This Will Probably Be the Last Weekend of Major Apple Picking; Come Pick Your Own Mutsu, Spy, Cortland, Rome Beauty; Cut Your Own Brussels Sprouts; Enjoy Old-Time Cider & Fresh Donuts.

SUMMARY

Farm is open 7 days a week 8:00 to 7:00 rain or shine • Pick your own Mutsu, Cortland, Red Spy, Rome Beauty apples • Cut your own Brussels sprouts • Find pumpkins around the farm and stand (u-pick patch is picked out) • Eat fresh cider DONUTS Fri, Sat, and Sun 11:00 to 6:00 • Now filling cider carboy orders, details below • Goodies at the stand = pumpkins, apples, pears, sprouts, squashes, ginger, turmeric, garlic, honey, syrup, slushees, hot spiced cider • COVID rules include (1) Keep SAFE distance, (2) wear MASK in closer quarters, (3) monitor your KIDS, (4) BYOBags for picking produce • Drive slowly on the farm • Thank you for being first-class Farmketeers

FULL STORY

DEAR FARMKETEERS: This could be the last weekend of major apple picking. If the weather is pleasant and the turnout is robust, your fellow ‘Creekniks will draw the u-pick apple crop down to a modest remainder – enough perhaps for a final week or ten days of quieter picking. So the next few days might be your chance to have a vigorous October harvest experience.

Pick your own Mutsu apples. It is a beautiful abundant crop this year, and these are prized dessert apples. Head south to find the Mutsu Orchard beyond the Dwarf Orchard. Also known as Crispin, Mutsu is perhaps the most versatile apple on the farm. It is a dessert apple. A pie apple. A bake-it-right-in-the-oven apple. It is the little black cocktail dress of apples. Appropriate for any occasion – and irresistible with that fetching hint of Mutsu blush.

Mutsus get as big as pumpkins. Or pumpkins get as small as Mustus. Dad planted the Mutsu orchard back in ’84. We could rhapsodize about the Mutsus for weeks. The British call them “oven busters” since a couple of old orchard ladies could pick one giant Mutsu and bake it in the oven and split it as dessert for their afternoon stitch-n-bitch. But – as we have opined before – boys can do that, too. Ovens and stitching and b*tching aren’t just for girls. Same with dessert. And feelings. And sharing. And little black cocktail dresses. All welcome at The ‘Creek. Hooray.

The u-pick Pumpkin Patch got picked clean last weekend, but you can still find pumpkins at the farm. We have set pumpkins around the farm, priced individually with labels, and also you can get them at the farm stand. They will probably get cleaned out this weekend.

Pick your own Cortland apples. Yes you can still find Cortlands in the Vintage Orchard, scattered around on big old trees with yellow ribbons. These are the apples that don’t oxidize (turn brown) quickly after cutting, making them ideal for fruit salads, lunch boxes, and food art.

Time to pick Rome Beauty (pictured) and Red Spy apples. These are our traditional harbingers of the late phase of apple harvest season. Everything is early this year, so pick Rome (blue ribbons) and Red Spy (red ribbons) starting now!

Cut your own Brussels sprouts. Also known as BROUTS for short. Stirfry with bacon or fakin’ and feel the nutrients flow. In one of our best signage decisions ever, you will find the sprouts in the patch marked “SPROUTS.” We have removed the leaves from the stalks that are ready. Cut the whole stalk; don’t pick individual sprouts since that wrecks the plant. Don’t be a plant wrecker. Be a sprout lover.

Get sprouts at the stand. You will find stalks at the farm stand if you don’t want to cut your own. These are a great party trick – who shows up with sprout stalks?! But until parties are allowed again, these work almost as well on Zoom parties.

Get fresh cider donuts every weekend. Donuts are rolling off the Mark 2 Donut Robot every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday 11:00 to 6:00. Nick the Donut Kid is churning out these freshly fried toroids of fructotic splendor – optionally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. Just whisper, “A sprinkle of SIN, SUGAR.”

Get CIDER every day. This is the 7th week of “Orchard Ambrosia” – our 100% unpasteurized, old-fashioned, nothing-added cider. You can get gallon and half-gallon jugs. Freezes great. It’s just apples and maybe a few pears, cold-pressed into juice. It gets better every week as the apple blend complexifies.

Homebrew cider fans, get your carboys filled NOW. Bring your 5-gallon carboys to Indian Creek and we will fill them with 100% unpasteurized cider for $35 each (only $7/gallon) OR $6/gallon when you buy 10-45 gallons (2-9 carboys) OR $5/gallon when you get 50 gallons (10 carboys). As of today the ever-changing blend includes Cortland, Gala, Spy, McIntosh, Liberty, Fortune, Honeycrisp, and more. Leave your carboys inside the double doors at the farm stand with your name and number attached. We will call you when filled.

Get local GINGER and TURMERIC. You only need to taste an itsy-bitsy slice of fresh ginger root to be a convert for life. Good enough to eat out of hand, not to mention bringing life to your cooking creations. Same with the fresh turmeric root. Sharon and Dean from TreeGate Farm around the corner have been delighting farm fans with these tropical roots grown here in the Finger Lakes.

Please BRING YOUR OWN BAGS for picking fruits and vegetables. You can fill your bags as you wander the orchards, then set them on the scale at checkout, and we will ring you out without touching your bags. You can also buy our totes which you might have seen around town.