Summer Fruit : GARDEN FRESH : Dribbler’s Delight

Of all the luscious summer fruits that dribble down our chins, peaches are the dribblingest. Some summers, peaches are great. Other summers--well, you could build a rock wall with the fruits pretending to be ripe. And once off the tree, they just don’t ripen as sweet as they could.

So grow your own!

If you have a patch of well-drained soil in full sun that’s about 15 feet around, and if you plan it right, you can pick tree-ripened peaches in parts of June, July, August and even September--heavenly flavored peaches the likes of which you can’t buy anywhere.

How? Plant three peach trees of equal vigor two feet apart in a triangle, each with a later fruiting time. Each mature tree will give you at least two weeks of glorious peaches for eating fresh--and perhaps for putting up.

Peach trees like their winters cold, their springtimes warm and dry and their summers hot. But peach people have been working away on cultivars that will produce good-tasting peaches in which these elements are marginal. Little of Southern California is classic peach territory, but now we have peaches that will ripen everywhere.

Here in the mountains near Idyllwild, our season begins in June with Early Redhaven, scrumptious yellow freestones on a prolific small tree. In our garden, they ripen over several weeks. Late in July comes Polly peach, a delicious and delicately blushed white freestone. In late August, we can pick Indian Blood Clings such as Thomas Jefferson grew. Crimson through and through, with marvelous white peach flavor, these are beautiful fruits.

If you live in the High Desert, you can also start picking in June with Gold Dust, a yellow freestone with exceptional flavor. The Nectar variety ripens in July, and some consider it the best-flavored white freestone of all. You can also grow Indian Blood Cling for August, or wait for White Heath Cling, a superb peach that matures in the high desert in September. White Heath has a particularly long blooming period.

Frost can be a problem late in the blossom season, especially in the Low Desert. Flordaprince ripens very early--sometimes in late April--producing lots of yellow semi-clingstone peaches of good quality. Midpride is a fine yellow freestone that ripens in July. However, in the Low Desert, it might be wiser to grow genetic dwarf trees in tubs.

Genetic dwarf peach trees have been bred to stay four to six feet tall once they mature. Their blooms are exceptionally beautiful, being thick on the limbs. They are adaptable to all of Southern California and are easy to move into a convenient spot; just use a large redwood planter or half-barrel (give the container rollers for easy moving). Plant two genetic dwarf peaches in a container for best pollination, mulch with manure, keep stringently pruned, and let the soil mix dry out just slightly between deep waterings. Two small trees with low chilling requirements are tasty yellow freestones: Southern Sweet, which is early, and Southern Rose, which is midseason. Add fresh soil mix to the top third of the container every spring.

You can even grow one standard peach tree in a very large container. Just prune the roots as well as the branches every couple of years when the tree is dormant.

In those parts of Southern California where there aren’t many hours in January and February below 45 degrees (called chilling hours), you might plant in your three holes Flordaking--a red-blushed yellow clingstone of high quality that ripens late May; then Shanghai, a juicy, wonderfully sweet white freestone for July--or Santa Barbara, a very peachy yellow peach; and for August, aromatic yellow freestone August Pride.

You’ll plant slender, leafless bare-root trees in late winter or early spring (in the mountains, plant in spring). Whether you get it through the mail or from a local nursery, bare root means the little tree is shipped without soil after being dug while dormant--when it’s leafless. In a state of suspended animation, the tree can endure a two-day trip through the mail. Companies ship varying sizes of trees, so inquire before you order.

You can bring a potted peach tree into your temperate garden any time of the year. In cold winter areas, wait till spring.

When you plant, tip each tree in the triangle slightly outward and remove the largest inside branches. Standard peach trees start bearing when they’re three years old; dwarf trees can bear the first or second year. Life expectancy for a peach tree is about 20 years, although production may decline sooner.

This year’s fruit was formed on last year’s growth. Once it has offered up fruit, that piece of branch will never bear again. What insures that there will be new branches this year to bear next year’s fruit? Heavy pruning. Probably more than any fruit tree, peaches respond to being cut back--in fact, unpruned trees grow cranky and miserable.

On its own, a standard peach tree (most of the best flavors come on standards) will grow to 15 feet tall, but you can keep the height down to where you can just stretch to pick from the top branches, and you can trim back width to suit your space. Your peach tree will respond to all this pruning by growing more lush. While the tree is dormant, either cut each branch back by one-third, or cut back two of every three branches.

Once the peaches are set, thinning is imperative. Otherwise branches break under the load and next year’s crop is severely reduced. Thinning results in bigger, sweeter peaches on a healthier tree. Wait until fruits are an inch or so across, then pick so they’re a hand’s breadth apart.

