This year has been a bountiful fruit year here in northern New Mexico. There were wild plums and peaches in abundance earlier in the summer.  Red Mountain Café featured sand plum muffins (apparently that’s what some people call wild plums here).  There’s lots of canning, freezing and drying going on around these parts.

Now it’s time for apple and pear harvest. I don’t have a lot of trees in my little orchard but a couple of them are so laden with fruit that the branches are low to the ground about to break under the weight.

 

 
Apples on the ground, apples on the trees, apples everywhere!

Apples on the ground, apples on the trees, apples everywhere!

I can’t save all this fruit.  So PLEASE anyone in this area who doesn’t have fruit, bring boxes and take home beautiful apples.  Lila’s got dibs on a lot of the pears but maybe not all.It’s also Hatch green chili season.  You drive from here near Ojo Caliente where the scent of apples is everywhere to a parking lot, any parking lot, in Espanola where roasters are set up and the aroma of roasting green chilis greets you.  I also love the sign at Romero’s fruit stand:    “new bean crop is in.”  Romero’s gets fresh pinto beans from Navajo Pride, a vast sustainable agricultural project on the reservation http://www.navajopride.com/.

It’s fall in northern New Mexico.

My friend Pam came by with one of her apple and green chili pies.  For those of you that aren’t from these parts, that combination may sound strange but it works really well. As she says, “it adds a little flame to your apple.”  I like that.  And it’s true.  She suggested goat cheese on top (we get our goat cheese right down the road) which made it almost a savory dish ‘cause Pam doesn’t sweeten her pies a lot.  I’m thinking of working on an apple green chili side dish inspired by Pam’s pie.

pie

The pie – deep dish, all butter crust – I decided to sweeten up with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream and a generous sprinkle of cinnamon.  Delicious.

Happy Fall!