Midsummer Stone Fruit Face-Off Competition

It’s still mid-summer, isn’t it? :) One of the great pleasures of the hot season here is the fruit. Farmers markets and grocers are brimming with juicy delights. We even have a few in the yard outside. Aside from the berries, which seem to be sold nearly year-round now (thanks to hothouses/tunnels), our region has apples/pears in the fall and citrus/pomegranates/kiwis in the winter. In the springtime, it’s late citrus and leftovers.

By the summertime, there are grapes and melons also, but the stone fruits reign. This year was not a great one for stone fruits, since the spring was unseasonably cool and wet. So many of them did not pollinate or ripen well; quality and quantity both suffered, but there are some good eats out there also.

The term “stone fruit” describes that family of fruits with large, single pits that include peaches, nectarines, plums, apricots, and cherries. These days, it also includes interspecific hybrids such as pluots and plumcots (plum-apricot crosses), pluerries (cherry-plums), and peacotums (peach-apricot-plums). There’s been a revolution in these crosses over the last decade or so. Each year brings new varieties even better than the last. One issue is that the vendors often do not know what varieties they are selling, so there are plenty of mislabeled stone fruits out there by late July.

So I thought, what better way to celebrate the bounty than to conduct a Stone Fruit Face-off with yours truly as judge, jury, and executioner. Yes, I’m going to slice off their faces soon enough and score them on a scale of 1-10 based on likeability. But first, shall I introduce you to the contenders? Their names/nicknames are capitalized for easy reference. I hope you have your bracket sheets ready.

And here they come. Let’s play ball!

FIRST MATCHUP: Black Velvet Plumcot vs. Yellow Plum!

Our first contest pits a plumcot with a fill-in-the-black yellow plum. The latter was labelled as a pluot in the store, but to me it looks more like a straight-up yellow plum. Some farmers mark plums as pluots nowadays because, aside from the initial patent fee when they plant the trees, they do not have to pay a duty to the agricultural board which represents peach/plum/nectarine sellers (at least that’s what I heard a couple of years ago and I assume it’s still true, but blame me if it's not). This yellow one looks like a plum, perhaps a Golden Nectar Plum or something related.

The Black Velvet Plumcot is a cross between an apricot and a plum. The skin is purple, but fuzzy like a cot. Someone patented it (and planted a bunch more in the last few years) due to the fruit’s popularity; good for them for profiting from this wonderful creation. At its peak, which is earlier in the season around apricot time, this is one of the finest fruits you’ll ever taste. It’s sweet, with a snap of aromatic apricot aroma. This particular one has a slightly wrinkled skin, which earlier on in the season indicates good ripeness. But it may be too late, so let’s see what it tastes like now.

SCORES: Yellow plum = 8/10. Plumcot = 6/10. WINNER: Yellow plum. JUDGE’S REMARKS: The yellow plum is exactly what you hope for when you bite into one of these things. It’s mildly sweet, mildly sour, and extremely juicy. It could be slightly riper, but I cannot fault this fruit. Solid entry. Meanwhile, the plumcot disappoints. It’s just too late in the year for these things and this one has lost its firmness. It’s trending slightly towards a fermenty flavor. These are done for the year and I’ll look forward to them next June or so.

The yellow plum advances.

SECOND MATCHUP: Dark Cherry vs. Cherry-Plum

Here, we have something relatively new, the Cherry-Plum. They are not going with the wholesaler’s suggested brand name of “Pluerry” and I don’t blame them. Cherry-plum is a more descriptive name for this red-yellow fruit. These are tiny ones, but we’ve seen some larger, plum-sized fruits also labelled cherry plums over the last 3-4 years.

To confuse matters, there are wild, native plums growing in the hills around here that also are called cherry-plums, but they are not hybrids; they are a different species of plum. Since the wild ones are small and sour, some people call them cherry plums also. But these Cherry-Plums are interspecific hybrids and they are relatively new on the market.

For a challenger, I choose some Dark Cherries. The local ones are long gone by late July, having peaked in early June this year. These particular cherries were in the supermarket and they were grown in Washington State, which has a later growing season than we do. These might be Bings, Vans, Lapins, or whatever is in season there right now; they’re dark red to purple in color. Crisp, northwest cherries are hard to beat, arguably better than the local ones. Let’s see if the Cherry-Plums can compare.

SCORES: Dark Cherry = 9/10. Cherry-Plum = 7.5/10. WINNER: Dark Cherries. JUDGE’S REMARKS: The best cherries on the West Coast still come from the northwest and this is their time. These are crisp, sweet, flavorful, and full of purple juice. Meanwhile, these local Cherry-Plums are a good fruit as well. They look and taste like small plums. Perhaps they are slightly firmer than a similar plum would be. There is an aromatic snap that is reminiscent of cherry, but otherwise it’s a plum. If the northwest cherries weren’t so good right now, I could eat a lot of these little Cherry-Plums.

The dark cherry advances.

