Happy Saturday morning everyone!  At this point it looks like we’re going to avoid more rain today – whew!  With all the rain we’ve had I do have to warn you – the mosquitoes are BAD! Please dress appropriately if you want to go for a walk through the orchard, pick a pumpkin and/or play on the playground.  Long pants and long sleeves are always a good idea and if you are cool with it – bug spray.

So let’s chat about something serious.  Our honeycrisp apples are selling out – quickly. They were definitely significantly damaged by the frost that hit our orchard in May and its evident as we sort them.  If you want one last bag of honeycrisp before the season is up … come visit us ASAP!

What are you going to do if you get the shop and the honeycrisp are already gone – please – try some other apples!  There are some really good ones ready too!

Here’s the list I recommend trying out before you just decide you’re all done with apples until the 2017 honeycrisp crop:

Melrose – Jared is loving these this year! They are juicy and crunchy with great flavor.  The favorite thing I’ve ready about this apple comes from Adam’s Apple Blog

“If you like sweet and simple, but Honeycrisp is a sugar lump too far, this [melrose] might be your apple.”

(Complete Sidenote:  Have you visited Adam’s Apple blog?  It’s really interesting if you want more insight on TONS of different apple varieties.)

Jonagold – the jonagold is another great one to try after the honeycrisp.  It’s got a great flavor and texture!  Great for eating and cooking – a win/win!

Snow Sweet – WOW!  This is one delicious apple!  It’s not really like the honeycrisp but it’s so good all on it’s own with a unique flavor that we’ve found that pretty much everyone who tries them buys a bag … a big bag!  I have a feeling this apple, once known more, will exceed the demand of the honeycrisp some day.

Alright – if you’re a person that thinks the honeycrisp is a fine apple but not necessarily your first choice … what do we have to offer you?

We’re not quite sure what caused it but the apples are exceptionally good tasting this year!  Our apples are always good … but this year they are just exceeding all of our expectations.  If you like a sweeter apple – we have the fireside, gala, fuji, honeygold, and tolman sweet.  (I would also put the snow sweet in this category but since I’ve already mentioned it.).

Want something that’s sweet and tart – try our hazen, sno, spartan, rebella (a great sauce apple too!), shizuka, arlet, jonathan, crimson gold and smoothee. 

Let’s chat a little bit more about the smoothee apple. The smoothee – we had a school tour on Wednesday morning of this past week … do you remember what the weather was like?  Yup – it was storming – hard!  Luckily, it was a group of 10 kids and we were able to improvise and they still had a fantastic time at the orchard.  And can I just give a little shout out to the 4K students at St. John’s from Pardeeville – what an amazingly well behaved group!  Anyway – back to my point – part of our improvised plan was to let the kids taste test three different apples under the lean, dry from the rain.  They sampled the macintosh, smoothee, and honeycrisp.  Afterwards we asked them there favorites and I would say half chose the smoothee over the honeycrisp! If you are a fan of the golden delicious – this is definitely an apple you want to try.

Are you more of a fan of a tart apple?  No worries!  We have the varieties for you too!  Give the crimson crisp, Bonnie’s Best, haralson, and empire a try.  The Macintosh and Cortland are still in there tart/crisp phase of there life so if you like them for eating – it’s still time!

And with that I think I’ve covered all the apples in the shop … We have some great pumpkin patches this year so I hope you keep that in mind as you’re collecting pumpkins. There is also quite a variety of winter squash, pie pumpkins, and decorative fall items from gourds to Indian corn to adorably tiny pumpkins.

What else is happening in our neighborhood?

This weekend is the official start of the season at Creek Bed Country Farmacy!  This fantastic corn maze and outdoor play area is located just about 3 miles from our place … a perfect opportunity to spend your day enjoying the non-rainy day in the country!

Creek Bed Country Farmacy will have the Soggy Prairie Boys performing 1-3 to celebrate the official start.  Sounds like a great time to me!

A little interesting fact … my husband, Jared, is not only a great farmer but he’s also a land surveyor at Burse Surveying & Engineering.  Every spring Julie from the Farmacy sends Jared the plan for the maze.  He programs it into CAD so once the corn has grown a bit he can go in and use his total station to cut out the design.  It’s a great partnership between farms!  This years theme is “Country Barn Dance”!

 

September 24th Events nearby:

Brew-B-Que in Lodi

Heritage Fest in Windsor

 

And with that – you have your weekend forecast!  I hope the orchard is in your plans!

 

PS!  Have you gotten our new app yet? It’s called “Apple Love” and it’s meant to be a companion to you on your visit or before you visit to get you more informed about all the apples we have.  Each morning I will update what apples are “In Season” (in the shop now), “See you Next Year” (done for the 2016 season), and “Coming Soon” (apples we have to pick).  If we sell out of apples during the day I won’t be able to update the app until the morning. 

