Cooler Heads Prevail: How We Keep Our Apples Fresh for Winter Farmers Markets

Cooler Heads Prevail

How We Keep Our Apples Fresh for Winter Farmers Markets

We get lots of questions about how we preserve apples for our farmers markets during the winter. The answer? A little orchard magic and some smart storage technology - all happening in our packing house at Mead! 🍎❄️

OPTION 1: THE CLASSIC COOLER

Our cooler is basically a giant refrigerator - just like your kitchen fridge - that uses cool temps to slow down the ripening process. The cooler can hold up to 200 bins of apples and each bin contains 26 bushels (1 bushel ≈ 120 medium-sized apples). That’s a lot of apples! For reference, you know the wooden boxes you see at our booth in the fall? Those are only half bushels. Any apples that get damaged along the way in transfer are set aside to become our delicious cider.

OPTION 2: CONTROLLED ATMOSPHERE (CA) STORAGE This is the high-tech option. In CA storage, apples go into a sealed container where oxygen is removed, stopping ripening almost completely. Each CA bin holds about 18 bushels.

Here’s the catch: once a CA bin is opened, ripening resumes, so we have to carefully track every bin. Sometimes, things don’t go perfectly and we get the dreaded surprise of a bin full of rotten apples. But as we get the hang of this technology, that happens less and less.

Investing in our own CA bins (shipped from Janny MT in France!) means we no longer have to rely on rented warehouse space, where timing and access weren’t always in our control. In farming, weather is unpredictable, so any tool we can use to take control over our apples is worth it!

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