Flats of berries were filling up quickly Friday at Prevedelli Farms on Pioneer View Road in Watsonville.
Filling store orders and preparing for sales at area farmers markets, field workers joined forces with Nick Prevedelli on their sloping farmland, harvesting loganberries, boysenberries and olallieberries and carefully placing them in small cardboard trays.
Boysenberries and olallieberries typically cannot be found in grocery stores, Prevedelli said.
“They’re too fragile; they don’t travel very well, they don’t keep very well,” he said. “You’ll only find them at farmers markets and at the farm. The olallieberry is amazing. It’s known as the king of the blackberries. It’s less seedy; it’s a very tender berry. So when you bite into it it melts in your mouth. They make really good pies or really good cobblers. They are sweet tarts: not too sweet, not too tart.”
Prevedelli Farms started in Soquel in the 1930s, but has operated in the Pajaro Valley since 1945. It was established by Arturo Prevedelli, who emigrated from Italy in the early 1900s.
In October, as part of the annual Open Farm Tour, Prevedelli Farms will welcome the public to the farm to sample their goods and celebrate eight decades of operation.
The farm also grows blackberries and raspberries. However, the olallieberry only has a four- to six-week season, which is at its best right now. The farm also grows 45 different types of apples, six kinds of European and Asian pears, 14 types of heirloom tomatoes, persimmons, lemons, sweet peppers and winter and summer squash.
“All their products are certified organic,” Prevedelli added.
“It’s interesting,” he said. “People at the farmers markets always say ‘I want the blackberries.’ But by the time I explain to them that this is a short-season berry so you should eat these—the olallie or boysenberries—people are happy to try them out.”
Prevedelli Farms typically sell at the farmers markets in Aptos (Saturdays, 8am-noon, Cabrillo College, 6500 Soquel Drive), Santa Cruz (Wednesday from 1-5:30pm on Cedar and Church streets) and Monterey (Fridays from 8am-noon at the Del Monte Shopping Center, just off of Highway 1 and Munras Avenue).
They also operate a farmstand on Fridays from noon-4pm at the farm, 375 Pioneer View Road (prevedelli.com).
