- Fellow explorers, we're on a road trip through
California Central Valley, the heart of California,
which is home to almonds.
80% of the world's almonds are actually produced here
in California Central Valley.
And so in this video,
we're gonna show you all the different almond delicacies
you can get in this region, where they grow them.
And we are starting at Rodin Farms farm stand
in Modesto, California.
This is a working, family-owned, second generation farm.
They've got the almond trees right behind,
and then they sell their almonds right in front.
They've got over 30 varieties of almonds.
And the first one we're gonna sample
are the butter toffee almonds.
I've actually been here before.
And these are my favorite.
What I love about the almonds here,
they're really good, is they taste just really natural.
Many almonds that you get taste super processed,
super artificial, but it just has a nice crunch to it,
buttery taste.
Then that toffee sweetness.
Another flavor. I haven't had this one yet.
'Cause they were sold out last time.
These are maple toffee almonds.
I love maple syrup.
And these are sweet.
If you've got a sweet tooth, you'll like these.
And for people who don't have a sweet tooth,
let's check out their onion and garlic almonds.
It tastes a little bit like a sour cream and onion
potato chip, except in an almond.
Pretty good too.
Hey, when you're at this farm stand,
they got tons of fruit here as well.
They got tons of dried things.
And if you're here in almond season,
definitely check out the almond blossoms,
'cause they let you walk in it.
If you are here during almond season,
you'll wanna watch my video all about the almond blossoms.
So you'll find a link to that in the description below.
Let's head out to the next farm stand.
It's almond time.
This is a taste of the Central Valley in one bite.
Orange honey almonds at the California Fruit Depot,
known for their oranges.
(indistinct) almond, which is pretty tasty.
Now these farm stands, in addition to almonds,
all have different things they sell too.
Oranges are super popular here.
They grow their own oranges.
They have a couple of varieties of oranges.
The navel oranges are my favorite and
super sweet.
And they keep them cut
right in the refrigerator right there.
So you can come in and taste them for yourself.
They also have some interesting dried fruit and vegetables.
This is an okra chip.
Wow. It's quite tasty.
They've also got orange citrus honey from their groves.
This is a good honey taste.
Just a little tiny hint of citrus.
And if orange honey almonds aren't your style,
they've got 14 other flavors to delight.
So in addition to flavored almonds,
chocolate covered almonds,
you can also get really natural almonds here
in the Central Valley.
Since this is where they grow them,
this is a great eight source for natural almonds.
We are here at Naturally Nuts in Visalia, California
that specializes in natural nuts.
And I've got three types of almonds
and two almond butters that we're gonna try here.
So let's come and take a look at these almonds.
First almonds, these are just almonds.
These are almonds.
They're not roasted.
They're not processed.
They're pasteurized, to kill the bugs.
And if you go to a store and you get almonds,
you're likely getting a pasteurized almond.
Now, you can also get roasted almonds.
What do roasted almonds taste like?
Kinda like the difference between bread and toast.
So they're cooked.
Which makes them a little crunchier and a little lighter.
There's less moisture content in them when they roast them.
So they're drier.
You can also get blanched almonds.
Blanched almonds, while you can eat them,
just like this, they're typically used for cooking.
A lot of Chinese cuisine uses this.
If you're going to your local supermarket,
you likely won't find this in the nut section.
You'll find it in the cooking section.
Now almonds can also be made into butter.
And we got two types of butter here.
This is the roasted almond butter.
So this is butter that's made from the roasted almonds,
kind of like peanut butter.
And here at Naturally Nuts,
they roast the almonds themselves
and they make the nut butter's fresh.
So if you come in, they will press it,
grind it for you and give you a little jar of butter.
You can use almond butter
anywhere that you use peanut butter.
And what's really neat about almond butter,
unlike peanut butter,
there's no sugar, there's no additives.
This is literally just almonds that's been pressed.
'Cause of the oil in the almonds makes it buttery.
And here at Naturally Nuts, they roast it a little less.
So if you've seen almond butter in the store
sometimes it looks a little darker.
That's a stronger flavor.
This one, medium roast, lighter flavor.
You'll find this with salt and without salt.
And now this one,
this is almond butter made with the unroasted almonds.
So you can see it makes it a little lighter.
How's this one taste? It's a little more watery.
It's a little creamier.
It doesn't have that roasted flavor.
Let me tell you, they're all pretty good.
I probably wouldn't snack on the blanched ones by themselves
but I would on all these.
And I think my next peanut butter sandwich,
peanut butter and jelly sandwich,
I think I'm gonna make with almond butter.
At Roberts Ferry Gourmet in Oakdale,
and Roberts Ferry, California,
this shop started life as a confectionary store
selling nuts and also selling almond popcorns,
like almond caramel popcorn.