This comes directly from the Wisconsin Apple Grower Association Cookbook.

Sometimes the name of an apple says it all. And that’s true of Honeycrisp, a honey sweet (with a touch of tart) yet amazingly crisp apple developed in Minnesota.

Honeycrisp was produced from a 1960 cross of Macoun and Honeygold, as part of the University of Minnesota apple breeding program to develop winter hardy cultivars with high fruit quality. The original seedling was planted in 1962 at the University of Minnesota Horticulture Research Center and since 1981, the variety has grown in popularity.

This cool climate-loving apple grows exceptionally well in the Midwest, developing large fruit with a mottled red color over a red background.

Its flesh is creamy to yellow colored and coarse with flavor ranging from mild and well balanced to strongly aromatic, depending on the degree of maturity. It has consistently ranked as one of the highest quality apples in the University of Minnesota sensory studies.

Honeycrisp fruit has shown excellent storage characteristics and is harvested in Wisconsin from late September until mid-October. The outstanding flavor and texture can be maintained for at least six months in refrigerated storage without atmosphere modifications.

It was an amazing weekend at the orchard! We had the most beautiful weather and lots of fun people and families visiting us. On Saturday morning I attended the Sun Prairie Farmer's Market. It was my first week there with cider and I'm pretty sure people were happy about that. If you ever decide to head over there on a Saturday morning be sure to not only get some apples from me, but try out the scones from Market Street Bakery...they are AMAZING (there apple pies and cheese bread are wonderful too)!

I spent the afternoon at the orchard helping out customers. Kelsey watched the girls for us, thank goodness. We're just so busy it's hard to keep an eye on both of them. Frank helped an old friend of his and got him hooked on mac's. As a treat, he sent him home with a sample Honeycrisp. I would say about 20 to 30 minutes later the gentleman was back...we had him hooked. I believe his exact words were, "It is better than steak!".

I can't remember if it was Saturday or Sunday, but we also had a mom and a daughter (I believe) that made me laugh...they had printed out our webpage and had done research before they came on the apples they wanted to try! I love a prepared person. It is so much like something that I would do! Thanks for stopping if you're reading this...it was fun!

Frank also picked the girls pumpkins on Saturday night. It was so adorable! He was so proud of them. He had to carry them both in and make sure to set them up for there pictures. So cute! Earlier, when the pumpkins were still green they had carved the girls' names into the pumpkins. As they grew that names turned scar-like. They're super neat. Be sure to look at them when you come into the store (window sill to your left as you walk in).

People went crazy with the raspberry picking this weekend! The berries were plentiful and everyone had a good time. Stop by tomorrow or later this week to pick your own fresh raspberries!

Cedi's awake, have to end my blogging for this morning. Have a good week everyone!

From Blog

From Blog

Things are going very well at the orchard! We have been keeping busy at the store and in the orchard. Jared managed to get off for a partial day yesterday so I went over to pick with him. I found some honeycrisp that are literally the size of softballs! Amazing! My parents have also been here for the past few days helping with the girls and picking. The cooler is starting to fill up and things are getting done! Jared also has off today so things should really get going. I found him an empire (his favorite) to try yesterday and he is going to be picking some for me today. We'll see if he has any other new variety for us today...

We have our second group coming to the orchard this morning. I'm sure they'll have fun! I'm heading to the DeForest Farmer's Market this evening with more apples than last week. I don't want to run out again (well, at least not until 7!)

I would write in more detail but I have to get moving....it's apple season!

Unfortunately mother nature has determined that I will not be heading to the Sun Prairie's Farmer's Market this morning. I do apologize. It's just too rainy and it looks like it's going to continue to be that way for the rest of the morning and into the afternoon. I would like to note that the apple store is OPEN! So, feel free to take a short day trip up the orchard to pick up your apples (Honeycrisp, gala, cortland, mcintosh, wealthy, spartan, fuji, paulared, NW Greening and wolf rivers), cider, and caramel apples. We would love to see you there.

Hello All! I'm taking a quick breather to update you on the lastest happenings in the orchard! Jared got today off from work and picked apples all day...I looked outside and the trailer is really full! I came with him in the morning to help pick and we started on the Gala's. They're absolutely beautiful and delicious! Then we decided to see how the Honeycrisp were doing...well, they are DONE, READY, JUICY, DELICIOUS, and we picked them. They are currently for sale on the shelves of our store.

After I finished picking some apples I went to the store to help Diane sort and run the store. Our neighbors were busy getting things out for our upcoming garage sale (starting tomorrow and running through Saturday). We stayed fairly busy throughout the afternoon. Frank headed out to the Waunakee market and we got the first of our pumpkins out. It's really starting to look like fall at the orchard!

Well, I have a few minutes to grab a bite to eat! Hope to see you soon!