I love fresh produce. Most of all, I love bing cherries and watermelon.When we lived in Stockton, our house was only about half a mile from a cherry orchard, and I would go weekly every spring and buy a 21 pound box of doubles and spurs for $7, and by the next week the three of us would have eaten it all and be ready for the next. Bings are a gorgeous deep purple and the very best ones are still firm, so that when my teeth pierced the skin I sometimes felt like a vegetarian vampire. Soo good.
Watermelon lasts longer, but since markets no longer plug them for you to taste, it can be a toss up whether you get a good one or not. Now, when I was growing up my grandparents lived out in the country and my grandfather grew, among other things, watermelons for the family table. Every year he saved the seeds from the very best melons in a saucer on the top of the refrigerator and used them for the next year. By the time I was born, Grandpa grew incredibly wonderful watermelon. When we lived in California, I would spend a week or two with my grandparents every summer and they would allow me to choose whatever I wanted to eat from Grandpa's garden. One summer I almost lived on tomatoes, green peppers, and watermelon. I would get up in the night to go to the bathroom and hear my grandparents whisper to each other -- Grandma would comment that I was paying the price for all that watermelon and Grandpa would answer that if I loved it that much they should just let me eat it.When I was little, my mother tried to get me to spit out cherry pits and watermelon seeds by telling me that if I ate them, a tree/vine would grow out of my ears. The thought of having cherries and watermelon where I only needed to reach up and pick them was so inviting that I swallow them to this day.
11 comments:
Cherries and watermelon are such treats in the summer, and even though we can still find watermelon year round, its just not the same as a local summer melon.
I have found I can't eat nearly as many cherries as I used to. The 'system' just can't handle it.
I love that you still swallow the pits/seeds.
I recently found out that one of Maya's teachers spits out the pomegranate seeds. She sucks the juice out, then spits them out. Who ever heard of such a thing?
My father told me that watermelon shouldn't be eaten until after the 4th of July. They just weren't good until then. To this day, I am convinced he was right. LOL
Bing cherries are one of my favorite foods. You make my mouth water.
My brother-in-law had a hybrid seed company in So. Calif., called Peto Seeds and he was one of the first to produce the small round watermelons that had a wonderful
flavor. (others had done it earlier than he, but could never get them to taste good.) That was about 25 yrs. ago.
Betty, Your father was absolutely right. You always see watermelon at 4th of July picnics in movies -- but they really aren't good until mid-July at the earliest.
Oh MAN I LOVE Cherries! THe Rainer ones are the ones we have the most of, or Princess Annes. Bings are really pricey in western Wa. I eat until I am sick ! Then I keep thinking of Jack Nickolson in that movie WItches of Eastwick, puking up all the cherries. LOLOL
ooh I can't wait til summer! hahaha
Ohhhhhhhh yeah!!!!!! Gotta swallow those pits and seeds!
granny do you have any of the old hierloom seeds from the olden days??? what a score that would be!!!!!!!!
Jay,
Sadly, when my grandfather moved into town he left growing melons behind him, since he had room in his new yard for a small vegetable garden but no more. The seeds are long lost -- but their memory is treasured.
Great story!! You're an amazing writer. I always eat my watermelon with salt, because my father always did, also sugar on tomatos! AND Did you know 15-20 min after you eat cherry's your spider vanes disapear. Best time to eat them is at the beach, mom's little secert. :)
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