Wild Apricots at the Market

I’m in love with unusual fruits and vegetables, but more than that I’m enamored of all things wild: wild mushrooms that grow in the dank wet ground of surrounding woods, wild raspberries that   I can pick from the bushes near my office for an early morning treat, the wild rosehips that grow on the hill next to our home and the wild chives that make an appearance at nearly every meal in the summer.   So, when I discovered wild apricots at our market, I was simply taken.

The flavor of wild apricots is so concentrated and perfumed.   I’d hoped to make a wild apricot clafoutis this week, but it didn’t materialize.   We ate them all fresh.

And they’re tiny.   Really tiny.   Maybe slightly bigger than a cherry.   Very slightly.

See, I told you they were tiny.   That’s an organic, cultivated apricot on the left and the wild apricot sits on the right.   I swear, all the flavor of the bigger apricot and then some is compacted into that tiny speckled   nugget on the right.

And there it is: open and ready for the eating.   I doubt they’ll last at the market much longer.   Apricot season is so short (though it’s been lengthened this year do to a late winter and cool summer).