The Baboon Congress

First Fruits

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Today’s guest post comes from Edith.

On July 8, 2013, I tasted my first raspberry.

Well, not my first raspberry ever. Not even my first raspberry this year – that is, if you count frozen raspberries that you buy in a bag at the grocery store. It was the first raspberry I picked and ate in my backyard this year.

Fresh_raspberries

Last year, 2012, was very hot and very dry. I seemed to spend hours every week moving sprinklers around, trying to get enough moisture to my poor raspberry plants, as well as the herbs, currant and gooseberry bushes, and flowers. It didn’t work. Normally I get a nice summer crop of raspberries and a seemingly unending and unlimited supply of fall raspberries starting in late August or early September and continuing until November, unless there is a severe frost earlier. Last year, not only was I cruelly disappointed by my “crop” of black currants (a couple handfuls at most) and gooseberries (three. yes, three gooseberries), but the always-dependable raspberries did not do what they’ve always done. The summer crop was sort of okay, but the fall crop was small and pitiful. Normally what I put in the freezer lasts quite a few months, but the small amount I had last year was gone before Thanksgiving.

So today when I spied a few red berries, I picked them and popped them in my mouth.

Man! The sweetness! The flavor! Such a sweet and tangy, lush, juicy explosion of everything that makes a raspberry perfect.

There is nothing like a raspberry that you pick and eat while still warm from the sun (although the ones I pick on a nippy morning in late October might be even better). And looking at the amount of raspberries that are still green and hard, I should be enjoying them for a few weeks to come, until they take some time off, and then come back with even more abundance in the fall.

I look forward to the first taste of raspberries all winter and spring and today it was everything I had hoped for.

What’s your favorite fresh-picked food?

81 thoughts on “First Fruits”

  1. My favourite? Oh definitely a perfect peach……in fact I was talking about that earlier today and I think I will now go and write about it…….

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  2. Raspberries is the list topper but its hard to throw sweet corn and watermelon under the bus
    I used to pick sweet corn as a kid and at the end of the day of pickin the owner of re fields would sometimes bring a truckload of watermelons and let us al eat till we were done
    Nothin better on a hot sweaty day

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  3. Good morning. Any kind of fresh picked fruit is great. Right now what I would really like is a ripe tomato straight off the vine. I did find one that I brought in to ripen in the house because I didn’t want any thing to get it. There is always a chance that something might get to a tomato before I can pick it if I let it completely ripen on the vine. When there are more tomatoes that are nearly ripe I will start letting them ripen on the vine. I think I will grow some cherry tomatoes next year because I think some of those ripen earlier than the bigger tomatoes. I prefer full sized tomatoes, but I wouldn’t object to growing cherry tomatoes if they ripen early before there are any ripe larger tomatoes.

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    1. Now and then during full tomato season I will find a lovely, low-hanging tomato with little rodent teeth marks or bites taken from it. Infuriating!

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      1. Well, I’ve given up trying to grow tomatoes. Between the dog and the squirrels, there were never enough for me.

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  4. Since the question asks about “fresh-picked food,” you gotta put sweet corn in there. Preferably bought at one of those little stands along the side of the road where they pick in the morning and sell out by noon.

    But let’s stay with fruit. When I was a kid growing up in Ames we had a number of vacant lots. One of them that was walking distance from our first home had wild raspberries, both the black ones and the red ones. That’s as good as it gets.

    But later I fell in love with Concord grapes. Many homes had grape vines on the fence next to the alley. Kids in those days owned the alleys. That’s where we played all the time. And it never occurred to us that there was anything wrong with grabbing fresh Concord grapes as we played. And here I insert a little PS: I have Concord grapes growing on my back fence now. When they turn ripe I’ll drop a note here so y’all can swoop in and eat them before the birds get them.

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    1. I remember hearing Garrison Keillor talking about sweet corn on PHC once – he described eating sweet corn that was cooked minutes after it was picked. “Sex is not as good as that.”

      (That may not be an exact quote.)

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        1. Well, I didn’t want to picture a pretty little girl eating her boogers, so there. I guess we’re even.

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  5. Morning all. I grew up in a big city (yes, much bigger than Twin Cities) so I don’t have too much “fresh picked” experience. I’ve picked strawberries, raspberries and the various produce from gardens over the years (beans, peppers, tomatoes). While I think a fresh strawberry that goes straight from the bush to the mouth is about as good as it gets, my favorite picking memory is actually wild blueberries in Wisconsin. My dad’s family settled in northern Wisconsin when they came over from Europe and my great great grandparents built “the homestead” at the turn of the last century. As a kid, we vacationed there most summers and that meant that most summers we picked blueberries. All us kids (various cousins and siblings) would be given bowls and sent out back to “the field”. We’d pick and eat, pick and eat until we got tired and then we take whatever berries survived in our bowls back to the house. Then my great great Aunt Iva would make blueberry pies. Nothing has ever been better than those blueberry days!

