The Market Note
Greengages and the first figs land as a heat dome grips the south
A read from the market floor before the week starts. The big story is the heat — a dome sitting over Iberia and southern France is pushing growers past 40°C, and it's showing in southern-European supply and grading. At home it's the opposite: plums, greengages and the first figs are the reason to be at the stall, and the season is quietly tipping toward autumn. Here's what we're seeing, and how we'd buy around it.
Region watch
Iberia & southern France
Direction: Dearersalad, courgettes & summer veg
A heat dome has pushed much of Iberia and southern France past 40°C, stressing summer crops and thinning both yields and quality; expect firmer prices and stricter grading on southern-European salad and soft veg over the fortnight.
Almería, Spain
Direction: Tightcoloured peppers (next season)
Growers are flagging reduced acreage and heavy Thrips parvispinus pressure going into the new Spanish pepper season — it hit nearly every farm in western Almería last year, leaving more second-grade fruit. Coloured peppers look firmer from autumn; on the stall now they're Dutch and steady.
Provence, France
Direction: Plentifulpeaches, greengages & black figs
Provence is at its stone-fruit peak — flat peaches, apricots, Mirabelles and greengages — and the first Solliès black figs land later this fortnight; the soil-grown Provence tomatoes are eating as well as they will all year.
Kent & the Vale of Evesham, UK
Direction: Plentifulplums, greengages & sweetcorn
English plums (Victoria, Opal) and greengages are in full flow and good value, with sweetcorn and runner beans hitting their stride. The first cobnuts and Discovery apples are imminent, so the season's tipping to autumn — and gooseberries are on last call.
In season now
- Provence flat peaches
- greengages
- English plums (Victoria)
- sweetcorn
- runner beans
- courgettes
- blackberries
- first cobnuts
On the way out
- English cherries (last of them)
- broad beans
- gooseberries
- green almonds
In the kitchen
greengages
Greengages turn from sharp to honeyed in a day, so catch them barely ripe — halve, and roast cut-side up at a hard heat for six minutes so they hold their shape; leave the collapsing-ripe ones raw beside a cold, hard cheese.
black figs (Solliès)
Quarter the black figs rather than slice them, and give the cut faces thirty seconds under a hot grill to blister the sugars — then plate straight away with something salty and cured. Cook them longer and they slump to jam.
sweetcorn
Corn turns its sugar to starch by the hour once it's cut, so cook it the day it lands: char the cobs dry in their husks over a high flame and let the trapped steam finish them — no pot needed.
Worth buying
- English plums & greengages — short glut, great value
- sweetcorn — just cut
- runner beans —
- blackberries —
Hold off
- southern-European soft leaf & salad — heat-stressed, dearer, grading tight
- green almonds & the last broad beans — season's done