THIRD MATCHUP: Ken’s Purple Plum vs. Dapple Supreme Pluot

Here, we go with a matchup between two plums or plum substitutes. The first is an unknown variety of purple plum, which I’ll name for the fruit stand where I bought it. The plum is slightly oval like a European style plum, but those come later where we live and have a gummier texture. Despite the egg shape, this one should have predominantly Asian plum parentage and perhaps some undisclosed apricot influence, which might account for the shape.

The second was labeled as a Dapple Dandy Pluot, but I have strong doubts about the accuracy of this labeling. Many consumers here know Dapple Dandy as the Dinosaur Egg, another marketing name that has been used. This particular pluot has a lot of color inside, whereas most Dapple Dandies have a pale mottling. This is what a proper Dapple Dandy "Dinosaur Egg" looks like:

Public domain

This fruit I have here is much more stunning in appearance. With the outer green and the intense inner fuschia, an almost watermelon-like contrast, it looks a lot like a Flavor Supreme Pluot. But this seems rather late in the season for them.

My research revealed that there is a cross between the two fruits that is now being marketed. It’s called Dapple Supreme and that’s what I think this is. The skin on mine seems greener than the other pictures of it, but these may have been picked slightly unripe. It’s supposed to ripen slightly earlier, but this year everything came late.

Picture of Dapple Supreme Pluot from the wholesaler, Dave Wilson Nurseries, davewilson.com.

Soon, I will know whether it favors it’s Dapple or Supreme ancestry more closely; I’m strongly hoping for the latter. Dapple Dandy is a terrible fruit unless it’s perfectly ripe when picked; sellers have done a disservice by marketing it so aggressively, because 90% of the time it tastes either watery or overripe. I’ve heard that the trees are extremely easy to pollinate and they produce prolifically. The opposite is true with the Flavor Supreme Pluot, which is tough to pollinate but can produce fruit as good as anything you’ll ever taste.

SCORES: Ken’s Purple Plum = 7.5/10. Dapple Supreme Pluot = 4/10. WINNER: Ken’s Purple. JUDGE’S REMARKS: I don’t enjoy either of these fruits as much as I’d hoped. When I sampled the purple plum from Ken’s, it was sweet and delicious. The same is true this time, but I have to cut into two of them to find a section that doesn’t have a brown patch. Yet, both were softly firm on the outside, so there’s a clear ripening issue. That inconsistency bothers me, but the taste is there. Unfortunately, it is more than enough to beat the hapless Dapple Supreme, which is all dressed up with a complete lack of flavor. This one tastes unripe and is much too watery. Sadly, even with the lovely color, it tastes like an underdone Dapple Dandy. Big disappointment.

Ken’s Purple Plum advances.

FOURTH MATCHUP: White Nectarine vs. Yellow Freestone Peach

Nectarines are simply peaches with smooth skin, so this is a good matchup between white and yellow fleshed peaches. In the past, the best peaches were yellow-fleshed (it’s actually more golden-orange, with more anti-oxidants than the white ones), but in the last decade or so, white-fleshed fruits have become quite widespread and popular in markets here. That may have to do with the high numbers of Asian immigrants on the West Coast, as the white-fleshed fruits are sweeter and lower in acid. Those characteristics tend to drive fruit popularity in some Asian countries and the trend seems to have spread here, too.

Once upon a time, the best American fruits had some combination of sweet-tart, but younger people are losing that taste. Sweetness has increased greatly along with the newer varieties, which is nice. And midsummer peaches should have plenty of aromatic flavor, so they are not exactly bland. Nevertheless, I have a more mature palette; I am biased towards that old-style peach flavor if I can find it.

SCORES: White Nectarine = 9/10. Yellow Freestone Peach = 10/10. WINNER: Yellow Freestone. JUDGE’S REMARKS: When fully ripe, these white nectarines are sweeter than candy and they have just enough of that peachy taste. This is a really fine fruit and I cannot find fault with it. To taste a perfectly ripe Yellow Peach in the middle of summer, though, is to reach for perfection. The sweet-tart, sugar-acid balance, the overwhelming floral aroma, the firm flesh, the juice…there is not a better fruit.

The yellow freestone peach advances.

FINAL ROUND

Are you ready for the Grand Finale? You are expecting a matchup between the peach and the cherry, are you not? I absolutely love plums and pluots, perhaps above these others, but there were no ideal examples in this week’s haul from the markets. Unfortunately, even if I were to “pit” the cherry vs. the peach in the final, it wouldn’t prove anything. This is like comparing apples to oranges and they are both good fruits.

By the way, this post has become too long. And so, in my dictatorial capacity as judge of this competition, I hereby award the grand prize to…

…the Sweet Corn!

Wait, wasn’t this a stone fruit competition? Yes, and I just entered the corn. It is so sweet that it wins instantly. And the judge has had enough sweet food, so he’s gone off to find a cool drink of water. The corn keeps the prize.

Top image is public domain. My corn pic did not come out well, so that last one also is a public domain stock image. The term "pluot" and associated brand names are believed to be trademarks of Zaiger's Genetics in Modesto, CA. They are normally some of the best summer fruits, but that was not the case during this period, either due to pollination issues this year, early overwatering, or sellers picking them before full ripeness.