These Taste Like Real Blueberries
When siblings Kether and Lyndon Smith were growing up, their family would pick wild blueberries during summer trips to Pennsylvania. The wild blueberries were so flavorful, that blueberries from the grocery store always disappointed Kether afterwards.
Now Lyndon, Kether, and her husband Deric McGuffey, own Cedar Grove Blueberry Farm in Cedar Grove, North Carolina. When they purchased the land, along with their mother and stepfather, they reunited two properties into one farm with over 1,200 blueberry bushes spanning four acres.
Over five years, they have pruned and weeded the engulfed blueberry bushes, a chore which they describe as a constant work-in-progress. While most literature indicates the bushes should live for around 25 years, Kether says these bushes are 30 years old and the blueberries “are not slowing down.”
Kether describes, “The first time I had these berries, long before we purchased the farm property, I was like oh my gosh, these taste like real blueberries.” The berries are Certified Organic and no-spray. To maintain their concentrated flavor, they are not irrigated.
“They’re really happy bushes,” Kether says. “It’s just mother nature, doing her thing.”
From the beginning, the farm has always been intertwined with family. Kether and Lyndon confess that another work-in-progress is the ability to run a business with your family and communicate like coworkers, rather than siblings or spouses. This is especially hard during harvest when ten hours is a “short” workday and 16 hours is not uncommon. As Lyndon puts it, “the pressure is high.”
On the same property, the family runs a second business, Botanist and Barrel, where they craft natural southern ciders, sours, and dry fruit wines. They use their own blueberries and other local produce, often the “ugly” fruit that consumers pass-over, and apply minimal intervention using natural fermentation.
Botanist and Barrel will soon have more estate-grown fruit for their creative local craft beverages. At a sister farm in Leicester, NC, Lyndon has been propagating many varieties of apples, pears, pawpaw, maypop, elderberries, strawberries, rhubarb, grapes, and herbs.
While Kether never imagined being a farmer, it was nearly an inevitability for Lyndon. “I dream about fruit in the middle of the night,” he says. “It’s weird, but I’ve come to embrace it.”
Like many farms and small businesses, Cedar Grove Blueberry has pivoted their offerings to accommodate safety, customer convenience, and increased demand for local food during Covid-19.
“We got lucky with blueberries and alcohol,” Kether says, “these are things that people still want.”
This year the farm offered a new pre-picked blueberry share and switched to payment by the bucket for U-pick. Kether was proud the farm could offer safe jobs picking blueberries to the community.
“My hope in all of this,” Kether says, “is that the interest in local food lasts. Let’s recognize the importance of local food and keep our farms going.”
New this year at the farm, is a vegetable garden with basil and shishito peppers destined for local food truck fare. In collaboration with neighbors Nourishing Acres Farm and Edens Meats, Botanist and Barrel will soon host a food truck, offering an agritourism experience where customers can safely linger over cider and a delicious local meal.