In our region, early autumn — before peak foliage color arrives — means peak apple-harvest season. Day-trippers come from miles around to pick their own, or simply grab a half-peck sack of their favorite apple variety to take home and get baking. That homey scent in the air this time of year, oft maligned as “pumpkin spice,” is really the classic blend of spices that go into pretty much any baked product of which apples are the central ingredient. There are apple brown Betty and apple cobbler, apple cake, crisp, grunt, slump and fool… and if you’re steeped in French cooking, tarte tatin.
But it’s apple pie that wears the crown. And if you want someone else to bake it perfectly for you, the Applestock harvest fair at the Reformed Church of New Paltz is where you make a beeline every year. Dressel Farms in Gardiner donate fresh apples by the crateful for this annual fundraising event for the church’s educational programs, and dozens of volunteers turn out in the week preceding to peel, core and slice, mix, roll, assemble and bake. “We look forward to this event every year,” said Saige Mae E. Reigert, service chair for Kappa Delta Phi NAS, a sorority chapter on the SUNY New Paltz campus, which sent over eleven young women to help bake for this year’s Applestock.
According to church volunteer Gail Yonnetti, who wrangled the baking marathon for Applestock 2024, more than 200 pies were made and at least 190 sold by the end of the event this past Saturday. Attendees had their choice of regular double-crust apple pie, crumb-topped Dutch apple and pumpkin pie as well. Since COVID social distancing policies forced a pickup-only fall bakery event in 2020, the church has implemented an online preorder system, ensuring that they won’t run out before you get there – although there were still enough left over for impulse purchases, as this reporter’s Monday breakfast can attest.
Another big draw at Applestock is the sale of apple fritters by the half-dozen bagful, feather-light, still warm and dusted with cinnamon and powdered sugar. The work is done by youths involved in various church programs and their friends, earning them community service points for school. In years past, these deep-fried delights often sold out by midday, so this year the kids made more. “We sold probably twice as many fritters as last year today, with the beautiful weather,” reported church elder Camille Damico.
Indeed, organizers could not have prayed for a more perfect autumn day for Applestock 2024. The closed-off stretch of Huguenot Street in front of the church swarmed with visitors, checking out the many crafts vendors and community group booths. They had their choice of craft beers, hard ciders and sangría to taste, and burgers, chili and butternut squash-and-apple soup to enjoy while listening to the live musicians performing on the church porch. This year’s entertainment lineup included Afternoon Delight, Sarah Stamberg and the Big Blue Big Band.
Amongst the vendors was a table where retired schoolteacher Julie DeLeo was signing and selling copies of her first-ever children’s book: Halloween Magic!! A Little Pumpkin’s Adventure. DeLeo said that she first moved to New Paltz in 1965 to pursue her elementary education degree at SUNY and “never left.” She taught first to fourth grade in the Hyde Park schools for more than 30 years, and since her retirement has been involved as a tutor and literacy volunteer and reads to kids at library story hours. Now she has her own book to share, beautifully illustrated by Susan Brewer.
“This little pumpkin so wants to be picked for Halloween and gets overlooked,” DeLeo explained. “He wonders, ‘Am I not big enough? Not orange enough? Not round enough?’” Only after the magical intervention of a “wise old owl” and a “kindly witch” does the little pumpkin discover his special talent: the ability to dance, which he soon shares with two other sad pumpkins. Before long they are named Grand Marshals of the town’s Halloween parade.
Besides being seasonally appropriate, Halloween Magic offers a special appeal to New Paltz residents and visitors: It’s obvious to locals from the art that the pumpkin patch where the protagonist grows up is Wallkill View Farms, and the high school marching band that accompanies the dancing pumpkins in the parade carries banners inscribed NPHS. This book is a love letter to the town and its long-running embrace of Halloween. The story’s narrative theme is also a reflection of the local vibe, the author said: “The empathy and inclusion that are very prominent in the New Paltz culture run throughout this book.” DeLeo’s husband John pointed out that the story will be relatable to anyone who ever felt left out, such as “kids who didn’t get picked for a team.”
Julie DeLeo and her books will be back on Huguenot Street on Halloween night itself, in the Rotary tent, as well as for Historic Huguenot Street’s Harvest Craft Workshop on Saturday, October 12, in the Autumn Story Time tent. Also in the near future, she will be doing live readings at the Plattekill Library and at Myer Elementary School in Hurley. To inquire about scheduling a reading, e-mail her at jjdeleo@icloud.com.
Self-published under the imprint of BrewLeo Publishing, Halloween Magic!! A Little Pumpkin’s Adventure is available for sale at various autumn crafts fairs in the area, Inquiring Minds Books in New Paltz, the Historic Huguenot Street Museum Shop, Wallkill View Farms and Dedrick’s Pharmacy. It can also be ordered via the usual online book retailers such as Amazon and Bookshop.org. The ISBN number is 979-8-218-39632-9.
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