IN HONOR OF CHERRY PIE MONTH: SOFT CHERRY JEWELS BURSTING THROUGH FLAKY LATTICE

Sour cherries are delicate. The climate has to be perfectly temperature, soil and wind balanced, with little range, metered perfectly across the seasons. The fruits don’t last long once they are harvested before they soften into rot. They don’t travel well either. That’s why most sour cherries are processed immediately, turned into jams, pie fillings, and dried fruit. It’s rare to find them fresh at the market.

Michigan, where most sour cherries come from, is reeling from the early warming, with a string of days at 80ºF in April, followed by a hard frost. The trees were fooled into budding, then robbed of their nascent fruits in the cruel freeze. Over 90% of the crop was wiped out. A few scattered farms in upstate New York grow a few sour cherry trees and for a scant two weeks in July, their farm stands sell the cherries in wooden slatted quarts. We like to eat them plain, sun-warmed, mashing them between tongue and palate, complex tart juice filling our mouths. We can’t imagine a world with no more sour cherries and no more cherry pie. Why do things seem more beautiful when we are in danger of losing them?