But about 30 years ago,
they were looking to do something different.
They were looking for things to make with their almonds.
And they said, "Hey, what if we make a milkshake
and put almond butter in it?"
And so for 30 years, they've been making these milkshakes.
Hand scooped ice cream, a scoop of almond butter, milk,
whipped cream on top.
It's super thick.
They have to scoop it out with a spoon.
You definitely want a spoon when you eat this.
And let's try that.
Almond butter milkshake.
It's good. You can get it in vanilla.
You can get it in chocolate.
When they first opened this location in Oakdale,
they sold 100 of these almond butter milkshakes in one day.
That's how excited people were to get these shakes.
I say that, 'cause the original location Roberts Ferry,
it's actually located on an almond orchard.
It's a little bit out in the country.
So this location in Oakdale, pretty close to Modesto,
if you're doing the almond blossom cruise.
In Yolo County, just to the west of Sacramento,
an almond delicacy at Seka Hills olive mill and tasting room
are almond cookies and olive oil ice cream.
Come in and take a closer look at this.
These are cookies with almonds on top,
and then you can see the ice cream has olive oil in it.
They make these once a year.
They make these once a year for the almond festival.
Which is always the last weekend in February.
So if you wanna get these, put that on your calendar,
come out for the festival, give these a go.
But I'm gonna give these a go 'cause we're here
during almond season.
Pretty excited to try this.
I've never had a almond cookie and olive oil ice cream.
That's good.
But I think I had a bite
that didn't have a ton of olive oil.
So I'm gonna have this one where I can see the olive oil
right on the front.
Mm.
Now I got a good bite of the olive oil.
And you might think olive oil is weird on ice cream,
but it actually tastes pretty good.
And the almond cookies,
these are something I might typically get
at a Chinese restaurant.
After I eat at a Chinese restaurant, almond cookie.
But they pair it really well together.
Fellow explorers,
maybe if you all come to the almond festival
and you love these things so much and you buy them out,
they'll have no choice but to make them all year round.
Or maybe not, maybe they wanna keep them special,
just for the almond festival.
Mm, tasty.
So when you come out to Seka Hills,
in addition to seeing the almond blossoms,
definitely check out their olive oils.
Because they have the full range of olive oil.
And if you haven't tasted really high quality olive oil,
they could be pungent, they can be buttery.
And they've got all that here.
But what's also cool, in their tasting room,
just on the side of it. You can see where they make it all.
This is where they bottle it.
They've got 100,000 gallons that they can store on-site.
And then they make it from olives into the actual olive oil
right here.
So it's actually a pretty cool attraction to stop at,
just in and of itself,
even if the almonds aren't blossoming.
Another delicious almond delicacy in the Central Valley,
is the original almond cheese pie
at the Hilmar Cheese Visitor Center.
Why is it a pie? It looks like a cake.
I don't know.
But the crust is made with graham crackers,
butter and almonds.
There's actually sliced almonds in this crust.
Four bucks. You get it here at the visitor center.
Kind of a neat place to visit in general.
But let's give this a try with the almond crust.
It's cheesy.
I've had some cheesecakes that don't taste like cheese.
And let me tell you, this one tastes like cheese.
You would expect that, since we're in a cheese shop.
But since we're talking about almonds,
and who does this? Who just eats crust?
But I'm just gonna eat crust
because we're talking about almonds.
I like the crust.
A lot of cheesecake crust is super dry
and it seems like it's just there to hold up the cheese.
But this has a bit more texture to it.
And you get a little bit of that crunch
from the almonds as well.
If you wanna make this cheesecake yourself,
and you happen to be here in Hilmar, California,
you can pick up the Gina Marie cheese
from that case right behind me.
That's what about 80% of this filling is made out of.
Traveling princess, would you like to try some?
She wants to try some.
Let's give it a go.
Shoes.
- Mm.
How's the cheese?
Is it gouda?
- Gouda.
You can see this one's traveling princess approved.
Now one place the Central Valley
that you can get lots of almonds in one spot
is Blue Diamond.
Come inside, I wanna show you around.
Blue Diamond is one of the country's largest
almond manufacturers of almond products.
And there's a ton all in one spot.
This is stuff that you will typically see
in your supermarket.
You will see Blue Diamond cans of almonds,
which they have here.
But they also have a lot of unique items
that I wanna show you.
The first one that I wanna show you,
this is something they only sell at this store right now.
This is Blue Diamond almond butter coated popcorn.
They are testing this out here at the store.
And if people love it, then they're gonna make it.
So you can get things here you can't get anywhere else.
