Extreme Taste: Mile-High Peaches from Palisade to Paonia

摘要

I had never tried Western Slope peaches before I visited Colorado in August 2003, but for years I could practically taste their reputation. Countless Coloradans had raved to me about their mountain-grown peaches as the juiciest and sweetest, a view endorsed, despite the whiff of chauvinism, by market forces: the states peaches account for less than one percent of the national crop, but fetch three times the average wholesale price. At elevations 4,700 to 6,850 feet, Colorado peach farms are the highest in the United States, perched between glory and disaster. I wondered, do the peaches really benefit, as do certain wine grapes, by being grown in extreme conditions?