Boiled peanuts and fried apple pies

No, that’s not a brush fire over there. Smell that? It’s the smell of the South – boiled peanuts. 

For many who grew up here, this is truly comfort-snack food.  After I-985 becomes Georgia highway 365 on the way to North Georgia, Jaemor Farms is one of the most visible stops for boiled peanuts. It has the added advantage that those along for the ride who have turned up their noses at the very idea can sample other local delicacies, among them, apple or peach fritters, made with fruit from the orchards that line the driveway. (In hot weather they have home-made peach ice cream as well.)

Jaemor Farms, 5340 Cornelia Hwy., Alto, has been established since 1981, but the Echols family who runs it has been farming here since 1929. They have a large selection of fresh fruits and vegetables, home-made cakes, pies and breads, local double-yolk and brown eggs and a number of jams and jellies. (In fact, that’s the way to find them on line – www.jamsjellies.com.) Manager Judah Echols says, “One of the biggest draws this time of year is the 14 varieties of apples that we have.”

That brings us back to whether you want a fresh-fruit fried pie (aka fritters) or a dried-fruit pie. Manager Stephanie Lewallen prefers the dried fruit filling. “That’s what I was raised on,” she says. “They’re a totally different texture from fresh.” She explains that those that contain fresh fruit are made with pastry dough, while the dried fruit pies are made with biscuit dough.

As for boiled peanuts, Stephanie says it pretty much is NOT something you acquire a taste for. “You either like ‘em or you don’t.” She cautions people who are trying them for the first time to set aside their ideas about peanuts, and think about them like pinto beans.