Plant Starts for Sale at the Orchard

One of the nice new signs Shoko made for the farm stand.

We have lots of organically grown seedlings from Peas and Harmony for sale now at the orchard.  The plant stand is full of many varieties of big healthy tomato plants, including heirloom, cherry, paste, slicing types. There are also pepper and eggplant seedlings and herbs.

Navel oranges, grapefruit, lemons, and eggs are for sale at the farm stand.  We've been busy in the orchard doing spring tasks such as fixing water boxes, hanging pheromone tags, thinning peaches, mowing grass and making rows in the vegetable gardens.  During the past few weeks we've planted zucchini, beans, and the first of the tomato seedlings.

Hoshigaki & Meat Buyer's Club

Viviano digging at the edge of his great-grandmother's garden with the chickens.

We're no longer sending out hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon) through mail order.  This season's supply is getting low and the weather is  warm enough that the sugar formed on the outside may melt in shipping.  If you can visit the fruit stand, you can still pick some up or you can wait until October 2012 when we begin taking mail orders again.  Our orchard is open through out the year growing other seasonal fruit and vegetables.  Feel free to visit the farm stand or come take a walk in the orchard.  

The Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club will deliver naturally raised local meat, eggs, honey and other local products to our orchard on March 16th. To make an order for the Meat Buyers Club, place your order online by Friday, March 9th at 5:00 PM.

We have a lot of citrus fruit and kiwi for sale at the fruit stand.   

Here's what's at the fruit stand now: 

• Mandarins--owari satsuma 
• Navel Oranges
• Blood Oranges
• Grapefruit
• Lemons--Meyer and Eureka
  
• Kiwi 
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• Eggs

Blooming trees

Shoko planting trees.

It's a good time to visit the orchard and come take a walk. Plum trees are in bloom with white fluffy flowers and the peach trees are just starting to put out pink blossoms.  By the end of this week the orchard should be full of pink and white flowering trees.

Unfortunately, it's been a very dry winter and spring, so we had to start irrigation for the trees earlier than usual. The trees needed more water before blossoming.  

During the past few weeks we've finished pruning the last trees, like the persimmon and olive trees.  We've also planted around 70 new trees, mostly peaches and few plums. We plan to hang pheromones in the stone fruit trees for the first time this year to hopefully help with pest control.

In the gardens we're starting to make rows for planting.  The first tomato seedlings are growing in the hot house.  We usually plant out tomato seedlings around April 15th, depending on the weather.

Oranges & Grapefruit

Ume branches in bloom (Japanese sour plum)

Blood oranges and grapefruit are now picked and at the fruit stand.  If you like soft persimmons, we have the very last ones of the season now.  We're still selling hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon) at the fruit stand and through mail order, while supplies last.  Maybe hoshigaki would make a good Valentines or Chinese new year gift?

 The next delivery for the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club will be at our orchard from 4:00 - 5:00 on Friday, Feb. 17th. Orders need to be received by Fri.,  Feb. 10th at 5:00.  Through the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club you can order local naturally grown pork and lamb, grass-fed beef, pastured poultry, eggs, honey and other local products. 

Here's what's at the fruit stand now:

• Mandarins--owari satsuma
  
• Navel Oranges
• Blood Oranges
• Lemons
• Kiwi
• Hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon) 
• Soft Persimmons
  
• Perfectly Persimmon Cookbook--1004 persimmon recipes by Jean Brine
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• Eggs

Winter Orchard News

We picked the first lemons and kiwi and now have them for sale at the fruit stand. The very last hoshigaki is finishing drying in the last drying room.  We're still taking mail orders for hoshigaki and we have some for sale at the fruit stand.

