Pecan-A-Rama
From the heart of Texas to the orchards of Georgia, pecans are falling from the trees faster than you can eat them. Let's catch up.
 
Text by John T. Edge, recipes by Elizabeth Taliaferro - Cooking Light, November 2000

While you were looking the other way, the new pecan crop came in. Down Texas way, the river bottoms are littered with fat, torpedo-shaped shells, and on Sunday afternoons, you'll spry whole families traipsing through the woods - twigs and shells crackling beneath their feet, khaki-colored leaves skittering this way and that in their wake - as they gather handfuls of nuts in tin buckets and tattered pillowcases. Meanwhile, in southern Georgia, where around one-third of our nation's more than 340-million-pound annual crop is harvested, oversize Rube Goldberg contraptions roll through row after regimental row of pecan orchards, grabbing towering tree trunks in bear hugs and shaking loose husks from the boughs. Across the Southeast, roadside stands that have been shuttered since last winter are now open for business again, their bins piled high with rattlesnake-striped black-and-brown shells. Soon, throughout the nation, Cub Scout troops and high-school band boosters, as well as Jaycees and Kiwanis clubs, will hit the streets, hawking sacks of sweet, silky nuts just begging to be cracked open and tucked into pies and cakes, folded into rice pilaf, or tossed with tender, young salad greens.

"Fall is my favorite time of year," says pecan farmer Joe Doby of Washington-on-the-Brazos, Texas, where the state's declaration of independance was first proclaimed. "When the pecans doesn't really matter what time of year it is. Even when I have to each into the freezer for my pecans - they're pretty perishable, you know - I start my morning with a couple of handfuls of nuts and a strong cup of coffee. It's the best breakfast I know of, and the darn things ar so good for you, too." He's right, by the way. Pecans, like many nuts, are naturally high in fat, but it's monounsaturated, one of the "good" fats and an important part of a healthy diet.

Like many a Texan, Joe doesn't shy from superlatives. Given half a chance, he'll tell you that, while the Georgia harvest is the largest in the nation, and natives of New Orleans do a fine job with their pecan pralines, Texas is the more likely motherland of pecans. "Around here, we learn to crack open pecan shells about the same time we learn to walk," says the 75-year-old. "This is pecan country."

Joe has a point. While pecan trees - first cousin to the hickory - groz as far north as Iowa and as far east as North Carolina, most folks agree that the heart of the native growing region is Texas, where the nuts have existed since prehistoric times and the state tree is - what else? - the pecan.

"I'm not trying to brag," says Joe. "You can get a good pecan almost anywhere these days. But you just get yourself ahold of a Texas pecan from this year's harvest. They're real buttery and sweet. You won't taste a thing in your life that's any better."

ORDERING PECANS

If you want to test for yourself which state produces the best pecans, try these mail-order sources.

Concho Valley Pecan
San Angelo, Texas
800-473-2267 or www.pecans.com
3 lbs. pecan halves: $19.95
(plus shipping and handling)

H.J. Bergeron Pecan
New Roads, Louisiana
800-256-5675
3-lb. box of pecans: $23.95
(includes shipping and handling; price varies according to season)

Sunnyland Farms
Albany, Georgia
800-999-2488 or www.nutsandcandies.com
3 lbs., 4 oz. small pecan pieces; $31.90
(includes shipping and handling)

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