IN FRUIT
The good news this week is all about new season Queensland strawberries. They are far better than normal and less expensive than I would expect this early in June. In prior years in fact they have often been close to fifty percent dearer than this week’s prices. Amazingly we are also seeing experimental blackberries from far North Queensland this week. It’s just two years ago that we wouldn’t have seen blackberries before late November or early December. So there is a feast of fabulous winter berries coming our way over the next month, all of course weather permitting. Avocados continue their good run as do Imperial mandarins. Some less desirable sized lemons (some too big, some too small) are dragging lemon prices down. Kiwi gold continue to be a favourite of mine and this week some smaller topless pineapples are in our shops at bargain prices. Imperfect pears and apples of all varieties continue to flood the markets. In fact, our only issue in fruit this week has been the imported cherries which have arrived badly weather damaged. As a result we will keep away from these over the next week.
IN VEGETABLE
Tomatoes of all descriptions are a real problem this week but almost all other lines are quite OK. We are just hitting the gap when the early plantings in far north Queensland were wiped out with the floods that followed on from Cyclone Debbie in late March. Luckily the plantings were very young and the gap will only be short term. Lots of options in most other veg lines particularly kumera, carrots, fennel, cabbage (all types) and zucchini remain at low prices, in some cases lower than last week. Other bargains are to be found in Spanish onions, parsnips (worth having a look at the imperfect option) spring onions and eggplant. Caulies are a little dearer than last week, but still a good value option.
