home.grown. Farm Feature: Paul Mazza's Fresh Produce
Jack Marquette
Marketing Intern
The Operation
Paul Mazza owns over 250 acres of farmland in Essex, Jerico, Williston, and Colchester. After visiting only the Essex and Colchester locations, we could tell each acre was used with purpose of growing some of the freshest produce in Vermont. An operation like this takes a group of employees who love to work for Mazza’s Fresh Produce and provide for their families in the snow seasons. Using busses, they can easily transport them around the farms. This operation leaves Paul working long days and is a reason why his Fruit and Vegetable Farmstand in Essex is so trusted.
Community Connection
We visited the Essex Farmstand location on a Wednesday afternoon and still there were cars consistently pulling in and purchasing the fresh produce from the stand. The community relies on trusts and respects Mazza’s stand and his work for delivering great produce. Their website, paulmazzas.com, displays that their mission statement has not changed. For 38 years they still want to “connect our community with fresh local foods.” Their website provides information on most services covered in this blog, but with much more detail. We encourage you to check out their website to learn more.
Pick-Your-Own
Even with the massive success of the stand, Mazza still says the people’s favorite is the “Pick-Your-Own”. You have the availability of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and apples. They encourage everyone to make memories along with collecting fresh produce at a great price. More information can be found on their website.
Overview
Paul Mazza offers many options to his loyal local customers. Whether it is his Fruit and Vegetable Farmstand in Essex, the popular Pick-Your-Own, or the hard work that goes in behind the scenes, there is a reason the community trusts the farm. Building through a community is something Paul Mazza and Price Chopper both take pride in and is one of the many reasons why he still provides fresh produce in our stores today.
Local Produce Season: A Crop Roster
We’ve been partnering with local farms since 1932, and it’s because of their hard work that we’re able to offer fresh, regional produce in our stores each year. Some of these farms, like Black Horse Farms in Coxsackie, NY have been partnering with us for over 50 years! This time of year is one of our favorites because of all the local crops that become available. You probably know that some crops take longer to grow than others, but do you know which ones are the early crowd and which ones take longer here in the Northeast? We break it down below!
Season Starters
Introducing our growing season starting lineup: lettuce, summer squash and radishes.
Lettuce: Thriving in temperatures around 60ºF to 70ºF, lettuce is definitely a lead-off batter in the growing season lineup. Many varieties of lettuce reach maturity in as little as 30 days, and some can be harvested even before then as microgreens.
Squash: Squash shine their brightest when the air temperature reaches an average of 65ºF. They need 50 to 65 frost free days to properly mature, making them typically safe for planting in the final weeks of spring.
Radishes: We source radishes from local folks like A. Gurda Produce in Pine Island, NY. Requiring anywhere from 22 to 70 days to harvest in New York’s Black Dirt Region, radishes are a cool-weather crop, so farmers try to complete harvesting before the weather becomes too warm. If you’re a home grower, radishes are best sown in the garden two to three weeks before the average last frost in spring.
Peak-Season Heavy Hitters
When the growing gets hot, our heavy hitters get growing: corn, eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes.
Corn: Corn thrives when the soil temperature reaches 60ºF. Two to three weeks after the last frost of spring is a good estimate. Depending on the variety and amount of heat during growing season, corn takes between 60 to 100 days to harvest. It grows well in air temperatures from 60ºF up to as hot as 95ºF. We get corn from folks like Shaul Farms in Fultonham, NY and Kinderhook Creek Farm in Stephentown, NY: some of the best corn growers in the corn growing game.
Eggplant: Eggplant needs a long, warm growing season to reach their full potential. They’re sensitive to cool climates and will fail in any frost or light freezing. Ideally, eggplants need four months of 60ºF to 85ºF temperatures. If you’re a gardener and are located in a cooler spring climate, eggplant will ideally need to be started indoors.
Peppers: Speaking of starting indoors, peppers need similar treatment. Start your seeds indoors 8-10 weeks before the last spring frost date. They require a growing season of 60 to 90 days. Once we start getting in Northeast-grown peppers in our stores we know the season’s growing peak is in full effect!
Tomatoes: We’re proud to source tomatoes from a variety of local farms, like Paul Mazza’s in Essex, VT. Tomatoes enjoy having their fun in the sun, and do not tolerate frost. It takes tomatoes between 60 to 80 days to mature. When planting, our farmers have to make sure their crop is in an area where it can receive 6 hours of sunlight a day. Luckily, most farm fields in our region are wide open and get plenty of sun!
Late Season MVPs
At the end of the season, we call on the MVPs to close things out: hard squash and pumpkins.
Hard Squash: Hard squash grows best in air temperatures of 50ºF to 90ºF. It has a growing season of anywhere from 60 to as many as 110 days. If you’re growing them in your garden, they should be set to plant no later than three weeks after the last frost of spring, or once the soil has warmed to at least 60ºF. A lot of folks are on Team Butternut, but we’re fanatics of Team Acorn.
Pumpkins: A favorite crop of farms like Black Horse Farms in Coxsackie NY, pumpkins are a tender vegetable. In Northern locations, pumpkins for Halloween are usually planted in late May. We typically offer regionally-grown pie pumpkins until early-winter, which wraps up our local growing season roster until the following year.
There you have it! We hope you’ve enjoyed our home.grown. season breakdown. We’re lucky to partner with local growers in our region for locally grown produce each year. From apples to zucchini, when it’s made or grown here, we get it here!
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