Don Curlee: Freezers extend outreach of fruits

The solid reputation of California's vast production of fruits and berries is enhanced by the companies that offer them in a solid form — frozen.

Consumers longing for a sweet and juicy peach, plum or apricot probably won't think of finding it in the frozen food aisle at the supermarket, but dozens of food preparers buy tons of some of California's sweetest and best fruits for freezing. That volume is often processed further to become a wide range of consumer products, frequently displayed far away from the frozen aisle as canned goods.

Take jams and jellies, for example. That famous Ohio company that says its products have to be good because the name on the label is uncommon buys several thousand tons of California apricots every year as raw mat-erial for jams, jellies and preserves that end up as canned goods on grocery shelves.

Harvesting those products in California's orchards and fields is done, as the jam and jelly folks say "at the peak of harvest." Freezing them on site ensures that they arrive in Ohio or elsewhere still at peak freshness, taste and consistency. A handful of California firms execute that strategic step of preservation.

One of the giants in frozen fruit products is Wawona Frozen Foods in Clovis. Peaches are its primary product, but the changing seasons and strong demand for a wide variety of fruit delights have resulted in expansion that includes 18 different frozen fruit products in a typical season, handled at the peak of the season by 900 employees.

Peaches are a natural for Wawona because the Smittcamp family which operates the business has been a large-scale grower of peaches in the Clovis area and elsewhere in Fresno County for three generations. A significant amount of fruit from the family orchards still makes it to market in the fresh state.

For the frozen products extreme and detailed attention is given to grading, sorting, slicing, dicing and pureeing the peaches at the freezing plant to prepare packages of various shapes and sizes for specific buyers. In addition to the folks in Ohio with the strange name, customers include ice cream and yogurt producers, bakeries, cereal manufacturers and canned food distributors throughout the country and abroad.

The family takes pride in freezing a high volume of freestone peaches. The distinctive texture, flavor and color of freestones are preferred by buyers of the frozen product and many fresh fruit consumers as well.

Strangely enough for California, statistics for the frozen segment of the fruit industry are not easy to find. However, it is known that 15,000 tons of the state's 60,000-ton annual apricot crop find their way to freezers, compared to 30,000 tons to canners.

The state's crop of cling peaches was 430,000 tons last year, of which 15,000 tons were frozen. The freestone crop was 725,000 tons, with approximately 70,000 tons frozen. The 2010 strawberry crop was 2.8 billion pounds, of which 417.6 million pounds were processed by freezing. A significant amount of cherries is frozen also.

While fruits are a major portion of the frozen food production in California, the universe of cold foods includes ice cream and other dairy products, complete dinners and specialty items and vegetables such as peas, beans, carrots, spinach, broccoli and more.

On one hand, cold weather and frost are persistent enemies when the fruit crops are in the blossom or early development stages. But once they are harvested, freezing is their friend. And the same is true of the vegetable crops, and that's good because broccoli can always use a friend.