Voice over: Phil Tregunno’s Niagara Peaches have been perfected over 4 generations.
Phil Tregunno: They’ve grown up in the farm, right from day one, you know, my father that handed down the tricks of the trade, I’m doing the same thing with my kids and you know we, we’re very proud of what we do. From some great land down here right along the Niagara River, beautiful sandy soil, it’s just been a great site over the years to grow peaches.
Voice over: Sheltered by the Niagara Escarpment and moderated by 2 great lakes, the Niagara area enjoy the unique micro climate; its rich soils in close proximity to markets make it ideal for tender fruit production.
Phil Tregunno: We’re really proud putting out a local product, you know, the speed of how we pack it and get it to the marketplace, the less travel time, less miles on the road, we get it packed up quickly, you know, what’s done today, will be sent up from the farm tomorrow
Voice over: That juicy tree-ripened goodness from our own backyard is what inspires cookbook author and Niagara Restaurateur, Tony DeLuca, he’s thrilled about home preserving making a comeback and excited that consumers are taking advantage of summer’s freshness.
Tony DeLuca: It’s really capturing a moment in a jar, if you will; that the season provides us with these wonderful fruits; we pick it, we preserve it, we enjoy it down the road. Preserving in our generation is not being a mainstream practice but lately with the concerns of our food origins, allergies, additives and preservatives, there’s been a real renaissance in home preserving and learning how to home-preserve. In contrary to what people think, it’s not a very complicated process. The first step, which to me is the most important step, is the selection of the fruit. You want to make sure your fruit is perfectly ripe at the peak of its goodness. The second part is when we’re adding flavorings to the fruit and the actual preserving which is the syrup, and the third part is putting it in the jar and making the jar safe so that the fruit will last till the dead of one term when we want to enjoy it. Very quick, 20 minutes and you’re done.
Voice over: For a taste of summer, there’s nothing quite like fruit fresh off the tree, bite into some local goodness and savor the flavor year-long by learning how to preserve at www.ontariotenderfruit.com, Martin Vanderwood reporting.
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