Peach Truck Tour to stop by Western Pa.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
When The Peach Truck Tour stops by the greater Pittsburgh area next month, it rolls in with some peachy news.
Unlike in 2017 when there was a shortage of peaches from the South, the region has a bumper crop this year and so fruits will be available through early August. This allows the Peach Truck, which was able to deliver fruits from Georgia only once last year, to visit Western Pennsylvania on Sunday and July 22 and stop at six locally owned hardware stores and garden centers during both trips.
Also, it has been a good season for the coveted freestone peaches that were hard to come by last year. “The Peach Truck is driving north with thousands and thousands of freestones,” said Rick Haley, director of the company that sells fruit freshly picked from Pearson Farm in Fort Valley, Ga. In 2017, the company sold only the clingstone variety on its sole trip north.
Both types of peaches are a joy to eat fresh as they are sweet and juicy. But as their names suggest the fleshy part of the freestones easily pull away from the pit while in the clingstones, the flesh stubbornly clings to the pit.
The price for each 25-pound box, which has 50 peaches, will remain at $40 this year. The peaches are remarkably sweet, said Stephen Rose, owner of The Peach Truck, because the cold winter down South has upped the sugar content in the peaches.
Peaches will be tree-ripe but firm so that they can travel well and will be in the hands of the
buyer within 24 to 48 hours after they are hand-plucked from trees that are handpruned at Pearson Farm.
The fifth-generation farm that has 250,000 peach trees has been growing them since 1885. “Pearson Farm has stood the test of time,” Mr. Rose said. “That region used to have dozens and dozens of peach farms and it is now down to five.”
Mr. Rose of Nashville, Tenn., got into a partnership with Pearson Farm, whose owners are family friends, in 2013 to market the peaches. “Tour” was added to the Peach Truck name, he said, because the company wanted to make it feel like a “band going on tour so that more people would show up and catch the experience. We wanted to convey that we are not just any old roadside peach vendor.”
Three semi tractor-trailers carrying 4,500 boxes of peaches will pull into the parking lots of the following hardware stores and garden centers, which Mr. Haley called a natural fit as they tend to deal with agriculture, on Sunday and July 22:
• 8 to 10 a.m. — Tractor Supply Co., 4015 Freeport Road, Natrona Heights; Rollier’s Hardware, 600 Washington Road, Mt. Lebanon.
• Noon to 2 p.m. — Bedner’s Farm & Greenhouse, 315 Coleman Road, McDonald; Hampton Do It Best, 4706 Route 8, Hampton.
• 3 to 5 p.m. — Ambridge Do It Best, 500 Ohio River Blvd., Ambridge; Rural King, 1500 W. Chestnut St., Washington, Pa.
Once you take home the peaches, it’s best to spread the peaches on a table or counter and check them everyday, Mr. Haley advised. Give them a squeeze and if they give a little they are ready to eat, share or can.
“There are plenty of places in the world that grow good peaches, but Georgia does it more consistently well than anyone else,” Mr. Haley said. “We have the correct minerals in the soil, temperatures, altitude and punishingly hot nights. And that’s what peaches want.”