Paw Paw Crazy!

It was fall in 2001. I was visiting my friend Dave Brown at Hay House Farm.

“Have you ever tried a paw paw?’ he asked as we walked the land. “I have never heard of them, what is it?” I replied.

That was the day I ate my first paw paw.

The following spring, Dave gifted me two growing shoots, also known as suckers, that he had dug out from under his trees. I planted them on my land. They took root and began to grow. Paw paws are quite easy to propagate and grow and don't have many pests or diseases to manage. Fast forward five years, and the beautiful trees produced their first fruits.

Paw paw’s grow on trees with large leaves and look like they belong on a tropical island. The fruit looks similar to a mango and tastes like they have no business growing in a northern climate. To me, their flavor is a cross between banana and pear with a slight pineapple finish. They are packed full of vitamins and minerals and are a considered to be a custard fruit - their flesh is very soft and silky. Not at all what you would expect to pick from a tree in Connecticut!

Customers seem to either love or hate them with the latter being mostly related to the texture. Their native range extends from New York to Nebraska and Michigan to the south coast of the United States. The trees grow tall and regal and the little fruits grow in clusters along the limbs and ripen in October.

A few years later, I was gifted a few more trees from our friends who own Perennial Harmony Nursery. Now we were growing five trees. Before I knew it, the trees were kindly giving us a couple hundred pounds of fruit each fall.

I started bringing them to farmers markets and giving them to our CSA shareholders. One year, NPR did a story on them, and all of a sudden I was selling every fruit the farm produced. More recently, Chef Colt Taylor from  e Essex in Centerbrook took some paw paws and made a delicious brûlée. What a delectable treat that was! Just last year, Fox Farm Brewery in Salem, purchased some to make special batch of a paw paw and peach beer.

Over the years, I have developed a little reputation as a paw paw grower from people looking for both fruit and trees. I have started to sell a small number of trees at our farm’s annual yearly seedling sale in Quaker Hill. Also, this year we have planted an additional 30 trees on our land and in the future want to plant as many as we can. Some might say I’m going a little paw paw crazy! But give them a try and I’m sure you’ll join the crazy group too!