddie stepped up to the task of growing our tree fruit, and has turned into quite a respected orchardist in our industry.
     He is shown above in a picture Lyn took yesterday out in a block of Goldrush, which are pretty close to being ready. The variety is certainly the most asked after of all the apples we grow. While we won't have them this week, they being among the latest varieties to ripen, along with our "late season Fuji varieties", we do have some fifteen varieties on display at this time; and if you can't find a few you like well what's wrong with you? Below, under "What's at market this week" I'll list all the current varieties.  
    
NEW APPLE VARIETIES THIS WEEK: 

      Cameo
is a relatively new variety which many, who tried them yesterday at Mt. Vernon, found to be their new favorite fresh eating apple. While HoneyCrisp remains the best seller at all of our locations Cameo sold out quite early and elicited great feedback. This variety was discovered in an apple orchard in Dryden, Washington and was considered unique enough to patent and propogate. It is a beautiful, red streaks over cream, rather large and delicious snacking apple which is plenty crisp and sweet. 
     Though of uncertain parentage Cameo may be a natural cross of Golden Delicious and Red Delicious, as it was found near orchards of those two varieties. Don't hold the Red parentage against it as I believe it has reverted to the fine flavor of the original Red, which was much better than today's strains of the variety, ruined by "Red Drift", none of which we will even consider raising. It also exhibits the now classic, tall, round shouldered and pointed bottom, with five distinctive knobs, which gives Reds their distinctive and unarguably attractive shape. The Cameo just has the flavor all modern Reds seem to lack.
     A great old fashioned variety, by way of Australia, is the Granny Smith, characterized by its very crisp texture and quite tart flavor; not one of the many varieties I characterize as semi-sweet. The apple is one most often recommended for pies and cobblers, but ours has just enough sweetness to be a fine eating apple for those enamored by really tangy fruit. Due to the fact that our dwarf trees expose most of the apples to a good amount of sunlight they often have a red blush over the shiny green background. Jo Robinson puts them at the top of her list of the most nutritious of the varieties of apples available today. Which leads right into:

Tips on Apple Nutrition

     As mentioned above there is research on the nutritional value of apples; and what follows all comes from Jo Robinson's new book "Eating on the Wild Side", the implication of which is that the closer we can come to eating wild foods the more nutrients, particularly phytonutrients, we will wind up with. She lists only a few, but of what we currently offer HoneyCrisp, Granny Smith, Gala and Braeburn are listed as the most nutritious varieties.
     Jo has an interesting suggestion for getting the most out of apples, nutritionally speaking, which has to do with consuming the skin. It is indicated that "extracts from peeled apples inhibited the growth of human cancer cells by 14%, but extracts from unpeeled apples blocked the growth by over 45% (p.228). Now, I'm willing to bet that most of you already eat the skin when consuming a raw apple; but her suggestion includes a way of getting the benefits when cooking pies and cobblers etc.
     She has a recipe for an Apple Crisp which cleverly incorporates the skin, often found to be objectionable in pies or cobblers, in an innocuous way. The recipe calls for peeling the apple as usual, but reserving the skins to be added back to the chopped apples. Here's the bit from the recipe (p.230): "Combine 1 cup of the sliced apples, the apple skins, the honey, 1 tablespoon of flour, cinnamon and nutmeg in the bowl of a food processor. Process on high speed until the skins are finely chopped, about three minutes. (This will seem like a long time.)" It will then be added back to the bowl of apples etc. according to whatever recipe you use; obviously I'm trying to give you a general technique for you to adapt to any recipe you care to make.
     
Yes I've gone on too long again, and I have so much more to say from reading in Jo's book. I'll save it for a later date; I don't wish to overstay my welcome. Less is often more, as my wife will tell you.
 Hey finally, huh, Chipotle Ketchup, Hot Pepper Jelly etc!
Aubrey and colleagues
*At all our locations this week 
  • Our flavorful, sweet, crisp and juicy Carrots will be available everywhere, both loose and in bags. A customer said to the lady beside him at Mt. Vernon that he used to be able to get carrots like this at a market in Paris. I tell you, "You can't make this stuff up!". I should maybe pay someone to stand there all day saying stuff like that. 
  • Bon Bon, Sunshine and Butternut hard winter squash
  • Lots of our fabulous Celery  
  • Fresh Brussels Sprouts and a few trays of Kaleidoscope Greens  
  • The fifteen apple varieties available this week are: Cameo and Granny Smith (both added this week), Pink Lady, Braeburn, Stayman, Winesap, Nittany, Fuji, HoneyCrisp, SunCrisp, Empire, Golden Delicious, Mutsu, Royal Gala and Jonagold. (I recommend Pink Lady, Grannies, Braeburn, Stayman, SunCrisp, Mutsu, Winesap, Nittany, Empire and Golden Delicious, as the best cookers this week.)
  • Sweet Apple Cider - This week's blend incorporates: Red Cortland (you may have wondered where they went; too soft for our retail), Stayman, Suncrisp and Jonagold. Not too sweet, tangy, as we like it, and unfiltered, as Jo recommends! for maximum health benefits.
  • Sweet bell peppers, mildly spicy Anaheim Chilis and sweet little "Yum Yum" peppers remain abundant. Due to the cold, many field vegetables will soon disappear, but we will have beautiful bell peppers coming from the greenhouse for some time yet. 
  • We now have the traditional orange fleshed Sweet Potato, Beauregard, as well as the less well known, but fantastic, white fleshed, purple skinned Japanese Sweet Potato.
  • Due to cool cloudy days the Manar Cucumbers, Arugula and Red Oakleaf Lettuce, all greenhouse grown, are in very limited supply this weekend and a bit beyond. 
  • Field grown Beefsteak Tomatoes are winding down, being replaced by our Greenhouse Trust Tomatoes also picked at the peak of ripeness; please get a sample. 
  • Candy, sweet onions and Mercury, mild red onions
  • Sylvana, fantastic, all purpose yellow fleshed Potatoes 
  • German Hardneck Garlic
  • Sungold, sweet orange cherry tomatoes and Dasher red grape tomatoes    
  • Chipotle Ketchup has returned!  
  • Marinara Sauce (yes, the cheaper quarts are back) and the two new products: Hot Pepper Jelly and Canned Peaches in jars 
  • Apple Butter and Apple Sauce
In addition to the above we *expect to have, at "Twin Springs Own Markets":             
  • Joe's Sweet Corn will be available Saturday and Sunday (10/26 & 27), but that is the last of it. 
  • Spinach, Kale, Green and Golden Zucchini, Radishes, Turnips, Green Peppers,both Green and Golden (Wax) Beans, Eggplant, Limas, Beets, Broccoli, Broccolini, Cauliflower, Purple Cauliflower, Romanesco, Turnips, Herbs (Rosemary, Parsley and Dill)                                                                  *Please take note that many of the most tender veggies are now in jeopardy due to possible frosts, but most of what is above will be true, for at least this weekend.
  • Local honey and maple syrup, salad dressings, jams and jellies, chow chow, mustards, sweet and hot relish, bar-b-que sauces etc.
  • A full line of Baked Goods, fresh each market morning: Croissants, baguettes, many loaf breads too numerous to list, both sliced and unsliced (The latter having a crisper crust) and cookies
 
Perhaps add a friend, helping to get one you love started on a wholesome lifestyle, while supporting local farms and farmers, not to mention bakers, cheesemakers and beekeepers.