At the end of last week, we finally got a few days of heavy rain, the first major rain of the winter.  Hopefully the rainfall will catch up to at least the usual amount this year.  Just before the rain it got unusually cold, as you can see in the photo. We had to turn on the irrigation to help protect the citrus from frost, and the spray froze and made interesting patterns.  The ice is supposed to insulate the trees and raise the temperature a few degrees. The first trees are flowering right now, too.  Both the white and pink flowering ume (Japanese plum) started blossoming, and the loquat (biwa) is almost finished.  

Sadly, our rooster was carried away by a coyote and eaten.  On one of the windy, rainy days my daughter heard what she thought sounded like a goose fighting with the chickens by the garden. She looked to see what was going on and saw a coyote carrying the squawking rooster in its mouth and then taking off through the orchard.   The photo in the previous post shows "Blue" the blue Orpington rooster by the edge of the garden where the coyote took him away.

Here's what's at the fruit stand now:

• Mandarins--owari satsuma
  
• Kiwi
• Lemons
• Navel Oranges
• Hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon) 
• Persimmons--Hachiya, Fuyu, Maru (chocolate), Hyakume (all soft now)
• Pomegranates--white variety
• Perfectly Persimmon Cookbook--1004 persimmon recipes by Jean Brine
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• 2012 Master Gardeners Calender
• Eggs

Meat Buyers Club & Late Mandarins & Persimmons

Chickens in the orchard by a mandarin tree.

New at the fruit stand now are navel oranges.  Grapefruit and kiwi should be coming soon. We still have lots of mandarins at the fruit stand, including  owari satsuma and another orange-red variety of satsuma.  Both are sweet and easy to peel mandarins, the difference is that the orange-red satsuma variety is darker on the outside and less acidic.

Surprisingly, there's still a good supply of persimmons at the fruit stand.  We have soft hachiya, firmer vodka-treated hyakume, fuyu and maru ('chocolate') persimmons.  Since both persimmons and mandarins ripened late this year, they're available later than usual. 

In late December KCRA channel 3 News came to visit the orchard to do a story on hoshigaki (Japanese hand dried persimmons).  You can see a slide show on the KCRA website.  The Nikkei West newspaper visited too and has an article about hoshigaki and Otow Orchard on the front page of the current issue.

The last hoshigaki is drying and we're down to only one drying room full now.  We still need to check on the hoshigaki to see how they're drying and massage them every few days until they're finished.  Shoko has been busy packing them up and sending out mail orders.  We're still taking hoshigaki orders for pick up at the fruit stand and by mail order, too.   

The next delivery for the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club will be at our orchard from 4:00 - 5:00 on Friday, Jan. 20th. Orders need to be received by Fri., Jan. 13th at 5:00.  Through the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club you can order local naturally grown pork and lamb, grass-fed beef, pastured poultry, eggs and honey.  New this month are mandarins, navel oranges, meyer lemons and mandarin sauces.  Monthly deliveries are at our orchard in Granite Bay, Community Ink in Truckee,  Confluence Kitchen in Auburn and Sinclair Family Farm in Penryn.

Happy New Year

An old metal tag left in a persimmon tree.

The fruit stand will be closed for New Year's on January 1st and 2nd.   We'll open again on Tuesday, January 3rd, with regular hours.  We remain open through out the winter and spring, from 9-6 Tuesday through Saturday, and 10-5 on Sunday.  Mondays we are closed.

We're still have hoshigaki for sale at the fruit stand, as well as through mail order.  When we stop taking orders we'll post it here on the website.

Mandarins & Persimmons

Chris and her son Toshio check which persimmons
are ready for massaging.

We have owari satsuma mandarins now at the Fruit stand. Owari satsuma mandarins are sweet, juicy and usually seedless with a thin, easy to peel skin. The crop was ready later than usual, like most of the other types of fruit have been this year. 

We're still taking orders for hoshigaki through mail order and for pick up at the fruit stand.  If you'd like to pick up more than a pound of hoshigaki at the fruit stand, please call us ahead of time.  