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  7. How can you possibly pick just one favorite? I was lucky enough to grow up in a place where we could pick all kinds of fresh fruit. A crisp apple, picked straight from the tree, nothing better. A ripe pear, freshly picked, is so vastly different from the ones you buy in stores Or ripe plums and cherries, so delicious. Wild blueberries and tiny wild strawberries must surely be near the top of my list. And let’s not forget homegrown tomatoes, picked and eaten while still warm from the sun, heavenly.

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  8. Whatever has just ripened. But I will have to admit the first raspberry is something, Edith.
    I’m not being original here, but sweet corn a few hours from the field can’t be beat. And a warm tomato – some people do salt and pepper, others do a little sugar and cream!

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    1. When he was a boy of about 8, my dad walked about with a salt shaker in his back pocket so he could always snag a fresh tomato, salt it and eat it on the spot.

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  10. Rise and Shine Baboons!

    This is like having to choose a favorite child. C’mon Edith! I love them all. And how did you find fresh raspberries from your cell? I am getting quite suspicious that you break out from time to time!

    There is a list here:

    Kohlrabi–in season at this very minute. Pick it, strip the leaves, peel it and slice. Eat it raw with salt. It is best when you take the knife and salt shaker with you to the garden, prepare it and eat it while standing in the garden. (As children at Grandma’s house, we would steal her salt shaker, spirit it out of the kitchen, pick the veggie and peel it with our teeth, then eat it like an apple with the purloined saltshaker. Stealing the saltshaker seemed to add excellence to the experience. And after she raised 8 children and 39 grandchildren we all believed we were fooling her. Really?)

    Raspberries–no more to say except that my new patch is taking off nicely and producing a few. Next year….

    Carrots–fresh from the garden they are wonderful. They do not even taste like those vile “baby carrots” sold in bags at the store. HMMMPH.

    TOMATOES–MMMMM

    Sweet Corn–heaven

    I agree with all listed by others as well.

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    2. This is not my original question, Jacque. Dale suggested it. So blame him for making you try to choose just one. 🙂

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  11. Ooh, I just remembered when visiting my sister in Bay Area Calif – apricot tree in the back yard with fruit just falling off – such succulent and sweet apricots!

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  12. couldnt help thinking of that pretty little girl in first grade who loved eating freshly picked buggers. she was so cute but she thought she was concealing it form us as she slyly slid that finger in there and hit her mouth on the way back don all in one fluid motion. as an occasional snot snuffer i can relate but timing is everything.

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  14. I love having raspberry canes, but I’m always a little disappointed in the summer crop. The canes that are bearing now were in their prime last fall. This year they are a little tired and contemplating retirement. The berries taste fine, but they’re a little on the small side and are thus more labor-intensive to harvest. I look forward to the fall crop.

    I love cherry tomatoes, off the vine, into the mouth, an explosion of seeds and juice. Aaaah.

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  15. I just came in from my little garden with a small handful of beans, a sweet red pepper and a some of my hot loco peppers. I’m thinking maybe some salsa today!

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        1. That’s another good combination. I believe it’s also known as Texas Caviar Salsa, or something like that. A little lime juice is always good in salsa says she who’d rather eat salsa than chocolate! I know! That’s almost heresy on this trail, but there you have it.

          O.T. – Have spent the afternoon cooking for a friend who fell and broke his left shoulder yesterday. Anyone know of anyone who has a small microwave oven they’re not using and would be willing to lend us for a couple of months?

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        2. pineapple or some sweet citrus are my longtime favorite partners of my tomato based stuff. olives makse an interesting sidestep that unsalsas it a bit but yum

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      2. No beans in the salsa. In fact, I have just a few so I might grill them and douse them with balsamic vinegar. Lisa brought some grilled beans to book club last week and they were delicious!

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  16. First task this morning is to go out yet again and pick raspberries. Ours are ripening at an alarming pace, and we have picked about a gallon thus far. I freeze them on baking sheets and put them in bags. Today I plan to make a raspberry pie. The Washington peaches are in at our grocery store, and they are great this year and the ones we bought yesterday are destined for a pie, too.

    We had really good luck with peas this year, and I love eating them raw right off the vine. Our terrier had a treat last night as husband was shelling peas. Every time he put an empty pod in the bowl by his side, the dog would delicately remove it and chew it and then spit it out. She did this with multiple empty pods. I guess it was sort of like chlorophyll chewing gum. She also likes to nibble up the stray peas that get dropped in the shelling process.. We have to keep her out of the garden when the green beans are ready, as she likes to graze on them, too.