When a tree receives 30 inches of rain divided evenly through the year, it doesn’t need to be irrigated. In fact, peaches from trees receiving only about 20 inches of water annually are smaller and fewer, but they’re sweeter and more flavorful than those receiving more water. This is called dry farming--it’s the way Native Americans raise incomparable peaches in the Southwest.

In good soil, the only food you should give a peach tree is a six-inch mulch of well-aged rabbit or steer manure in early spring.

The biggest problem you might encounter is peach leaf curl--it happens when winters are wet. If such a winter is forecast, cover the tree with white or brown (not clear or black) plastic between mid-December to mid-February; don’t tie the bottom. Or place the tree under an overhang where it won’t get wet.

Birds will take their share unless you use a bird scare. A bright yellow plastic balloon with big glinting eyes is the only thing I’ve found that works. You hang one on a limb for every 85 square feet. Alter the balloon’s position every week or 10 days during peach season--the birds think: Good grief! It moved! It’s real!

When is a peach ripe for picking? Press the bottom ever so gently. If it gives to the pressure, the peach is ripe and will come off the branch with a touch.

In addition to eating out of hand and wiping off the dribbles, we celebrate peaches in cobblers, pies, turnovers, tarts and crisps, as pickles, preserves, marmalade and cold peach soup. But is there any better way to enjoy peaches than slicing them into a bowl, sloshing over the cream and shaking on powdered sugar? Yes.

To me, fresh peach ice cream is the treat of summer treats. My feeling is, don’t stint on the cream and don’t make ice cream unless the peaches are perfumed and ultra-peachy. And make it Philadelphia-style. Rather than cloud the subtlety of ripe fruit with thickeners and emulsifiers such as flour and egg yolks, Philadelphia ice cream is pure fruit, cream, sugar and vanilla--the cleanest, clearest flavor.

Second only to the quality of ingredients, the most crucial thing about homemade ice cream, I think, is to serve it while it’s soft--within an hour or two of churning. This isn’t the usual advice, but I find that great cold blunts the flavor. Should your cream freeze hard, leave it at room temperature 10 to 20 minutes until it softens enough to stir into fluffiness.

Sources:

Fresh fruit--A farmer’s market for the most interesting and tree-ripened peaches.

Bare-root trees--August Pride, Flordaprince, Midpride, Southern Rose from Pacific Tree Farms, 4301 Lynwood Drive, Chula Vista, Calif. 91910. Early Redhaven from C&O; Nursery, Box 116, Wenatchee, Wash. 98807. Gold Dust from Fowler Nurseries, 525 Fowler Road, Newcastle, Calif. 95658. Indian Blood Cling, Polly from Gurney’s Seed & Nursery Co., 110 Capital St., Yankton, S.D. 57079. Nectar, White Heath Cling from Smith Nursery, 270 W. Briggs Ave., Lathrop, Calif. 95330. Santa Barbara, Shanghai, Southern Sweet--ask your nursery to order from wholesaler L.E. Cooke Co., 26333 Road 140, Visalia, Calif. 93292.

Bird scarer eyes’ balloons from Brookstone, (800) 926-7000.

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To peel peaches, drop them in boiling water and lift out after about 10 seconds. Peaches that are still firm may need 30 to 60 seconds. Lift out with a slotted spoon, then slip off skin. Peaches mashed and mixed with sugar may deepen in color. If they start to turn brown, add a little fresh lemon juice. Some or even all of the cream may be replaced with chilled half-and-half.

PHILADELPHIA FRESH PEACH ICE CREAM

2 heaping cups peeled, mashed peaches, about 2 1/2 large peaches

Sugar

2 cups heavy whipping cream, chilled

2 tablespoons vanilla extract

1/8 teaspoon salt

In bowl use fork to mash peaches into very small pieces. Texture should be between puree and lumpy. Blend in 1/4 cup sugar. In bowl combine 1/3 cup sugar with cream, vanilla and salt. Stir until sugar dissolves. Cover peaches and set in cool place, cover with cream and refrigerate 1 hour.

Blend peaches and cream in chilled canister. Freeze according to manufacturer’s instructions, using about 10 pounds ice to scant 2 cups table salt. Remove dasher and scrape bits of peaches back into cream. Stir to mix thoroughly. Drain ice water from bucket, layer in more ice and salt and cover. Serve ice cream while soft. Makes 1 quart, or 8 servings.

Each serving contains about:

282 calories; 60 mg sodium; 82 mg cholesterol; 22 grams fat; 21 grams carbohydrates; 2 grams protein; 0.27 gram fiber.