Thank you to everyone one who visited our Old Road Estate stall at this year's Friday Night Feast! What a night! The weather was certainly on our side, a blue sky filled with sun and warmth meant loads of people were out and about to enjoy the festive buzz  and they weren't disappointed. The town center was strewn with fairy lights and filled with music, people and of course delicious fare and wine. 

Our fig trees held on wonderfully this year to provide juicy ripe fruit ready for our 'Fresh Figs Three Ways'. 

We like to keep our figs wholesome, simple and delicious but most importantly featuring as many local producers as we can.  

 The dishes we featured as like our first event were:

1. Fresh figs w Vanilla + Maple Mascarpone, Maple Roasted Orchard Walnuts, Candied Figs + Dad’s Fig sauce
2. Fresh Figs w Whipped Cranky Goat’s Cheese, Uncle Joe’s Roasted & Salted Hazelnuts, Thymebank Watercress + local Olive Oil
3. Fresh Figs with Thymebank Rocket, Whitestone Windsor Blue, Prosciutto + Balsamic Glaze

Thanks for having us Feast Marlborough, we'll be back in 2020! 

What a privilege it was to be featured in the March issue of Capital Magazine who ran a piece on 'Mates across the Strait' focusing on local Marlborough producers who firmly believe in provenance. Growing up here in Marlborough, we have fond memories of the bounty of produce that was grown on the plains of this region. Corn, peas, stone fruit, cherries and garlic to name just a few. While Marlborough is proudly home to many vines, including it's world renowned Sauvignon Blanc, it's also nice to see other crops making a resurgence, especially those that can be purchased direct from the growers at either farmer markets or roadside stalls. All of this produce certainly compliments our region's award-wining wines. We love nothing more than hosting chefs and customers from around the country keen to find out more about the orchard and where their Autumn fruit is grown. 

You can read the full piece from page 38 at the link below:

https://issuu.com/capitalmag/docs/capital_59?fbclid=IwAR2Qaao234VAmLVw62xR93Lt5h7Bv-a4fPUUF8JgDbTfoSYamX1KXKnGQkk

We love our little roadhouse. It's an opportunity for us to share our ripe, lush fruit every day of the week (weather permitting for picking!) with both locals and visitors to our region. Special thanks to Bayleys Country Magazine who featured us alongside other folks who run honesty box systems in other parts of New Zealand. You can read the full article at the link below: 

https://www.bayleys.coz/country/articles/honesty-is-the-best-policy 

Happy reading! 

Christchurch folk this 2019 fig season are lucky enough to be able to order this most delicious Fresh Fig, Almond and Honey Cake! Topped with chocolate ganache and toasted hazelnuts, it is such a seasonal beauty! 

You can find out more and order here: http://www.cakesbyanna.co.nz/2019/4/2/fresh-fig-almond-and-honey-cake

What a season! After a long ripening period and sun-drenched days we enjoyed a season with plentiful, ripe and juicy fruit. Both our figs and feijoas have been utterly delicious with the feijoas being some of the largest and tastiest we have ever seen. Some of our new fig varieties started fruiting for the first time this season which is very exciting! We were lucky enough to end the season with a final flurry being involved with a local event - Feast Marlborough and the Bayleys Friday Night Feast event.

We wanted our offerings to be simple, fresh and abundant with local produce, so we decided to serve ‘Fresh Figs Three Ways’…

1. Fresh figs w Vanilla + Maple Mascarpone, Maple Roasted Orchard Walnuts, Candied Figs + Dad’s Fig sauce
2. Fresh Figs w Whipped Cranky Goat’s Cheese, Uncle Joe’s Roasted & Salted Hazelnuts, Thymebank Watercress + Stanton’s Olive Oil
3. Fresh Figs with Rocket, Whitestone Windsor Blue, Prosciutto + Balsamic Glaze

Take a look at some of the images taken by Clayton Morgan Photography at Friday night’s event.

While our fig sales have finished for 2018, we still have bags of feijoas available at our farm gate sales while Mother Nature allows! Thank you to everyone who has supported our family orchard this season – we couldn’t do it without you!

The orchard is well and truly in full swing and we have an abundance of beautifully ripe and juicy figs available. The season began a number of weeks ahead of last season thanks to a lovely warm and sun-drenched ripening season.

We’re absolutely thrilled to be able to share our figs with fellow fig lovers and so our gate sales are open 7 days a week at 32 Old Renwick Road where you can find cooking/preserving figs or plenty of ripe figs to eat at an affordable price direct from the orchard!

