Article
How Sweet Fall Is
Discover Berry Hill Fruit Farm and R-Grow Farms. You'll find the recipes that complement this feature - Plum & Sausage Kebabs, Thai Curry Sweet Potato Soup and Sweet Potato, Maple & Pecan Tarts - in the recipe section below the article.
Little Jack Horner sure had it right! But don't wait until Christmas to enjoy these fragrant little jewels - they're in season now in Ontario. Enjoy their sweet, tart flavour in both desserts and savoury dishes, like Plum and Sausage Kebabs (see recipes, below). Several local farmers grow plums, including Berry Hill Fruit Farm in Aylmer, featured here.
Berry Hill’s on-farm market is not your typical tiny farm gate stand – it is HUGE! It is also surrounded by a wonderful variety of fruit trees and other crops as far as the eye can see.
Berry Hill is a big operation, but maintains a personal touch that visitors value. Farmer Dick Saarloos began planting his orchard of apples, peaches, plums, pears, strawberries and raspberries almost thirty years ago. Wife Renee works both on and off the farm and specializes in marketing their produce. The Kraan family are long-term employees and an integral part of Berry Hill – Alice’s infectious smile and enthusiasm are a welcome part of a visit to Berry Hill or the markets where their products are sold.
More recent additions to the items grown at Berry Hill include sweet corn, tomatoes, potatoes, green beans and melons. On an early September visit to the farm, in search of plum pictures, I found both Dick and Renee eager to show off their crops. Renee pointed out one patch of luscious-looking ever-bearing strawberries – there’s something to look forward to at fall market!
The trees of earlier plum varieties had been picked clean, but Farmer Dick, seeming to know where every tree in the orchard was located, readily directed me toward a blue plum tree laden with fruit. He chatted about the effects of a winter cold snap or a sudden hot spell on the different fruits, noting the brown spot at the centre of a plum that can appear when they are heat-stressed. He emphasized that a plum picked too soon will never develop as much flavour – he likes to leave them on the tree for as long as possible for the best taste.
Dick notes that 60% of Berry Hill’s products are sold at market (their own and at local farmers' markets) and 40% to local stores. A key to marketing their produce has been to develop good partnerships with local retailers. He notes one such positive relationship, supplying seasonal strawberries to Briwood Market in St. Thomas, has lasted twenty years.
Renee and Alice (pictured above) both recommend the best way to serve plums is whole in the hand, ripe and fresh. They are prepared, though, if you would like to do something more fancy, with a whole binder full of complimentary recipes through the seasons for plums and all their other produce.
Berry Hill Fruit Farm is located at 48937 Glencolin Line , Aylmer. They are also regulars at the St. Thomas Farmers’ Market and Aylmer Farmers' Market on Saturday mornings. For more information, call 519.765.1752.
Plum Facts
- Japanese and European type plums are grown in Ontario. Both are fine for eating but the European types (blue and blue prune) are also well suited to cooking and are often available into October.
- Plums are often the base for delicious baked goods and sauces, or as a meat and game complement.
- The first Thanksgiving dinner menu included plums.
- To ripen firm fruit, store at room temperature in a loosely closed paper bag.
Source: Foodland Ontario and The Ontario Tender Fruit Producers (www.ontariotenderfruit.com)
R-Grow Farms in West Lorne is owned by Leo and Monika Rastapkevicius. They grow sweet corn, muskmelons, seeded and seedless watermelons, ornamental pumpkins and gourds, sweet potatoes and cash crops.
Leo’s family had grown tobacco in Elgin County for many years. However, when Monika and Leo went into farming together, following graduation from the Agricultural Program at the University of Guelph, they decided to look seriously at alternatives. They experimented with a small acreage of several different alternative crops and over the years have expanded on the ones they found best fit their operation.
At the Horton Market it is obvious that R-Grow is very much a family operation and their children enjoy bringing their produce to “market.” Daughter Anita works efficiently, ever attentive to customers, while Joe works intently at marketing packages of cut-up melon. Monika notes, they also help with seeding in the greenhouse, washing trays, picking product in the field and packaging in the barn. The best job perk is watermelon tasting!
In total, the Rastapkevicius family farms 450 acres, 125 acres of which are fruit and vegetables (sweet corn, muskmelons, seeded and seedless watermelons, ornamental pumpkins and gourds and sweet potatoes) and the remainder cash crops.
Monika notes, they are very enthusiastic about the “buy local, eat fresh” movement and enjoy promoting products “grown close to home.” They are currently in the process of becoming a verified MyPicks vendor through Farm Markets Ontario.
R-Grow’s customers are their neighbours – the family takes quality, flavour and freshness seriously. That means: hand-harvesting, careful handling during packaging and delivery and use of environmentally sensitive production techniques. They are participants in the Environmental Farm Plan, use Integrated Pest Management Techniques, and grow crops using alternative practices such as ground covers, row covers, crop rotation as well as mechanical and manual cultivators.
When it comes to sweet potatoes, the family enjoys baked sweet potato fries, sweet potato muffins and sweet potato pie. Says Monika, “Move over pumpkins, sweet potato pie is delicious!!”
You will find R-Grow Farms with their produce at the Horton Farmers’ Market in St. Thomas and the Masonville Farmers’ Market in London. It is also available at several local grocery stores.
Photos (left to right): fall decorations available from R-Grow at the Horton Market; sweet potatoes; Monika, Anita & Joe; sweet potato, maple & pecan tarts (recipe below)
Sweet Potato Facts
Monika Rastapkevicius provides a few fast facts on this new darling of the vegetable world.
- Many people are surprised to find that sweet potatoes can be grown in Ontario. What is sometimes marketed in Ontario as a yam is truly a sweet potato.
- A true yam is a starchy edible root that is rough and scaly and very low in beta carotene. Yams are generally imported to North America from the Caribbean. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, sweet potatoes and yams are not one and the same.
- Sweet potatoes are smooth with skin colours that can vary from pale yellow to deep purple to vivid orange. The internal flesh colours can also range from light yellow to pink, red or orange.
- Sweet potatoes with the vivid orange colour flesh and skin are what we see most often in our Ontario grocery stores. Other varieties of sweet potatoes that are lighter skinned have a firmer, drier texture when cooked.