where can i find frozen sour cherries?

hi, all. does anyone know where i can buy frozen sour cherries in manhattan? so far i've only looked in my neighborhood at the whole foods, food emporium and garden of eden. and they only have frozen sweet cherries. i'm off to trader joe's and another food emporium. any clues would be much appreciated. thanks!!

[twins4me]

You should be able to find them at any Persian grocery store.

[chocoaussie]

Trader Joe's does have tart, unsweetend dried cherries. They reconstitute very nicely in organic tart cherry juice. I have never seen frozen tart cherries.

[poppywonderland]

Well if you can find canned ones in water (preferred) or in fruit juice ( I really personally wouldn't go for ones soaked in a sugar syrup even though the juice is sugary it is natural and should make the cherries taste more like tart cherries if they are in tart cherry juice. So put those in a coriander/strainer and rinse them with water and dry them out well with a paper towel so it is quicker or just let the water drain off and dry naturally. They don't need to be completely dry but once they are dry to your desired stage just put them in a freezer bag and freeze them just how you would grapes. I really enjoy frozen grapes! sooo good!

[TheConfoodant]

Dole Individual Quick Frozen Red Tart Cherry 5 Pound
http://www.foodservicedirect.com/prod...

[Jeany]

Those are dark, sweet cherries, not pie cherries. I got all excited there for a moment.

[chocoaussie]

No...they are Montmorency dry cherries at TJ's Montmorency are tart, and you can also find tart organic unsweetened cherry juice at various stores including Asian markets to reconstitute them. So go ahead and get excited!!

[Jeany]

Sorry, I was replying to an earlier message about a Dole food service product.

I love TJ's, the bad news is the closest one is about 600 miles away. The good news is I'm going to northern VA tomorrow and may come home with a suitcase full of cherries. I eat dried cherries, but I'm kind of tired of the over-sweetened version. I will look for the juice while I'm up there, too. Thanks for the suggestion.

Still, I really long for the fresh-frozen, they're perfect little fruit popsicles for the mid-afternoon snack. They are available on the web, direct from the big Michigan orchards, but they're expensive, and the shipping makes them prohibitive. Like $50 for a 10 pound bag, plus shipping. Overnight shipping to Florida. Uphill both ways. :-/

[grinch5451]

When I was a kid my Mother and Grandmother always bought cherries frozen and sugared in 30 pound cans and they put them up in jars. Now we can just keep them in the freezer and use as necessary, however, it is very difficult to find them. No stores in my area handle them. If anyone has any info. on where they are available I would appreciale knowing where. Thanks.

[roxlet]

If you would like to have sour cherries in your freezer, my suggestion would be to wait until they are in the greenmarket or other market, and freeze them yourself. We have done this many times, and believe me, a perfect sour cherry pie in February is a wonderful thing, as I am sure you know!

[cmw]

I don't live in Manhattan but I use the Marco Polo or Great Lakes brands - available online at kalustyans.com. In a pinch, you can use tart cherries for most applications.

[ndl]

i saw them this morning at union square...

[kersie]

They are readily available at the greenmarket right now. There's no reason you couldn't freeze them yourself (I do this with a lot of fruit when it's in season and I can't eat all I buy!)

[JoanN]

Yes. I bought two pounds of fresh sour cherries last Saturday at the greenmarket across from Lincoln Center. I can't imagine they wouldn't be at Union Square now.

[nogs80]

Try IQF (Individually Quick Frozen) cherries from Friske Orchards (231-599-2604), in Charlevoix, Michigan.

[calypsogirl]

really? they're not commercially frozen? i have all these recipes that call for frozen sour cherries and they seem to imply that they're readily available in grocery stores. i have yet to find them. i did find the jarred ones at whole foods.

If you're willing to mail-order and settle for dried sour cherries or packed in water, I have this link for you.

http://www.mi-cherries.com/order.htm

I've never even heard of commercially frozen sour cherries... canned, prepared pie filling, yes, but plain, frozen, no - I doubt there's much of a national or even regional market for them.

[Jeany]

When I was a child, we made a pilgrimmage to my grandparents' place every year to pick and freeze cherries. Living in Indianapolis from 1976 -2000, I can't remember a time when you couldn't buy bagged loose-frozen pie cherries in the supermarkets; I kept them in my freezer and ate them semi-defrosted for snacks. They began disappearing somewhere in the mid 90s, I think. canned water-pack cherries do not make as good a pie. I've wondered what happened to them, they really were especially useful when I wanted to lose a few pounds.

[buttertart]

Believe it or not they do exist and are sold in the Midwest - the Hy-Vee store in the Quad Cities (IA/IL) carries them (I know because we always get some on visits home to my husband's family, can't bring them back to NYC but they are good straight out of the bag). Will check producer's name on next visit, perhaps we can lobby them to sell to stores here. We pit and freeze a lot of the ones from the Greenmarkets here every summer - as roxlet notes below, they freeze well (even packed in plastic containers without sugar as we do them).

i think trader joes has them

i was just there. unfortunately they don't. but thanks! i thought they would as well. this is so frustrating! i've now been to whole foods, food emporium, trader joe's, dagastino's and garden of eden. no dice. now i'm going to try citarella and jefferson market.

not exactly what you're looking for, but i know that fairway (in harlem) has jarred sour cherries. they're by the mustards, just before the jams. the brand is marco polo, i think, and they're a bit sweet for my taste.

yeah, the fruit warehouse on 3rd ave and 26th st in brooklyn has jarred sour cherries too. hope this helps.

one of the Union Square fruit vendors that carries a wide range of small fruits as well as apples (from Kinderhook or Red Hook upstate) also sells large packs of frozen sour cherries.

I think TJs frozen cherries are sweet cherries - many of the European jarred cherries are morello, which are great but not exactly the same (or as tart) as the bright red montmorencies we are used to.

[TheConfoodant]

Do you know the name of the vendor who sells the large packs of frozen sour cherries at the Union Square Market? Or what day they are there?

Thanks!

saw the jarred stuff at the east village cheese place today too, btw

Whole Foods (Union Square) carries jarred sour cherries from Red Hills Fruit Company. They're labelled Tart Cherries (Pie Cherries), and I prefer them to Marco Polo because they are packed in water with no sugar added.

heya, all. thanks so much for the tips. so i went to NINE different places and couldn't find the frozen sour cherries. the frozen sweet cherries (and fresh ones) were readily available. the recipe i was trying to make recommended the frozen over the canned/jarred sour cherries because those would have too much sauce. but maybe i'll try the the jarred ones from whole foods that were mentioned.

and the one about the union square fruit vendor...they have frozen bags for sale? do you mean at the farmer's market??

thanks again, everyone!!