We stopped peeling new persimmons late last week because most of the hachiya had gotten too soft to peel.  Since we're not able to peel and start any new persimmons for the hoshigaki drying process, the persimmons left drying now make up the end of this year's hoshigaki supply.  In the colder weather, the persimmons take longer to dry, so we expect to be drying these last persimmons at least into the middle of January.  Next year sometime in October we'll begin the process again. 

Around the fruit stand we've been very busy taking care of numerous customers and massaging and packaging hoshigaki.  Out in the orchard most of the fruit besides the citrus has been picked and winter pruning and irrigation repair work has started.  If you come and take a walk through the  orchard you'll see flocks of geese and other birds visiting the trees trying to find un-picked persimmons.  Wind and cold weather has made most of the leaves drop, so you can see through the bare trees down to the strawberry field. 

Here's what's at the fruit stand now:

• Mandarins--owari satsuma
  
• Persimmons--Fuyu, Maru & Nagamaru (chocolate), Vodka-treated Hyakume, Hachiya, Gyombo, Hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon)
• Apples--Pippen, Granny Smith
• Pomegranate--white variety
• Winter Squash--butternut, kabocha, red kuri, buttercup, spaghetti squash, pie pumpkin 
• Local Honey--from bees at our orchard & star thistle honey from Lincoln
• Perfectly Persimmon Cookbook--1004 persimmon recipes by Jean Brine
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• 2012 Master Gardeners Calender
• Eggs

Christmas Hoshigaki, Local Trees & Meat

We can't guarantee Christmas delivery on any hoshigaki mail orders postmarked after December 1st.  We're still taking mail orders but we can't promise that we'll be able to ship out any new orders and have them arrive at the customer or gift recipient address by Dec. 25th.   If you want to give hoshigaki as a Christmas gift, an option would be to let the person know the order is in and request on the mail order form that we mail the order to the gift recipient directly.  We'll do everything  we can to get your order out as soon as possible.

Hoshigaki is still for sale at our fruit stand.  Please call ahead if you'd like to pick up more than a pound at one time so we can set it aside for you.  

The next delivery from the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club at our orchard will be Friday, Dec.  16th from 4:00-5:00. Orders must be sent in by 5:00 PM Friday, Dec. 9th.  Through the Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers Club you can order local grass-fed, hormone free beef, lamb, pork and chicken, as well as eggs, honey, kiwi, mandarin products, and the Placer County Real Food Cookbook.  Orders are made online and then you choose one of four locations to pick up your order.  Locations are Otow Orchard (in Granite Bay), Sinclair Family Farm (in Penryn), Confluence Kitchen (in Auburn) and Community Ink (in Truckee).

The Koyama Tree Farm next door to the orchard is selling Christmas trees this coming weekend and the next only.  The dates are Dec. 3rd and 4th, and Dec. 10th and 11th.  Hours are from 9-4.  These are the only days they'll be open for the season.  You can choose and cut your own tree.  Info about their farm and other local Christmas tree farms is at the PlacerGrown website.

Busy with Hoshigaki

This past week the hoshigaki drying process slowed a bit because of a few days of rain and a string of foggy mornings.  As a result, the persimmons have filled up the drying rooms and we even ran out of sticks to hang the freshly peeled ones on.  Tosh has been making new drying racks and sticks to try to accomodate all the kaki. We converted the cool room that we use when it's  warmer for refrigeration into a drying room, so now we have all the possible inside rooms being used for drying.

The freshly peeled persimmons are first hung on sticks on the outside racks until they're  dry enough to massage.  Then the sticks are usually moved into the hot house, which is a small building used like a green house where we can open the doors and windows and and adjust the temperature and air circulation.  As the sticks of hoshigaki get dryer they're moved through two other drying rooms, then to the final drying and packing room.  In each room the hoshigaki are  massaged to help them dry evenly and remain soft. In the photo at the left you can see freshly peeled persimmons hung on sticks on the outside racks, the hot house is on the right.

