IN FRUIT
Mangoes continue to be our main focus at Harris Farm and this week - it’s all about Honeygolds, either the not inexpensive extra-large stack fruit or the mixed size imperfect fruit, both definitely the best eating fruit in our stores at this stage. Our Australian grapes get sweeter every week and strawberries are finally coming good, however this will be one of those years they will be in short supply for Christmas. I shared the very large 400g clear plastic punnet (marked Majestic) strawberries with friends last weekend and I thought it was the best strawberry I had eaten since July. That experience certainly totally debunks the theory that big strawberries have no flavour, they are so big they would not fit in a regular punnet, yet superb eating. This is very nearly the time when Australian limes become cheap. This week our Aussie limes are the same price as the imported USA product, by next week our limes will be cheaper. Passionfruit and Panama passionfruit are falling in price, look for bargains in the nets next week. Not a lot of premium passionfruit this season as a new disease up North is downgrading the quality and appearance of the harvest. For the best stonefruit option with regard to both flavour and value, my pick is the yellow nectarines, however all peaches and nectarines are pretty good this week. I had a Caprese salad with our Shaw River buffalo Mozzarella and Honeygold mango on the weekend, it was fabulous!
IN VEGETABLE
A number of people have asked me what happened to the ‘Sweet Pep’ chillies from New Zealand that were two pieces in a plastic wrap in previous years. We do have them again this year but no longer in plastic (which we don’t like) and now loose on the stack. In fact they are not a chilli at all but are a sweet capsicum that our grower calls Sweetpoints and are part of the Palermo capsicums. We will refer to them (correctly) in store as Sweetpoints going from now on. They look like what we sell in winter as red bullhorn chillies but are far sweeter. On the Barby with olive oil and salt they look and taste sensational! Meanwhile snow peas and broccolini have eased in price this week. Cucumbers remain very reasonable in price and if you like to do your own gherkins there are two windows to do this a couple of weeks right now and again in early March. Fresh peas have been good and reasonable of late, look for an in-store on the day bargain over the next week. They always get dear again for Christmas.
