Hours

taproom

3-8 Thursday, October 8

Closed Friday, October 9

12-6 Saturday, October 10

12-6 Sunday, October 11

12-5 Monday, October 12

Farm stand / PYO

1-5* Friday, October 9

9-5 Saturday, October 10

9-5 Sunday, October 11

9-5 Monday, October 12

*We’ll be adjusting our hours this Friday due to a private event. The taproom will be closed but our farm stand and pick-your-own will be open!

*Please refer to Events Calendar or Google listings (Farm / Cidery) for private event closures or special holiday openings which may occasionally affect these hours.

What’s Pickin’?

APPLES
We will have NINE varieties of apples available for pick-your-own this week! Please see the schedule on this page for some adjusted hours on Friday, and our additional Monday hours!

Mutsu aka Crispin: New this week! A cross between Golden Delicious and Indo. Released by the Aomori Apple Experiment Station in Japan in 1937. A sibling of Shizuka as they share the same parents. A large green apple with light yellow and crisp flesh. Extremely sweet and faintly tart. Great for fresh eating and noted for making pies. These apples are delicious and are typically a fan favorite. This variety is located up the main orchard road and is the last row in both the Center Hill and Pines Blocks. Extremely limited quantities.

Fuji: New this week! A cross of Virginia Ralls Janet and Red Delicious, made and selected in Japan, and was introduced in 1962. Orangish-red, kind of pink colored skin, white flesh, crisp, juicy, very sweet, slightly sub-acid. Two rows of Fuji can be found on the eastern side of the Pump Pond Block, between the old strawberry field and the Gala rows. Extremely limited quantities.

Fortune: New this week! A cross between Schohairie Red Spy and Empire made in Geneva, NY at the Agricultural Experiment Station and introduced in 1995. Also known as NY 429. Large to very large fruit in size, mostly red in color, creamy colored flesh, crisp, subacid, and slightly aromatic. Such a wonderful apple and oh so susceptible to the bitter rot fungus due to its tender thin skin. Most farms ripped these out of the ground soon after they started bearing and began calling the variety "Misfortune". We have done our best with this variety and there are some very nice fruits on the trees. This single row can be found in the Lower Center Hill Block, 5 rows up from the pond by the blueberries

Keepsake: New this week! This is the second year that we will be offering this variety for pick-your-own. These are on the trees we top-worked in 2021 and turned Red Delicious into Keepsake, and they bore another full crop this year. People have already been picking them, so this week folks will have to go about half-way down the row towards the pine trees to find the fruit. Keepsake was introduced by the University of Minnesota breeding program (same program that introduced Honeycrisp, Chestnut Crab, and many other amazing apples) in 1978. It is a cross between Northern Spy and Frostbite, two incredible apples in their own right. Their offspring is really phenomal. It is good straight from the tree, and it is excellent after some time in storage. It would be great to grab these, put them in the refrigerator and forget about them for a few weeks. It is a very firm apple, very sweet with molasses and cane sugar flavors, and also a little fruity flavor on the back end. Let's go! These apples can be found going up the secondary orchard road in the Pines Block, just below the Mutsu.

Ludacrisp: New this week - A recent introduction by MAIA (Midwest Apple Improvement Association), this apple comes from an open-pollinated Sweet 16. Mostly crimson-red skin skin with some light streaking. Crisp yellowish flesh that is full of sweetness and a little tartness and is full of tropical flavors. This variety is located up the secondary orchard road in Seymour Field. Limited quantities.

Roxbury Russet: New this week! This is often believed to be the oldest named variety in North America dating back to the early 1600s in Roxbury, Massachusetts. White flesh tinged with yellow and sometimes green. Green skin that is smooth and often covered with greenish to yellowish-brown russet. Firm, somewhat coarse flesh, moderately tender breaking flesh that is juicy with a bright subacid flavor. Good for fresh eating, but it really shines in the kitchen and cidermaking. This variety is located up the secondary orchard road in Seymour Field. Limited quantities.

Royal Empire: Supposedly an improved strain of the original Empire, this sport colors redder and comes on about a week or so later than the original Empire. Crisp, juicy, sweet and tart in flavor. A really beautiful New York apple. These four rows are found way on top of the hill behind the peach block. These trees are some of the oldest trees on the property, planted in 1984 by Karen and Dave Fraleigh alone, sometime soon after they were married. 

