For avocado lovers, buying direct from a local grower offers something supermarkets often can’t: different varieties, seasonal flavour and fruit that has travelled only a short distance from farm to market.
Long-time local grower Kate sells her avocados and other seasonal fruit, both at the Mullumbimby and New Brighton Farmers Markets, with an avocado season generally running from late April through to November, and sometimes as far as Christmas.
Rather than offering just one familiar variety, Kate’s season moves through several different avocados. It begins with Fuerte, a smooth-skinned, pear-shaped avocado prized for its creamy flesh and rich flavour. As the season progresses, Hass becomes available, along with smaller quantities of Sharwil, before finishing with Lamb Hass later in the year.
The changing varieties are one of the pleasures of shopping seasonally. Each has its own flavour, texture and characteristics, while the succession of varieties allows locally grown avocados to be available for many months.
Kate believes freshness and the way the fruit is handled also make a difference to flavour. Her explanation for what goes into growing them is simple: ‘Equal shovel loads of compost and love.’
Unlike Kate’s avocados, which travel directly from her farm to the farmers’ markets, supermarket avocados can spend considerable time under refrigeration during storage and transport. Kate explains that commercially-sold avocados may also be gassed before reaching the shelves to trigger and control ripening.
Buying directly from a grower also means customers can ask when their fruit was picked, which variety they are buying and how best to ripen it at home.
Kate suggests allowing green avocados to ripen at home, although refrigeration can be useful for slowing the process and holding fruit once it is nearly ripe.
And avocados aren’t the only attraction at her stall. Depending on the season, shoppers can find mandarins, oranges, lemons, limes, lemonade fruit, custard apples and black sapote – making every visit a little different
You can find Kate, from The Organic Avocado, every Tuesday at New Brighton Farmers Market from 7am to 11am, and every Friday at the Mullumbimby Farmer Market from 7am to 11am.
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