Peach Picking at Demarest Farms in Hillsdale

by Alice Magdziak • July 21, 2014 • Bergen, Food, Garden State, Green Jersey, Shopping • Comments (0) • 3644

It was a peach of a day at Demarest Farms in Hillsdale!

Peaches are my favorite fruit of all time. My grandparents had a peach tree in their backyard when I was a kid and it was magical to me. I ate so many peaches that I barely ate any other meals while we visited them. So, why did it take me so long to go peach picking?

Saturday morning we decided to head up to the tip of northeastern New Jersey and do some peach picking at Demarest Farms. Little did we know that the New York Times would be publishing an article about Demarest Farms the very next day! It’s true what they say, great minds pick peaches at all the same places.

Why are we all drawn to Hillsdale and Demarest Farms for peaches? It’s certainly easy to get to—right off exit 168 of the Parkway. The prices are excellent—we got 75 peaches for $18, plus $5 for a hay ride to the orchard (we realize we probably went a little crazy filling our two $9 bags all the way to the top)! The farmstand has great lunches, baked goods and many other fruits and vegetables on sale—we really enjoyed our cider donuts for dessert that night.

Maybe it’s all of the above reasons that make Demarest Farms such a nice place to spend a warm summer morning.

We got there close to the beginning of the picking schedule. The farmstand opens at 8:00am but the hay rides to the orchard don’t start until 10:00am. There weren’t too many people picking with us so it was a pretty laid back affair with lots of trees to pick from.

Brian and Jillian made the most of their morning filling their bags with those beautiful peaches, too.

Check out Demarest Farms’ Facebook page for more information on what types of peaches are available each week and whether they have specials going on. In the fall, they have pick-your-own apples and pumpkins, too.

There’s plenty of work for kids, too. Peach trees are low enough for little hands to reach the bottom branches.