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    1. My cousins and I wiped out the peas in my Grandmother’s garden one year. Didn’t know we were doing anything wrong. At a slightly more mature age, we helped the adults shell peas and tried to sail the pods in her brook. They weren’t terribly sea-worthy.

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      2. When I was a kid, we used to have pea pod fights. After shelling peas, there would be a bushel basket or more of pea pods. We would haul it out by the clothesline and have at it, throwing pea pods at each other in a big free-for-all.

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    2. Back when I lived in a cooler climate, my mom could grow peas all summer long – it never got too hot for them. I don’t think she let me pick them very often because I would eat so many of them straight out of the pods.

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    3. I freeze raspberries the same way, Renee. Not to brag, however, but just the other evening, I got two gallons of raspberries just from picking from one side of one patch (it was the more prolific side, on the sunny side). I think all the rain we had earlier this spring and summer has really made the berries go wild, at least in my yard. I’m not complaining.

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  18. Inspired by VS’s straw bale garden last year, I have 3 experimental bales by the alley this year, trying to see if there’s enough sun now that my elm is gone. It was a thrill to harvest a couple of cherry tomatoes and one big one. The latter had blossom end rot but I salvaged the good part. I don’t know how impressive my total harvest will be but it is fun to watch the process.

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    1. A friend from my other book club stopped by yesterday to look at my bales. She says she’s going to experiment with one or two next year. I feel like the Pied Piper!

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  19. I am stretching this a bit to fit the topic, but I have been giggling about it since Thursday and need to tell. My dad indulged in a nice summer treat this week. I was on the phone with my mom on Thursday and she said “You’ll never guess what your dad did this week. He bought a new car!” He turned 92 in June. Two weeks ago he told me he thought he was failing, as he was so tired all the time and was having more chest pains. Well,on Tuesday he drove his 2009 Chevy Cobalt to the dealer in town for a trade in,and told the young salesman “Go out to the lot and pick out a car that you think I might like.” The young man drove up with a bright red Chevy Sonic sedan, and Dad drove it home. He also is determined that he and my mom need a 42 inch HDTV to replace their aged TV.. I am glad my son and his wife are visiting them this weekend so he can help pick out a new, perhaps somewhat smaller TV and get it all up and working for his grandparents. I guess my dad isn’t done on this earth just yet.

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      1. No, his town has about 4500 people. He still drives in Sioux Falls sometimes, but he is so familiar with that city since he has been driving there for 60 years or so.

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    4. By the way, Renee, as far as I know, you don’t need to try to fit things to the topic. You can always preface it with “OT” (for Off Topic).

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    1. Food, Glorious Food
      Hot sausage and mustard
      While we’re in the mood
      Cold porridge and custard!

      THe musical Oliver. Perhaps an apt Baboon Theme song.

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      1. I think that’s part of what drew me to this group – not only the easy-going attitudes and humor, but people that – like me – love good food and books!

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  23. Greetings! Fun blog again today — FOOD AGAIN! I second everything said above. I remember my parents had a big raspberry patch so we would have fresh raspberries on our cereal in summer. I really miss that. They also had a big garden (it seemed huge when we had to weed it) and several apple and pear trees, so I remember always having fresh picked fruits and veggies. Loved Kohlrabi! My dad would always plant lots of green onions, and he would douse them with salt and chomp away.
    When I had my EarthBoxes in full swing, I couldn’t wait for my first taste of Purple Cherokee heirloom tomatoes — a wonder of glorious tomato taste and texture. I’ve got only two earth boxes out on the sidewalk of our townhome, but they’re not heirlooms. I waited too long to plant so ended up with ordinary tomatoes from local stores. Homegrown tomatoes rule!

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  24. Thelma and Louise just made it home. A wonderful time was had. Daughter can drive on the interstate and in a major city. Now I can relax.

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    1. The girls said that they ran into an irritable US border guard who wanted to know why they went to Winnipeg for a vacation. Daughter said “My parent met there.” Best friend then added “It was LOVE.” The border guard wasn’t amused.;

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  25. last night was like discovering a patch of berries growing on the side of my yard last week. what a nice surprise to see clyde back on the trail. when i first read his entry i registered ben and was wondering for a while why everyone was welcoming ben, hed been missing for a day or two but he has all those shows to deal with… then the light bulb above my head lights up and i realize its clyde. a little like discovering berries when you were expecting none it was ony a coffee cups worth but..how pleasant.

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  26. Morning all!

    Perfect for this weekend’s topic…. I had raspberries and tomatoes for breakfast. A handful of raspberries from my little canes and my first three ripe grape tomatoes! YUM.

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