We are also grateful and very thankful to have the support of talented local chefs who have been creating wonderful things with our Autumn produce. See a few of the magical creations below…And don’t forget if you feel like you’re in need of some fig inspiration, pop on over to our recipe section to peruse a few ideas here.

But first, feast your eyes on these local fig dishes! 

A beautiful Autumn plate of soft goats cheese, honey, Old Road Estate figs, pumpkin + red walnut by the lovely folk at Arbour...

Bacon, honey glazed figs, walnut, pear + raspberry vinaigrette by our friends at Scotch Bar...

Balsamic glazed fig salad of avocado, roquette, choggia + pear by Damian @yogachefnz...

Pavlova topped with fresh + roasted figs, almonds, pistachios + burnt honey by Sam at Harvest Restaurant Marlborough...

Our fig and feijoa season has come to an end for the year. A season with a delayed start due to rain and reduced sunshine hours across the region meant our production was down on previous years but the fruit still tasted as BEAUTIFUL as ever.  

The reduced volume meant the figs were more sacred than ever before with each and every fig handpicked, inspected and packed to ensure optimum quality. While this happens every year, there's something quite special about smaller volumes as you almost get to know every fig! We are a small team that is very passionate about our fruit and each day we all spend many hours with our produce. As a result we are constant contact with each other about what is happening out in the orchard and in the pack shed.  

While the leaves on the trees are now falling and any fruit left dropping to the ground and providing nourishment back into the soil, we'd like to thank you for your support this season. We hope you enjoyed our Autumn fruit! 

We'll be in contact in 2018 as soon as we see our fruit appearing and ripening on the trees but in the meantime, we wish you a happy, healthy and delicious Winter. 

Kind regards,

The Old Road Estate team

We are so very excited to announce that our farm gate sales are now open for the first time ever - hopefully with many more years to come for Old Road Estate.

Dad has outdone himself with this nifty idea for a ‘fig house’ to keep the fruit cool and fresh so that you can enjoy them as we do – just like you’ve picked them straight off the tree yourself. The idea of the farm gate sales is to enable locals to try and enjoy those figs with delightfully juicy spilt skins that we all take home after a day in the orchard to eat (if we don’t eat them sooner!), but that we can’t send around the country to our customers due to the fragile nature of our luscious figs.

We are using an honesty box system and will be delivering a number of punnets each day to the farm gate for you to take home. If we ever run out of figs – just let us know by texting the orchard on 027-234 6050 and we will run some extra down  to the gate to ensure more folk can enjoy them!  

We’re into recycling around here so please drop off any punnets back to the farm gate fig house so we can ensure nothing goes to waste. We’d love to see how you enjoy our figs so please share your fig creations, recipes or ideas with us on Facebook and Instagram using #oldroadestate.

FIND US AT:

Facebook: @oldroadestate

Instagram: @oldroadestate

Thank you!

The Old Road Estate team

Feijoas originate from Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Argentina, however they were bought to New Zealand in the 1920’s where new varieties were developed that had much improved flavour.

Delicious and nutritious, fresh feijoas are packed full of fibre and Vitamin C. Just four small feijoas will provide a woman with 16% of her daily fibre requirements and a man with 13% of his daily fibre needs. Whereas, four small feijoas will provide a woman with 21% of her daily Vitamin C needs and a man with 19% of his daily needs. Feijoas are also a wonderful source of antioxidants, well known for their protective health benefits. Specifically the Proanthocyanins, a type of polyphenol antioxidant, found in feijoas has been found to reduce inflammation and blood clotting as well as potentially playing a role in regulating blood pressure.

If you need some Feijoa inspiration, take peak at a few of our favourite ways to eat them here!

Fresh figs are wonderfully nutritious and highlight the importance of following nature and eating seasonally. The fig season is incredibly short at approximately eight weeks so it’s worth making the most of this luscious fruit while it’s abundant and totally delicious!

Fresh figs provide a rich source of fibre which helps to support a healthy digestive system and regular bowel habits to eliminate waste from the body. High-fibre foods also help to keep us feeling fuller for longer by satisfying our appetite which in turn can support maintaining a healthy body weight.

Fresh figs also provide valuable vitamins and minerals to support all of the chemical reactions that take place in our bodies every second of every day. Importantly, like many other colourful fruits and vegetables, fresh figs provide much-needed antioxidant polyphenols which undertake the important job of mopping up free-radicals within the body to protect cells from damage which in turn supports a reduced risk of diet-related diseases such as heart disease and certain cancers.

So not only are figs absolutely delicious to eat but they are also good for you too!