Valais apricot
Valais grows most of Switzerland's apricots, on the Rhône plain and the hillsides around Saxon, Martigny, Nendaz and Sion. The harvest runs from late June to early September; the Luizet, an old variety, made their name.
One spring night, a siren wails through the valley: frost threatens the apricot trees in blossom. Until the 1980s, Culinary Heritage of Switzerland recounts, this was how the alarm was raised in Valais. A personal pager has since replaced it, so the whole village is no longer dragged out of bed.
Origin
According to the Valais fruit and vegetable trade organisation, the apricot tree is thought to have been domesticated in Manchuria. Its first trace in Valais dates back to 1812, on the slopes of Sion and Nendaz, where forgotten varieties such as the Bourbon grew. Selected near Lyon in 1838, the Luizet reached Saxon around 1875. Around the same time, the embanking of the river, begun in 1870, freed up a plain well suited to fruit trees. In 1926, Valais had nearly 88,000 apricot trees, 85% of them Luizet.
Growing
The apricot tree shuns the sunniest slope: on the right bank, it would blossom too early and would be certain to freeze. So it is planted on the plain and on the opposite slope, facing north, where it blossoms later. Half the orchards climb in tiers from Chalais to Bovernier, sometimes above 1000 m; the other half stretch from Leuk to Vernayaz. Sion, Martigny, Nendaz and Saxon have the largest areas. Fragile, the Luizet travels badly: from 1990 onwards, the Confederation and the canton helped to replace half of them. Thanks to some 80 varieties, picking lasts from the end of June to the beginning of September, four fifths of it between early July and mid-August.
At the table
The Luizet has yellow-orange skin, flushed red on the sunny side, and very juicy flesh. The apricot is eaten as it is or made into tarts, jams, ice creams, sorbets and preserves; frozen, it keeps for later. It is also from this fruit, at least 90% Luizet, that Abricotine AOP is distilled, entirely in Valais.
Today
According to the trade organisation, the canton accounts for 96% of the country’s apricot orchard area: 688 hectares in 2022, some 136 producers and an average harvest of 7600 tonnes. In August 1953, in Saxon, some 4000 demonstrators protested against the influx of Italian apricots that was blocking the sale of the country’s own fruit; the crowd ransacked railway wagons and cut the Simplon line. Since then, imports slow down at the start of the season and stop for as long as the Swiss harvest is enough.
Sources: Culinary Heritage of Switzerland, entry “Abricotine (AOP), abricots du Valais”; Interprofession des fruits et légumes du Valais, page “Fruits du Valais”; Swiss PDO-PGI Association, factsheet “Abricotine AOP”.