Organic Apple Marketplace

Local Apples for Local Folk

Local people share in the fruits of our orchard by coming to the farm on announced harvest days. We are not a pick-your-own orchard but rather make tree-ripened fruit available for sale when varieties come ready. We invite customers at appointed times rather than having open hours every day. You get on our preferred customer list by simply letting Michael know of your love for especially tasty apples. Please understand that we are not set up to ship organic apples at this time.

Someday we intend to be squeezing fresh cider and making such available on a shareholder basis. The trees will be producing sufficient quantities of apples for cider making purpose in another few years; we need investment help for a commercial cider press to do right by this increasing harvest. You can bet we'll give a holler when Lost Nation "Nectar of the Gods" is available once again!

Real Cider Vinegar

Cider vinegar is the end result of hard cider left to sit. The alcohol of the cider converts to an acetic acid in the presence of vinegar bacteria (called acetobacter) and air. The best vinegars are aged for as long as four years in genuine wooden barrels. Time preserves the delicacy of flavor found in real cider vinegar that is lost in the 48-hour acetator process of industrial vinegar making. Equally important, the enzymes that give vinegar its reputation as a healing tonic only develop in contact with wood. Real cider vinegar -- made from organic apples and properly aged -- acts as a therapeutic buffer of the human circulatory system. The presence of an acetobacter mother (those strands that appear in our bottled vinegar) is proof positive that living vinegar comes unpasteurized.

Our batch production of real cider vinegar will be limited until our apple plantings come fully into bearing. Nancy uses much of the current supply for our High Calcium Tonic, available each fall in Nancy's Apothecary. Vinegar excels in drawing out the vitamins and minerals of nutritive herbs like borage, nettles, milky oats, and raspberry leaf.

Organic Cider Jelly &
Yankee Apple Butter

People loved our specialty apple products at the former Lost Nation Cider Mill. Have hope! Among the good things that follow the procurement of a cider press here at Heartsong Farm will be the return of our 100% Pure Cider Jelly and Yankee Apple Butter (made with real maple sugar) to our Organic Apple Marketplace.

The Apple Grower:
A Guide for the Organic Orchardist

Michael Phillips combines the half-forgotten wisdom of a century ago with the latest scientific knowledge about pests that plague apples and other fruits (click for a book summary).