Fishing for a living and growing some of the best fruit available. It doesn’t get much better. Brady
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Thanks Brady, taking advantage of California’s best resources!
I’m looking forward to trying Honey Punch this year, also Flavor Grenade. Last year my Flavor Kings tasted funny to me, very perfumy, off putting flavor. They are my least favorite pluot. I guess why we have so many, everybody has different taste buds. I like the size of many pluots, very big, and so far I like them much better than any plum. Although Weeping Santa Rosa was fairly tasty.
You can’t tell by the photo but Honey Punch has a more purple cast to it’s color than Flavor King, which is more red. It rained (at last) yesterday, and water spots are visible.
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I’d very much like to taste FK, no matter how perfumy.
I suggest all taste them, most really like them. What I meant is take any perfume, poor it over the pluot and take a bit, that’s what it tasted like to me. I gave them all away. Half the people in the world think that cilantro tastes just like soap. The other have love it. These things happen. I’m on the loving it side of cilantro.
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Tony,
How can you tell that your FG ripen? I have 3-4 fruit set but not sure when to pick them.
It’s hard to tell, they hang a long time. Plums and pluots seem to stay good over a month, unlike peaches which get mealy if left on the counter (or tree) too long. I keep a journal, and it is useful for ripeness dates.
I harvested Flavor King 9-13-17 last year. Mine looks to be ripe earlier this year. I noted it was perfect last year for ripeness. I add notes about ripeness when harvested to try and pick them at the right time, not easy! Some fruit I like slightly under ripe, or over ripe, just to complicate things!
I picked them when they turned colors like my photo above. My Wife liked them crunchy so I picked some earlier last week. Trial them one fruit every 5 days to see which h stage is the best once they turned a little yellowish.
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I heard these fruit stay crunchy, Mine are yellow now too, I should pick one. I have 6 of them this year. DWN says August 30th to October 2nd! These babies can hang! Dates are not helpful for me here in the Midwest.
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Drew it’s likely you just don’t have the right conditions to grow a good Flavor King. Don’t blame the fruit blame your weather or lack thereof. Pluots need a long season and high heat.
Here’s what ripe FK look like:
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I will be making my annual no sugar fruit leather early next week. Just waiting for some more pears to ripen up. I promised last year to post this recipe but got completely ravaged by dried fruit beetles. After a lot of work keeping the orchard clean this season and last, brought in some free range chickens to help out, we have plenty of fruit to make leather this year! So here is my recipe, very simple. I take 15% pears, this year warren pear, and place in vitamax blender. The pear is the most essential ingredient, as it provides the pectin. Almost all fruit leather at the store has pear as main ingredient, like fruit roll ups. The second ingredient is 15% rich, ripe berry figs, like VDB, Panache,and Strawberry Verte. The final ingredient is 70% ripe Flavor King pluots, mine are averaging around 25 brix. Place the fruit in your blender and fully blend on high, bringing it down a bit to Finnish smooth. Pour the blended fruit on your drying trays and dry at 135 degrees. I have to put in the time to dry to right consistency, it should be dry but not overly dry. I will post pics of proper dryness next week when I make it. The finished product is awesome, super Flavor King flavor, with pear and rich fig, the seed crunch and sweetness of the fig makes this leather Off The Hook! You can add some white nectarine or peach too, the whites work best, as they are the sweetest. You don’t have to use those ingredients, I have made fruit leather out of many fruits, the main thing is you want sweet fruits, or you may have to add sugar. Enjoy this recipe, my favorite combo for fruit leather!
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All sun, no rain, it doesn’t get better. We have had more 90 degree plus days than I ever remember Sometimes we only have a couple. I would say about 30 days of 90 plus temps this year. Best year ever for stone fruit. My trees are showing great stress from lack of water. Almost looks like herbicide damage. It’s like this most summers, fantastic growing conditions. Well this year, I have to eat my words. One was damaged from a bird peck, and ripened early and fell off. I ate around the damage, and the fruit was fantastic. Not sure why last year it was so poor? No other plums were? Well it is much better, for whatever reason? Your Flavor Kings look just like mine. Bigger this year too! They appear to be ripe right now. Still going to leave them be a couple more days. I have to leave town today.
While doing this one fell off, and it’s perfectly ripe, slight give when squeezing.
I was just looking at the rain averages for Sterling Heights
July 0 inches
August 0 inches.
That’s not really accurate, i would say we got about a 1/2 inch for the 2 months at my exact location. It rained 2-3 times for a few minutes.
It’s raining cats and dogs in other parts of the state. We have tornado damage this week, but not one drop here in at least 3 weeks. I’m so tired of watering my potted plants. I have to go right now and do it again…Takes about an hour!
Now wondering if i should harvest or not? 2 days should make little difference though.
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Drew,
I harvested some of Flavor King fruits a little early to avoid the birds and squirrels and they ripened on the counter just fine and tasted as good as tree ripened. I was a little surprised by the results so next year I may do the same if too much pests issue.
@Drew51
Tony
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Ok well I’m harvesting them tomorrow or Monday if that is the case.
My Flavor Granade are still hard like rock. Squirrels abound.
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Hopefully the squirrels will leave them alone and you will enjoy a real sweet crunchy fruit.
Tony
Squirrels have eaten half of my Satsuma plums and keep taking my A pears even though I put in a temporary fence. There are trees all around my neighborhood. That makes it easier for them to jump to my trees.
I decide to sacrifice my 20th century pears so they leave my Koream Giant alone. Taste wise, there is no comparison between the two anyway.
But… having those critters stealing my fruit is very frustrating. I am trapping them but there are quite a few of them showing up all the times.
Time to a pet dog. That will teach them a lesson!
We have no squirrels here but wouldn’t cat(s) be better? Gardening in US is so much more difficult.
We got no fireblight, black knot, squirrels, possums, very little deer and rabbits, no Jap. beetles, SWD, ambrosia beetle, spotted lantern flies, plum curculio and don’t know what else. There are so many pests the average US grower has to fight that if I lived there I would probably give up on growing fruit all together 
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Cat will do. Cat is less maintenance than dog in a way!