Catskill Maison Bed & Breakfast

Hector cherry picking at Bohringer Fruit Farm

It’s finally that time of the year where the farmstands in the Catskills are up and running!  No more schlepping  to Whole Foods for produce from California and Chile, my strawberries are being picked by yours truly!  This past week has been the last week of cherry picking.  Cherry picking season is really special in the Catskill Mountains and Hudson Valley because the season is really short (about 2 weeks long).  At Catskill Maison Bed and Breakfast we pride ourselves on picking our own fruit.  Hector and I went to Bohringer Fruit Farm in Middleburgh to get Strawberries last week and found out it was day 1 of cherry picking season…so despite the constant threat of thunderstorms I insisted that we pick because a week later they would be gone forever.  Hector, not being a fan of cherries wasn’t a happy camper about this excursion, but being the supportive boyfriend that he is, he caved into my desire to pick and rolled up his sleeves.

So the Brooklyn boy and I picked for about 3 hours and got 16 quarts of cherries!  AND Hector who thought that cherries were nasty and bitter ate almost as many as he picked!  Rule of thumb (and I know I preach this all the time)…local farm produce tastes VERY different from that stuff you get in the supermarket.

The Greenmarkets in NYC are chock full of local produce right now as well as town farmers markets in Westchester, LI, and NJ!  Head to your neighborhood market and support the local farmers.