{"id":21,"date":"2004-09-05T08:59:51","date_gmt":"2004-09-05T17:59:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.taodekitchen.com\/2004\/09\/05\/i-hunt-for-figs\/"},"modified":"2006-01-09T21:43:09","modified_gmt":"2006-01-10T06:43:09","slug":"i-hunt-for-figs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/gardening\/i-hunt-for-figs\/","title":{"rendered":"I hunt for figs"},"content":{"rendered":"

I love fall\u2026the longer shadows, the sunlight has a bit warmer cast and here in the Bay Area we get Indian Summer. Besides all that, the figs on the neighborhood trees begin to swell up into sweet ripe purple orbs\u2026or green if you\u2019re spying a calimyrna or a kadota. A few weeks ago, you could catch me on a daily basis peering over the fence assessing whether it was worth dragging the ladder over to pick the bounty. A few times I even jumped the fence to take a closer look\u2026don\u2019t worry the neighbors know of my fig love.\u00a0Finally, one very hot afternoon I declared it was time. The household gathered round and we trekked over to pick a few bags full.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/span>I\u2019ve loved figs since I was a kid. Figs were popular in my family whether in the form of fig newtons in our lunch boxes or fresh off my mom\u2019s fig tree in our backyard. For the rest of human kind, figs have been enjoyed for over 5000 years. Figs have been found in Egyptian tombs as a healthy snack in the afterworld. The Greeks and Romans used figs fresh, roasted, dried and as a sweetener before sugar was discovered. It was the Romans who were instrumental in introducing figs to other parts of Europe. In turn, during the late 1700\u2019s the Spanish missionaries introduced figs to California. Today, you will find fig trees growing all over the state.\u00a0 Nutritionally, ounce for ounce figs have more fiber than prunes, more potassium than bananas, and more calcium than milk. And oh so much of that \u2018good and good for you\u2019 fiber.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/span>Figs, a soft super sweet fruit with numerous edible blossoms and seeds encased in a thin edible skin, are a member of the Mulberry family and has two fruiting seasons. A short one in the spring and a longer more abundant one mid to late summer. Some common varieties you will find are the green \u2018kadota\u2019 and \u2018calimyrna\u2019, the brown \u2018brown turkey\u2019, and the purple \u2018black mission.\u2019 I pretty much love all varieties but the green ones rank up there. The purple ones are great for extra the antioxidants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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When shopping for figs, pick soft ripe fruit free of bruises, mold or nicks in the skin. A few small natural cracks are fine. Figs do not ripen off the tree so avoid firm unripe fruit. Key to this point is going to your neighborhood Farmer\u2019s Market. You\u2019ll rarely see a truly ripe fig at a grocery store. My favorite farmer is Rick Knoll – his figs are just oozing with ripe syrupy fig goodness. Do not wash until just before you are about to eat or prepare the fruit and if necessary, you can refrigerate for 1 or 2 days.\u00a0If you\u2019re picking fresh from a tree, grasp the stem between your fingers and twist. It\u2019s a little tricky at first because you have to try not to squish the soft fruit at the same time.\u00a0So what do I do with the bags and bags of figs? I eat them fresh – yum yum. Or dry them to use in baking and compotes. Or as I did last night, marinate them in balsamic, olive oil, honey and mint for a hour and then grill them (broiling will work too.) I served them on little grilled toasts with a dollop of ricotta that had been spiked with mint, honey and a squeeze of lemon. But don\u2019t stop there! Search the internet and you\u2019ll find loads of recipes for figs and proscuitto, fig tarts, fig jam\u2026.<\/span><\/p>\n

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I love fall\u2026the longer shadows, the sunlight has a bit warmer cast and here in the Bay Area we get Indian Summer. Besides all that, the figs on the neighborhood trees begin to swell up into sweet ripe purple orbs\u2026or green if you\u2019re spying a calimyrna or a kadota. A few weeks ago, you could […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gardening"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/taodekitchen.com\/tasty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}