Cherry Picking on a Hot Friday

…another Israeli Kitchen/Baroness Tapuzina adventure.

Picking cherries is so easy. You just slip your fingers  between the stems, tug a little, and the dark crimson, heart-shaped fruit separates from the branch. It’s a sensuous delight, compared to say, picking hawthorns. Lots of shade, and all the sweet fruit you can pop into your mouth…better than a candy shop. Baroness Tapuzina, Mr. B.T., The Little One and I decided that we had to do it.

We set off on the long drive to Kibbutz Rosh Tzurim, where their annual cherry-picking festival is taking place. For those interested, there will be two more pick-your-own Fridays on Rosh Tzurim on June 26th and July 3rd.  It was a long, dry drive to Gush Etzion, but we were well equipped with picnic fare and lots of water bottles.

Arriving, we found a shady spot and spread our blankets down to picnic first, pick later.

Just ordinary picnic food: the most elaborate dish was a quiche of Swiss chard and mushrooms.

Hunger satisfied, we packed up the remains of our simple picnic and headed down to the orchard, following the crowd.

The trees and paths between them were hung with netting to keep the birds off the cherries. It was a blazingly hot day, and the net covering made you feel stifled at first.

But the pickers were happy. One good thing about the netting was that there were no bird droppings on the fruit, just a little dust. The cutest was how the little kids got so excited over picking real cherries off real trees. Indulgent Moms and Dads hoisted tots onto their shoulders and pulled branches closer; bigger kids scampered around pulling off whatever they could reach.  We even caught a rare glimpse of The Nymph in the Glade…

…sometimes also known as Mr. Baroness T.

A lot of English was heard there: British and Americans, and some French families too. It was a peaceful mixed crowd of religious, secular, Israeli, foreign – all intent on the cherries. We stopped at the trees bearing Bing cherries. Other pickers ventured further into the netted orchard and emerged with boxes full of Rainiers. There’s no comparison to the taste of fruit popped into the mouth seconds after picking and their taste after being boxed, shipped, and bought a day or three later. So fresh, so sweet and yet slightly tart, so delicious.

Our baskets filled up very quickly, standing as we were under a couple of loaded trees. But it really was hot under the netting – although possibly it would have been hotter under the full sun. We took our treasure back up to the festival grounds and browsed the stands of local artists and food suppliers.

There were framed photographs…

…ceramics…

…olive oil…

…goat’s cheese…

…books, as it’s Hebrew Book Month…

…cotton candy…

…one of those inflated castles for the kids to jump around on – what are they called?…

…necklaces containing a grain of rice with your name engraved on it…The Little One couldn’t rest until she had one…

…a truck taking folks on a tour of the kibbutz…

But what delighted me was the band, who were playing a smooth, flowing run of Cole Porter songs overlaid with a Jazz/Latin flavor. I embarrassed The Little One to death by singing along as we wandered over the grounds – don’t know if she’ll ever willingly hear “Night and Day” again. But hey, the Bossa Nova riff in the middle of that old song was really good. Very easy to improvise vocal variations and scat over it. Good thing I’m still too modest to climb up on stage and take the microphone; that would have killed her.

It was delightful. Cherries and kids. Live music and food.

We left, saying we’d be back next week – well, maybe. I’m not really sure what to do with all the luscious cherries I have on hand now. I have a feeling that my next few posts will feature them.

Driving away, we saw an entire hillside shrouded in netting:

Baroness and Mr. B. took us home and stopped in for a cup of coffee. They had done the driving and the guiding and were in need of caffeine to finish their Shabbat cooking. I also rushed to pop a chicken in the oven, heat up soup and a potato kugel, wash the lettuce…but that night, all my dreams were of cherries.