I have grown up in the company of pears — or their remains — because breakfast with a perfect pear is something The Boss starts his day with, almost without exception.
In summer, before the William Bartlett pears are picked, he will make way for a nectarine or peach if he can find a good one. This is not as easy as it should be, since the supermarket nectarines are as hard as cricket balls and the peaches are either picked too early or kept too long in storage before we get them.
Luckily, we have a few local fruiterers who source their fruit from growers in the area, so the chances of finding good fruit around here are better — but you still have to go looking for it.
And he has a mate with a brief supply window of that delicious heirloom peach, the Elberta — at which time the pears are bringing their flavours together anyway.
He has always moved on to the Packhams when the Williams finish up around May – the Packhams will keep well in storage for a year and ripen nicely in a cool, dark spot. But the Packhams’ long-held dominance is about to be challenged by his new passion, the Ricó.
The Ricó is a handsome blush pear variety that was developed right here at what we used to call the Tatura Research Farm — but is now the Victorian Government’s Horticultural Centre of Excellence.
A cross between Corella and Doyenné du Comice, the Ricó has a fine texture, deep green colour and attractive blush and sweet juicy flavour. It can be eaten firm or left to ripen and soften for a soft, buttery texture — and The Boss reckons it’s a corker.
The Ricó pear has its own website and claims to be a pear with personality, even slightly irreverent. It features several of the Goulburn Valley growers producing the variety, including Matt Lenne, who is described as “an aircraft pilot and yoga guru who grows pears in his spare time”.
When The Boss went out to visit Matt at Ardmona recently, the orchard and cool stores were a hive of activity, so he kept his jokes about the tree pose to himself.
The pears had finished picking, and the apples were in full swing, but Matt was kind enough to take some time to show The Boss around, during which time he took a deep breath and extracted some new season Ricós from cool storage.
I’ve been enjoying them with him ever since. The triumph of the Ricó is that — apart from its cheerful red-to-purple blush — is that it eats equally well either firm or fully-ripened. What’s more, it stores as well as a Packham, so in theory it should be available until Christmas.
The trouble is, The Boss says, people in our export markets appreciate it more than we Australians do. One of the problems with pears here is their sheer abundance, since they grow so well in our soil and climate, particularly right here in the Goulburn Valley. That has left many Australians rather ho-hum about a fruit which is highly regarded elsewhere in the world for its texture, juiciness, and unique flavours.
In other words, pears get a much better price on export markets than they do here so, like our nectarines and peaches, the very best tend to go straight to export.
Thus, while the Ricó has only been available in any volume for four years, it has already found enthusiastic buyers overseas, and most is sourced from five large growers in our region. Like some other pear varieties, the Ricó benefits from a few months “conditioning” in cool storage after picking, allowing the sugars and flavours to meld, and this year’s crop is about to start shipping.
Fortunately, Coles has been smart enough to secure some Ricós for local consumption and you’ll be able to find this delicious fruit at Coles supermarkets from now until around July. My advice is to give them a go. Woof!