Worth It: Coachella’s Best Dates

Forget chocolate. These candy-like dates should be your go-to snack.

Worth It is an occasional series in which we highlight amazing food products that we love and we know you will too.

There are surely many benefits to being the child of two food writers. But one of the downsides, as my 13-year-old daughter Lucy will attest, is that most every vacation includes a visit to a farm. On a recent week in Palm Springs, Lucy was hopeful that hot, dry desert would afford her uninterrupted time at the pool.

Wrong!

The Coachella Valley, south of Palm Springs, is home to hundreds of date farms — the industry harvests 35,000 tons of dates a year — and dozens of varieties beyond the dried-up deglets and medjools you find at your local supermarket. Some of the farms are even serious tourist attractions: At Shields Date Garden, a giant knight welcomes you, and silver fiberglass statues of Jesus, portraying scenes from the Bible, are scattered throughout the palm groves. (The main attraction, though, is a date shake, which includes milk, vanilla ice cream, and date paste.)

Dates, of course, are a super-trendy snack foods right now as people try to trade away from candy and processed food: The Wall Street Journal reported recently that sales of chocolate dropped 5 percent and beloved “sweet snacks” fell 5.5. percent — more than any other category except (randomly) popcorn. Dates — sweet, and loaded with fiber and antioxidants — are a great replacement.

The rest of the world seems to already know this. A chain called Bateel has Godiva-like stores across the Middle East and at luxury retailers such as Harrods in London. The shops show off myriad varieties in glittering displays, and the flavors are, to use a bit of British understatement, quite different than what Americans find on the shelf of a local grocery store.

On the recommendation of a fellow date obsessive, we set the GPS for Coachella’s Best, a small organic and regenerative farm. It sits at the edge of the valley’s sprawling development, just minutes past a gas station and shopping center. But upon entering, we found an oasis of palms with sheep grazing beneath them. Our guide Tony Somohano explained that the herd serves as excellent grass mowers and, conveniently, fertilize the soil while they’re at it.

Sheep grazing at Coachella’s Best Dates; the yellow blossoms you see midway up the trees will turn into date fruit

Coachella’s Best sells six kinds of dates; we tasted four. My favorite are the soft and chewy Barhis, which taste exactly like caramel. But a close runner-up were the Halawis, which dissolve in your mouth into a sweet, fruity paste reminiscent of ripe apricot. (Fun fact: Dates are “drupes,” fruits with a single pit, like stone fruit.)

The variety of date has a lot to do with flavor. And you won’t fine many of these on store shelves. But equally important is freshness. Dates that languish on the supermarket shelf lose their pliable texture and nuanced flavor. It’s why it’s “worth it” to order them fresh from the farm (and store them in the refrigerator after they arrive.)

Dates have long been an afternoon snack for me, when I’m hankering for something sweet. Since returning home, I’ve been searching for new ways to use my four (!) pounds of them. On the list are a room-temp farro salad with chopped apples, walnuts, and dates and, if I am feeling ambitious, this delicious looking sticky-toffee date cake. In the meantime, Lucy and I have used the medjools to make a coffee-date smoothie (milk, yogurt, coffee, banana, chopped dates, and a pinch of cinnamon). She is no longer complaining about our trip to the farm.

Coachella’s Best Dates: $12.99 a pound.