Heirloom Apple Tasting & Apple Tree Variety Identification - 10.17.2010

This is a really great event and wonderful opportunity to tour some of the lesser known areas of Clark County...not to mention a chance to rub elbows with Jacqueline & Joseph of Friendly Haven Rise Farm.  


Sunday Oct 17th from 11-4
Venersborg One-Room Schoolhouse
24317 NE 209th St., Battle Ground, WA

Clark County used to be a fruit growing area, well known for abundant and gorgeous apple trees. There's a good chance some of the old apple trees that are languishing in backyards and old farm fields may be the last of their varieties. That's what happened with us -- three years ago we identified one of our ancient apple trees as, until we re-found it, "thought to be extinct." Help us find more before the old trees die out.

First, the apple tasting:
We have over 200 different kinds of apples to taste. Yes, indeed, come hungry because 200 tastes of each and every apple will be like eating who knows how many single apples -- a lot! And every one of them is different. We've got apples that taste sweet, tart, juicy, bake up well, smell like bananas - roses - honey - cinnamon. We have some that have been grown continuously for 400 years and others that were just brought out to the public in the past decade. Some have flesh white as snow, others are striped pink inside, or golden yellow, and some are even deep red INSIDE. They're all so unusual and nearly all of them are uniquely delicious, or uniquely shaped, or uniquely colored inside and out.

And you get to taste them all. How cool is that?

The apple tasting is at the historic Venersborg one-room Schoolhouse at the corner of Risto Rd (also called 209th Ave) and 242nd Ave right across from the Venersborg Store. Lovely country drive, right near our farm and about 35 minutes north of PDX. Come on out.

24317 NE 209th St., Battle Ground, WA
Admission is $5, kids under 16 are free.

What's going on that day?
* Taste as many apples as you like. Try them all!
* Pie making demos
* Make your own pie to take home and bake
* Homemade yummy apple goodies to eat
* Hotdogs, apple turnovers, apple scones, hot cider
* Tour the schoolhouse and hear its history
    at 1pm and 3pm
* Raffle tickets for the handmade quilt the elder
    ladies in Venersborg made this year
* Taste an apple you really like? We can graft one
    for you when they go dormant this winter and
    we'll have it ready for a February planting

* Apple Identification
If you have an old apple tree in your yard (or know someone who does) bring a half dozen of them
(unwashed, unpolished, just as they are when you pick them) in a paper bag and we'll have our experts from the Home Orchard Society tell you what they are. These people are really good. The old tree we have is called a GIDEON SWEET, a type that had, for 50 years, been thought to be extinct. If you come to the apple fest you can taste it, knowing that nobody but our cows had been eating them for many years. (didn't we feel silly, giving such an incredible apple to our herd!)

More info on our website http://www.FriendlyHaven.com/apples.html

Drum roll please ... due to the massive success of our fundraising for the old schoolhouse over the past
two years, this is the FIRST TIME we have a real flush toilet instead of the outhouse. Aren't we proud?

warmly,
Jacqueline & Joseph Freeman
Friendly Haven Rise Farm