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Home > Celestial Blood > Nicole Rucker harvests peaches from her adopted tree near Fresno
Podcast: Celestial Blood
Episode:

Nicole Rucker harvests peaches from her adopted tree near Fresno
Category: Arts
Duration: 00:00:00
Publish Date: 2025-08-08 19:00:00
Description: Summer means peaches, and at the Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers Market , that means a visit to Troy Regier, who has been selling there since 1983. Troy brings his tree-ripened peaches, nectarines, and often his whole family down from Dinuba in the Central Valley. Troy explains that sun exposure and the potassium added to the soil influence both the sugar content and flavor of his fruit each year. Handpicking peaches is hard work, especially in temperatures reaching 100 degrees. Peach fuzz feels like fiberglass as it enters the body's pores, which open up in the heat. A hot shower only makes it feel worse, says Regier. Four guys can pick three to four flats in an 8-hour day. With premium trees and high-quality fruit, Regier maintains that handpicking is still the only option for his farm, choosing flavor over convenience and technology. A phone booth sits in the middle of a field at Masumoto Family Farms, where visitors are encouraged to connect with their deceased relatives and ancestors. Photo courtesy of Nicole Rucker. Pastry chef Nicole Rucker of Fat + Flour in Culver City and Grand Central Market adopted a peach tree at Masumoto Family Farm just outside of Fresno. David Mas Matsumoto, a third generation farmer, has handed over the reins of the farm to his daughter, Nikiko, and her wife. For nearly a decade, Nicole and a small group of friends have traveled to harvest fruit from her tree. "It's just a beautiful day in the field," she says. "They always mark it with an opening ceremony, where they either read a poem or they talk about current events and updates and things like that, and it's just a very beautiful time. And then we go and do a bunch of hot, dirty manual labor in the fields and get to know what it feels like to be a peach picker." Nicole and the Fat + Flour team will put the harvest to work, launching their glazed peach pie this weekend. Nicole Rucker adopted a tree at Matsumoto Farm, where she and friends harvest peaches that she brings back to use at her bakery, Fat + Flour. Photo courtesy of Nicole Rucker.
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