The Community Table · Presented by The Churchville Inn

Solebury Orchards: Apples, Applesauce, and Cider on Creamery Road

A New Hope orchard that grows apples, peaches, and blueberries, and keeps a market known for its applesauce and cider.

Solebury Orchards, New Hope

Solebury Orchards began in 1985 on twenty-four acres of gently rolling ground in central Bucks County, where corn and soybeans had grown before. Brian Smith planted that field with rows of apple, peach, pear, cherry, plum, and apricot trees, and within a few years blueberries and blackberries joined them. The trees took their time, as trees do, and in 1989 the orchard opened its doors to the public. In 1996 a forty-five acre field just east on Creamery Road was added to the farm, and the cider pressing that began in the early years grew into a name people know across the neighborhood. New trees go into the ground every year, and Brian, who started the farm, still runs it today.

Today the farm covers about eighty acres on Creamery Road outside New Hope. Apples, peaches, and blueberries are the main crops, with smaller plantings of pears, plums, apricots, cherries, and blackberries. The market is known for its applesauce and cider, and in This is a different kind of year at the orchard. A freeze in late April took most of the crop, including a large share of the apples, as it did at a number of orchards in the area. At most times there are no apples to pick from the trees, so the market is stocked with apples from New York farms, and bins of them are set out in the orchard rows in their place. The wagon runs on weekends, there is a new pumpkin patch, and the picking season continues through November 1. Reservations are required for weekend orchard visits in September and October, though not for a visit to the market alone, so the pick-your-own page is worth reading before you go. The orchard is open Thursday through Sunday from nine to six through October, and from nine to five in November and December, and the orchard’s own site has the current hours./p>

The orchard is open Thursday through Sunday from nine to six through October, and from nine to five in November and December. Earlier seasons asked for pick-your-own reservations, so the pick-your-own page is worth reading before you go, and the orchard’s own site has the current hours.

We like to point our neighbors toward places like this one, where the work is plain and the season is honest, and where a cider doughnut and a cup of cider make a good afternoon. A farm that has planted new trees every year for four decades is looking past one hard spring, and we are already looking forward to the next fall.

Part of The Community Table series · The Churchville Inn