Royal Court: A limb sport of the original Cortland discovered in Nova Scotia by Jacob Hartenhof. A relatively large apple with dark red to purple skin and white flesh. Complex sweet, tart flavor. Very aromatic. Great for fresh eating and really holds its own in the kitchen. (These trees were planted in 2016, have a beautiful crop load this year, and are found going up the secondary orchard road between the Center Hill Block and Pines Block, and found in both blocks). Final week.

Empire: A cross of McIntosh and Golden Delicious, made in 1945. The seed was produced in Claverack, NY (about 20 minutes drive north of here), then propagated in Geneva, NY by Roger D. Way and introduced in 1966. Creamy white flesh with both a sweet and tart flavor. Juicy and crisp. Good for fresh eating, salads, baking, and sauces. If used in applesauce, the sauce turns pink! (This variety is located up the main orchard road on the right. There are two rows below the Jonamac and two rows above the Jonamac. The darker colored fruit will be more ripe.)

We will have all of these varieties available pre-picked at the farm stand.

We will also have the following varieties available pre-picked at the farm stand, among others:

NY 428: These are INCREDIBLE this year. Notes of banana, fruity, and super rich in flavor. It has the same parentage as Fortune. It never received a name because the breeders thought that it was too familiar in taste to Fortune and allegedly gets "greenish cork light spots". I haven't noticed them so much. Rich complex flavor. It really is a remarkable piece of fruit. And oh, so beautiful. Limited quantities.

King David: Possibly a cross of Jonathan x Arkansas Black that originated on the farm of Ben Frost in Washington County, Arkansas around 1893. A gorgeous dark red/maroon skinned apple with yellowish flesh. Firm and crisp, juicy, aromatic, sweet but the acidity is bright and bold. Multi-purpose excellence - eats out of hand well, and excellent in the kitchen and for cider.

Ashmead’s Kernel: This variety has a cult following to say the least. Believed to originate in Gloucester, England in the early 1700s, it has traveled the world and has excited and enarmoured many an apple lover. Medium-sized apple that has a honey colored russet usually tinged orange on one cheek. INTENSE sweetness (not a usual sweetness when we think of sweet apples) and acidity (not the usual tartness when we think of tart apples) combines to offer a mind and mouth altering experience. It is not for those who want an easy eating apple, but is an exceptional and amazing experience to eat, cook with, and drink.

Idared: A cross between Jonathan x Wagener, introduced in 1942 by the Idaho Experiment Station. A wonderful apple with perfectly balanced sweetness and tartness. Fine textured, white flesh, and tastes like an apple in the best way. Richly flavored and juicy. Excellent for eating, applesauce, baking, etc. Multi-purpose apple that does a lot of things really well. Limited quantities.

20 Ounce: Originated on the farm of George Howland in Massachusetts in the 1840s. Very large green/yellowish skin, sometimes splashed with red or dark red streaks. Thick skin, moderately tender and mostly white flesh, juicy, subacid. An old favorite for making pies. Also great sliced with cheese. Limited quantities.

PUMPKINS
The pumpkin patch is back! We do not plant pumpkins here. Instead, we place them in a freshly mowed field (between the larger Macoun trees that are on the left as you begin going up the main orchard road and the two rows of Macoun on the left in the Farm Stand Block). We have carving pumpkins as well as the small pie pumpkins. We will also have pumpkins situated around the farm stand.

APPLE TASTINGS #5 AND #6
We will conduct APPLE TASTINGS this Saturday AND Sunday morning at 10 am in the picnic area outside the farm stand. Please spread the word and come if you want to try some interesting, tasty, and lesser-known apple cultivars. We’ve got 15 GEMS on deck! THESE TASTINGS ARE GOING TO BE A LOT OF FUN AND EDUCATIONAL all at the same time.  

Join us in the taproom Thursday through Sunday for locally-crafted drinks and food pop-ups. Keep an eye on our events calendar for upcoming live music, featured ferments (tastings by other NYS makers), classes, festivals, ticketed dinners, and more. See you soon!

Browse our Food Vendor and Events Calendar.

See Rajiv Surendra’s recent visit to the farm for HGTV Handmade!

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Find Out More:

Address:  14 Rose Hill Farm, Red Hook, NY 12571

Conveniently accessible from I-87 and the TSP yet peacefully tucked away off the beaten track.

Directions from NYC: Take Taconic State Parkway N to exit 67 (toward Pine Plains/Red Hook). Turn left at NY-199 W. Enter Village of Red Hook, NY-199 becomes Market St. Turn right onto Route 9. Turn right at Fraleigh Lane. Make left into Rose Hill Farm.