I'm gonna try this in just a little bit
to tell you what this tastes like.
But I wanna show you back here.
But first things first, this is the almond corner.
These are the almond cans you'll typically see
in your supermarket.
But they've got some here
that I've actually never seen before,
which are their extremes that they've got in different
flavors, really spicy flavors.
They tell me ghost pepper is one of the most popular.
So let's go ahead and open up the ghost pepper
and see how these ghost pepper spicy almonds taste.
I've never had a ghost pepper almond.
You can see their reddish.
And let's go ahead and dive into a ghost pepper almond.
Crunchy.
Salty.
Spicy.
The spicy comes on later.
That is quite a spicy almond.
It's probably not as spicy
if you just bite into a ghost pepper by itself,
but it's definitely the spiciest almond that I've had.
It's pretty good.
If you like spicy things,
definitely check out these extremes.
Let me show you some of the other things in this shop.
Next to the nuts, they've got Almond Breeze almond milk.
Which I could use some now after that spicy ghost pepper.
They've got Blue Diamond almonds Nut Thins,
which are crackers that are made out of almonds.
Something also new,
is they've got Blue Diamond almond cake mix.
This is cake mix without gluten.
You can get the cake mix like that.
Or you can get it in a little cup,
where you can just add some water
and microwave and get a cake in a cup.
That's pretty cool.
I'm gonna take some of these home myself,
'cause I like cake.
I don't like to cook it.
Also down here,
they've got these big restaurant packs of almonds.
If you don't want them roasted,
you want whole blanched almonds, you can get that here.
There's a few more almond things around the corner
I wanna show you.
They have a whole section
of chocolate and candy covered almonds.
And these are specially chocolate covered
by the Sconza candy company.
Which is another candy company right here in Modesto,
just down the road.
Next to these, they've got almond wedding cookies.
If you want a little cookie,
you can get those that are almond flavored.
And they've also got some other products
from local companies in the region,
Roberts ferry Gourmet, home of the almond milkshake.
They've got their almond popcorn right here.
Also they've got some almond soaps made with almond milk.
Smells heavenly.
And it does.
It smells just like almond milk in a little thing of soap.
And finally, if you are into making your face nice,
they've got sweet almond oil, not for cooking,
but this is for a beauty regime.
So they've also got other local products that aren't almonds
in particular.
They've got Sciabica olive oil.
This is a producer in Modesto.
My favorite olive oil.
I really like the garlic flavor. You can pick it up here.
You can pick it up at the Sciabica store.
But if you're in a one-stop shop, why not just get it here?
Now as promised, let's check out the almond butter popcorn.
Open that up.
What's it look like?
Oh, this is different.
Different than the Roberts Ferry popcorn.
These are much more, you can see they're coated
all around in there.
So let's go ahead and let's pick up a few of them
so you can see them in my hand too.
There we go.
That's the almond butter popcorn.
And I won't do a handful.
I'm gonna start with one of these.
Mm, it's crunchy.
It's sweet.
It's buttery.
With a hint of an almond taste.
There's no almonds in it.
You're not gonna bite into a nut.
But you could easily sit here for a whole movie
and eat these.
Am I eating too much?
They kind of remind me of maybe a new school Cracker Jack.
Hey, an extra bonus.
These are gluten free and vegan.
So if you're in Modesto,
check out the Blue Diamond gift shop.
Get the popcorn, get one of their unique items.
Let them know if you like it.
Might be at your local supermarket soon.
In California Central Valley,
you can get a really unique honey.
You can get honey that's made from the bees
that pollinate the almond trees.
Hey, that rhymes.
But seriously, we stopped into The Hive,
just west of Sacramento to taste some of this really
unique honey.
- Okay, California almond.
This honey is rarely collected.
That's why you just don't see it on shelves out there.
But it's got a really interesting
light, bitter flavor to it.
As if you're eating a green almond almost.
- Well the bitterness,
it takes a little while to get the bitterness.
It was sweet at the beginning.
A note about all the bees that are here,
there are a lot of them,
and you know what bees like?
Yellow shirts. They like yellow shirts.
If you don't like bees, don't come to the Central Valley
probably almost anytime of year in yellow shirts.
Well fellow explorers,
next time you're hanker for some nuts,
definitely think of all these things
that can be made with almonds.
And if you come to California Central Valley,
well definitely check out some of them too.
Now, if you enjoyed this video,
you might enjoy watching some of my other videos
from this Central California series.
You can check out our whole travel vlog when that's out.
You can see where the best almond blossoms are.
I definitely wanna thank the cool people at
visitcentralvalley.com and Visit California
for making this series possible.
And as usual, I won't say goodbye,
'cause I'm gonna see you in one of these videos.