Every so often I remember that as a kid, I didn’t like peanut butter and I’m shocked anew by how much I’ve changed. These days, I am a little bit obsessed with it. And by “a little bit,” I mean “a lot.” My obsession goes beyond peanut butter to all sorts of nut butters. Nutella? Yes, please. Sunflower seed butter?
Little orphan boys like Oliver aren’t the only ones craving extra bowls of porridge this time of year, especially when the porridge is a warming bowl of oatmeal. The humble bowl of oats earned a health halo in the 1980s when researchers noted that the soluble fiber in oat bran helped lower “bad” LDL cholesterol in people who consumed it.
Q: Why is the skin loose and puffy on some of my tangerines? A: Those are delicious satsuma mandarin oranges! They have a naturally loose, sometimes bumpy peel. At first glance, people sometimes think they’ve gone bad—but they’re oh-so-good and super easy to peel—just zip the skin off, and eat.
Chocolate surrounds us. We treat ourselves with it. We use it to express our devotion to the ones we love. We crave it, we adore it—but how often do we think about where it comes from? Like many of our everyday foods, chocolate starts with a plant. The evergreen cacao tree grows in the warm, humid understory of tropical rainforests
There is more to fruit than meets the taste buds. The vitamins, phytochemicals, and fruit acids that make fruit so healthy can also be effective ingredients in homemade beauty products, natural cleaners, and other household mixtures. We’ve scoured the web, hit up our friends, and raided our own recipe boxes for ways to take the fruit out of the fruit bowl
The Lunch Lady is not dogmatic about breakfast. The Lunch Lady believes that if you eat breakfast and it works for you – i.e., you are maintaining your weight and health – that’s awesome. And if you’re not eating breakfast but are staying healthy and at a healthy weight, well, that’s great too. However, after years of a breakfast that consisted
Q: How can I tell when my stone fruit is ripe (or ready to eat)? A: To protect stone fruit during delivery, such as peaches, plums, nectarines, and apricots, we send it to you on the slightly underripe side. Stone fruit continues to ripen after picking and should be stored at room temperature away from sunlight and heat until it gives softly to
Today’s strawberry, Fragaria ananassa, with its large, practically perfect berries is the culmination of selective breeding going back centuries to when strawberries were tiny, rare, and found only at the peak of summer. Strawberries are mentioned in works by Virgil and Ovid, yet they made no appearance in ancient Roman cookbooks. By the 14th century, the tiny European wood strawberry
The mason jar—that humble, old-fashioned glass canning jar—has taken the place of the bento box as the latest lunchtime accessory. And why not? Using a quart-size jar as a container for salad is a great idea. The classic lines of the canning jar are the perfect backdrop for a salad built upon colorful layers of veggies, herbs, and greens. If
Q: Is it true that The FruitGuys is not offering vegetables anymore? A: After five years of providing the best mix of excellent organic produce that we could find each week, we have decided to discontinue offering vegetables and get back to our fruit roots. Our last delivery of mixes containing organic vegetables was on Thursday, January 30, 2014. We
Valentine’s Day may have been co-opted by greeting card companies, chocolate makers, and the romantic love-crowd, but there are so many different kinds of love that I’d argue for a more inclusive approach to this holiday. There’s the overwhelming, almost visceral love a parent feels for a child. There is the love one feels for fellow humankind—including ones’ co-workers (even
What fruit has the vitamin C of an orange, the potassium of half a banana, and the fiber of a half-cup of bran flakes? Hint: It’s furry. Answer: Kiwi. Enjoy kiwis by peeling and slicing, or cut latitudinally and scoop out green (or yellow) flesh with a spoon.
A hybrid developed in 1958 at UC Riverside, yellow oro blanco gets its puffy coat from pomelo and sweet spritzy flavor from white grapefruit. Its thick skin and mild, seedless flesh create a nice combo of easy-peel and wakeup taste. No snooze button here.
A happy accident! Discovered in a pear orchard in Nelson, New Zealand, in 1986, Taylor’s Gold is thought to be a “sport” (a variety or strain resulting from another variety) of the Comice pear. Sweet and fragrant, with smooth, russeted skin and creamy, rich flesh.
You wouldn’t want to bite into the iridescent precious stone opal, but you would an Opal apple. Hailing from a cross of the Golden Delicious and Topaz apples, the Opal’s sweet-tangy and extra crunchy flesh is hidden behind a bright golden-yellow peel with the slightest hint of russeting near the stem.
We asked The FruitGuys staffers to pony up with their favorite Thanksgiving side dishes. And maybe we’re all watching a little too much Netflix, but all the recipes featured a main ingredient with a certain stand-out hue that just so happens to be front and center of a new Netflix-exclusive show. See if you can guess the color that ties
A herald of winter in many regions is the persimmon. Where the rain or even sleet has begun, the bare persimmon tree, with its orange ornaments, makes a striking silhouette against the grey horizon. These fruits can stand a chill; as the old farmer saying goes, “Persimmons grow where mangos fear to tread.” The common persimmon is native to the
Q: Why do some of my apples have brown patches on the top? Are they still good to eat? What about the spots on pears? A: It is known as russeting. Russeting is a brownish, corky or netlike texture that appears on many apple and pear varieties. It ranges in coverage from a small patch, typically near the top of the
Love the satisfying crunch of an apple and the sweet juicy flesh of a pear? Then you’re going to fall head over heels for the unique Crunchy Gold apple-pear from California’s family-run Kingsburg Orchards! Crunchy Gold apple pears are a special type of Asian pear (aka Nashi)—they’re bright yellow with a smooth texture and thin skin, like that of an
“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.” —Martin Luther (1483–1546, a German monk and church reformer) In a world awash with Red Delicious apples grown for their size, color, durability, and profitability—but definitely not their flavor—keeping heirloom apple varieties alive is vitally important. In Sebastopol, CA (Sonoma County),
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