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Gardens are in full bloom and many crops are ripe for the picking. There’s no doubt about it, fresh fruits and vegetables from the backyard garden are a harvest treat like none other!
So what’s the next best thing to a homegrown crop? Look for weekly Farmers Market events and local farm stands during the harvest season to ensure the freshest picks. Not sure how to choose fruits and vegetables at peak freshness from an outside market? The following guide can help you pick perfect produce from early crops through the end of the season:
Beans, snap
Look for small seeds inside straight, fleshy pods. If you can see large seeds through the skin than the beans are probably too old. Avoid beans with dry-looking, rusty, wilted or damaged pods.
Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Cauliflower
Look for tightly compacted flower clusters on broccoli and cauliflower, and compact, uniform sprouts. Avoid wilted, yellow, or dirty heads, and avoid loose, open sprouts or those that are yellow or pale green.
Cabbage and head lettuce
Look for firm compact heads that are heavy for their size. On leaf lettuce, choose unwilted, compact, crisp-looking compact plants.
Carrots
Look for deep orange colored and smooth skinned roots. Avoid carrots with purple or green shoulders or pale in color, or ones with forked or crooked roots. Oversized roots usually mean they are woody. If tops are still attached on carrots, they should be fresh.
Celery
Choose large, firm stalks with uniform stalk and a white bottom. Avoid spindly, wilted stalks.
Chard
Look for fresh, dark green leaves with bright, tender stalks. Avoid wilted, poorly colored leaves.
Collards and kale
Check for tender, green, full-sized leaves with tender tips; avoid wilted, tough or overly large leaves.
Corn on the cob
Choose for well-filled cobs with plump, straight rows of kernels. Avoid large, wrinkled kernels.
Cucumbers
Pick long, slender cukes that are medium to dark green.
Peppers
Look for firm, darkly colored fruit with uniform size, color, and number of lobes. Avoid wrinkled or shriveled ones or fruits that are sunburned (contrasting color spots).
Radishes
Choose medium-sized, firm, crisp roots. Avoid wilted or soft roots or those with growth cracks or insect damage. Oversized roots will be pithy. Sunburned crowns are also not desirable.
Summer squash
Choose ones that are uniform in size, color, and shape. Avoid large fruits (over mature) or ones with scarred skins, missing stems, or that are soft or wilting.
Tomatoes
Look for smooth skinned, firm fruits with uniform color. Avoid fruits with growth splits, sun scald, or overripe (soft) fruits.
Apples
Choose firm, well-colored fruit that feels crisp.
Blueberries
Pick plump, firm, deep blue berries with their natural waxy silver coating.
Cantaloupe
Look for a smooth shallow base; thick, coarse, corky netting that stands out from skin. Should yield slightly when pressed on non-stem end and have the slight scent of cantaloupe.
Cherries
Should be dark in color, glossy, plump, with fresh looking stems.
Nectarines
Fruit should be plump, slightly soft along “seam”; either orange-yellow or greenish between red-blushed areas depending on variety.
Oranges
Choose firm oranges, heavy for its size; smooth-textured, with bright-looking skin.
Peaches
Should be somewhat firm, becoming slightly soft; red with creamy, orangy base color.
Pears
Look for firm fruit, just barely beginning to soften. Bartletts: pale to rich yellow; Boscs: green to brown yellow.
Pumpkin
Look for a pumpkin with an even orange hue. Give it a thump; if it sounds hollow, it is ripe and ready to be picked. Look for hard skin and a hard stem. Leave several inches of stem when you harvest a pumpkin. Doing so will slow down the rotting process
Watermelon
Should be symmetrical with bright green rind with a creamy yellow underside. Choose a watermelon that’s heavy for its size.
Win Dinner for Two at the Publick House
Your tips can win you a great dinner for two at the historic Publick House Historic Inn in Sturbridge! Simply send in a hint to be entered into a random drawing. One winner per month (or whenever enough submissions are received) will win a fabulous three course dinner for two at the renowned restaurant, located on Route 131 across the town common in historic Sturbridge. Because I’m in the business of dispensing tips, not inventing them (although I can take credit for some), I’m counting on you readers out there to share your best helpful hints!
Do you have a helpful hint or handy tip that has worked for you? Do you have a question regarding household or garden matters? If so, why not share them with readers of the Spencer Journal? Send questions and/or hints to KDRR@aol.com. Hints are entered into a drawing for dinner for two at the historic Publick House Inn.
About Karen Trainor
Karen Trainor’s career history includes covering local politics as a Worcester Telegram & Gazette correspondent for 20+ years, and reporting local news for Stonebridge Press daily and weekly papers, as well as Managing Editor of the Brimfield Antique Guide and Our Town newspapers. Her longtime column, “Take the Hint!” ran in several Stonebridge publications each week, and she voiced daily radio snippets of the column on Oldies 98.9 FM in Worcester; as well as weekly radio shows on WESO AM, and Real Oldies 1250.
