Meditations on the Okanagan: Fruit

Allan and I just got back from a week-long road trip down to Oliver, BC and back. My sister Mary and her family live in Oliver and it’s always a great time visiting them, especially because the destination itself is so beautiful and fun.

As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, I generally try to make an effort to eat local, which means something very different in Edmonton and Oliver. In Edmonton it’s easy to find meat, grains, most vegetables. But fruit is much trickier; it can, and does, grow here, but not well enough for anyone to do a whole lot of it. Not being one to deny myself things that are delicious, I usually seek out BC fruit and wine when I can’t easily get my hands on something local. But even that isn’t easy if I’m just at the grocery store. Even smaller local grocers stock almost entirely USA grown produce. I won’t get into the economic, environmental, and culinary reasons why this is so infuriating right now, but suffice to say it means enough to me that I spend most of my trip to the store scouring little stickers looking for something from western Canada instead of California.

Anyway, what I’m trying to say is, my primary goal of this trip, other than some bonding with Mary, Greg, Layla, Baron and their gigantic dog Chester, was to a) try a lot of Okanagan wine (an upcoming blog entry unto itself) and b) eat a lot of Okanagan fruit.

To my delight, the drive into Oliver and then further to Osoyoos was a steady stream of fruit stands, vineyards, and U-Picks. On our first day we stopped at a fruit stand and grabbed some treats for me and Layla to make a pie with.

Are those not the most beautiful apricots and blueberries you’ve ever laid eyes on? I was just giddy with the huge arrays of gorgeous fresh fruit laid out in generous boxes at prices better than their significantly less awe-inspiring Californian counterparts at Safeway.

A few days into our stay, Allan and I hiked the Golden Mile Trail, a 10 km stretch starting at the Tinhorn Creek vineyard, through a stretch of hot flat desert where the trail seemed to dance under our feet with all the strange and exotic-looking species of grasshopper that were out exploring with us, and ending at a little road that wound through a variety of orchards. I was drained and losing enthusiasm after the first two-thirds of our hike through the hot sun, but walking past the rows of tantalizing fruit was my reward. Tart, crisp little green apples ripening on trees, golden peaches and apricots just taking on a rosy blush, bright red cherries bunched together on a branch, contrasting sharply with the deep green foliage; more ripe, plump deep burgundy cherries ready to fall right off the tree. Everything looked so beautiful, so alive, so delicious. I bored Allan once again with my musings on food; how fruit is the only thing in nature designed to inspire lust in us, that we’re biologically programmed to find deep pleasure in, not just something that our pliable omnivorous palletes have taught us to accept as food. It exists to charm and please us, to taste sweet and perfect. By the time we left the orchards, I never wanted to eat anything but fruit ever again.