Annabel Langbein

Not all nectarines are the same. Here are some tips for identifying the stonefruit.

For lovers of fresh fruit, this has to be the best time of year. The parade of stonefruit (known collectively as summer fruit), which starts before Christmas with the first cherries and apricots, is now in full swing.

A flood of glorious peaches, nectarines and plums is upon us, joining later-season varieties of cherries and apricots. (Cherry varieties like Staccato and apricots like Trevatt and Cluthalate continue to ripen right through to late February.)

Peaches and nectarines were among the first fruit trees imported to New Zealand but by the late 19th century, seedlings grown from the stones were found to be more suited to New Zealand’s soil and climate than most introduced cultivars.

Peach seeds may sometimes grow into trees that bear nectarines and nectarine seeds can grow into trees that bear either nectarines or peaches. You can’t reliably grow nectarines from pits, as occasionally they will throw peaches, so they are grafted on to peach trees to guarantee a crop of nectarines.

Nectarines are identical to peaches with the exception of one gene — the one that makes peaches fuzzy and nectarines smooth. For this reason the two fruits are pretty much interchangeable in recipes, the advantage for nectarines being they don’t have a fuzzy skin.

Like peaches, nectarines come with white or yellow flesh and fall into two categories: “clingstone”, describing how the flesh clings to the egg-shaped seed stone known as a pit, and “freestone”, where the flesh comes easily away from the pit. Freestone fruit are much easier to use in recipes where you don’t want the stone but this information isn’t usually displayed when you buy the fruit, so you need to know your varieties.

Fantasia, a freestone variety that ripens a little later in the season, is considered the established favourite in the freestone category with a sweet flavour and juicy flesh. Ruby Diamond is an earlier freestone variety with a shiny, dark red skin and a delicious old-fashioned nectarine flavour. If you just want to eat the fruit, clingstone varieties like Mid Star, which is a semi-freestone, is a highly coloured, red-skinned fruit with yellow flesh that’s super-sweet and super-juicy with mild flavour. Summer Bright is another great clingstone nectarine, with a sweet, intense flavour that can be eaten slightly underripe when it’s still crunchy or soft and juicy when it’s ripe.

While nothing tastes better than sunripened fruit picked straight from the tree, if you are buying nectarines it’s better to buy them slightly underripe. Once they’re ripe, it’s nigh impossible to get them home without a bruise — they bruise even more easily than peaches.

Place them in a paper bag with a banana or an apple and leave on the bench for a few days. You’ll know they are ready by the luscious fragrance that comes out of the bag when you open it and the flesh should be slightly yielding. Test by gently pressing on the shoulder, it should have a little give.

Here are some of my favourite ways to use these glorious fruit while they are in peak season.