Tosh making a new rack

We're still peeling persimmons to start new hoshigaki because the persimmons are still hard enough to peel.  Soon we'll need to stop peeling because the persimmons will either be mostly too ripe to dry well or the weather will be too cool or damp for them to dry well.  Right now we're still taking orders for pick up at the fruit stand or mail order. If you'd like to pick up more than a pound of hoshigaki at out fruit stand, it's a good idea to call ahead. 

When we need to stop taking orders we'll post it here on our web site. 

Fuyus & Hoshigaki

We've been very busy with persimmons lately.  We have boxes and boxes of fuyus and hachiyas that we have to find space for, and now the outside rack and inside drying rooms are filled with sticks of hoshigaki in various stages.  We're still peeling new hachiya and gyombo persimmons to dry, since there are some still hard enough to peel and the weather is still holding up for drying.   The trees are colorful with red, orange and yellow leaves, and it's a good time to visit and take a walk if you can.  It's probably the peak of fuyu persimmon season right now.  We have firm fuyus for sale by the bag at the fruit stand.  We're still taking mail orders for hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon) and accepting orders by phone for pick up at the fruit stand.  If you'd like to buy more than a pound of hoshigaki it's a good idea to call ahead. 
 
Here's what's at the fruit stand now:

• Persimmons--Fuyu, Maru, vodka-treated Hyakume, Hachiya, Hoshigaki
• Apples--Fuji, Pippen, Golden Delicious
• Asian Pear--Okusankichi
• Pomegranate--white and red varieties
• Winter Squash--buttercup, kabocha, red kuri, spaghetti squash, pie pumpkin
• Pumpkins & Gourds  
• Vegetables--green tomatoes, herbs
• Local Honey--from bees at our orchard & star thistle honey from Lincoln
• Eggs
• Perfectly Persimmon Cookbook--1004 persimmon recipes by Jean Brine
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• 2012 Master Gardeners Calender

Vodka Persimmons

We now have finished hyakume vodka-treated persimmons at the fruit stand.  These persimmons are large, yellow-orange and sweet with a mango-like texture.  Each hyakume persimmon has been treated with a few drops of vodka to cause a chemical reaction in the persimmon that changes the astringency (tannic acid) to sweetness (fructose).  Hyakume persimmons are a "pollination-variant non-astringent" type of persimmon that are naturally sweet when pollinated, though not all of the fruits get pollinated.  For more details on this, see the post "How to Eat a Persimmon".

If you'd like to order hoshigaki (Japanese hand-dried persimmon), it's important to get your order in as soon as possible.  It looks like this year's supply will be smaller than last year's,  so at some point we'll have to stop taking new orders.  If you want to order hoshigaki through mail order, please mail in the order form soon.  If you'd like to order hoshigaki to pick up at the fruit stand, please call us as soon as you can.  

The Sierra Foothills Meat Buyers club will make a delivery at our orchard on Friday, Nov. 18th.  Through the Meat Buyers club you can order local and naturally produced beef, pork, lamb, chicken, eggs and honey online, then pick up your order at our orchard, at Community Ink in Truckee, or at Confluence Kitchen in Auburn.  Orders need to be received by Friday, Nov. 11th at 5:00 PM. 

Here's what's at the fruit stand now:

• Persimmons--Fuyu, Maru, Hyakume, Hachiya
• Apples--Fuji, Mutsu, Golden Delicious
• Asian Pear--Okusankichi
• Pomegranate--white variety
• Winter Squash--butternut, kabocha (various types), red kuri, buttercup, spaghetti squash, pie pumpkin
• Pumpkins & Gourds (at the fruit stand and at the pumpkin patch)  
• Vegetables--tomatoes, peppers, oregano, mint
• Local Honey--from bees at our orchard & star thistle honey from Lincoln
• Eggs
• Placer County Real Food Cookbook--by Joanne Neft and Laura Kenny
• 2012 Master Gardeners Calender