Today on Homestead Homebodies our peach tree is beckoning....it's time to harvest the soft and juicy fruit!
Last year our tree produced ten peaches, the year before just five. This year we harvested fifty tasty fruit!
Peaches have been domesticated for more than 4000 years with hundreds of known cultivars. These are classified as either freestone or clingstone. This is determined on whether the flesh sticks to the pit or not.
Our tree is a clingstone.
Peaches make a delicious snack loaded with healthy polyphenols such as chlorogenic acid, catechins, and epicatechins. They do have a dark side however as the seeds of several cultivars contain cyanogenic glycosides. These are capable of dissolving into hydrogen cyanide gas!!!
Mmmmm, this one is delicious!
While Candy guards the few remaining we headed into the kitchen to preserve most of them for peach pie on a cold winters night!
