Collecting apples and pears for regional juice Maasheggen

Luuk Geurts (Groenings Hofke) and Erik Willems (De Brembroeken), two members of the collective Taste of the Maasheggen, have joined forces to get the residents of De Maasheggen even more involved in making apple/pear juice from the area - giving it an even more emphatic Maasheggen stamp.
"Individuals can submit apples and pears to us," Willems says. Not just one or two apples, they are multiples of 10 kilos. "For every 10 kilos they turn in, they get a bottle of juice from us. The rest goes on sale in the region. If you hand in 50 kilos, you get 50 bottles." For a 0.75-liter bottle, you need 1 kilo.
Anyone with fruit left over can hand it in at De Brembroeken (Brembroeken 1,Vortum-Mullem). This is possible on August 26, September 16 and 30 and October 14. Furthermore, fruit can be handed in by appointment. Fruit must be edible, clean but unwashed. The aim this year is to collect between 2000 and 2500 kilos, in the past between 750 and 1000 kilos have been collected.

Article in De Gelderlander
The joint initiative of Geurts and Willems was the subject of the attached article in De Gelderlander on August 22:

"It should be the ultimate drink of the region. An apple and pear mix combined with flavors of fruits from the Maasheggen area. Anyone with apples and pears to spare can come forward.

The "regional juice" has been around for three years, says Erik Willems of Camping & Guesthouse De Brembroeken in Vortum-Mullem. But it is not widely known. That needs to change. With the name recognition of the Maasheggen - the oldest cultural landscape in the Netherlands - and ingredients from the area, the initiators want to make an attempt.

How it works.

''Individuals can turn in apples and pears to us, Willems says. Not just one or two apples, it's multiples of 10 kilos. ,,For every 10 kilos they hand in, we give them a bottle of juice. The rest goes on sale in the region. If you hand in 50 kilos, you get 50 bottles." For a 0.75-liter bottle, you need 1 kilo.

Preventing wastage of fruit

Why people would do that? ''If individuals have apple trees, they make an apple pie out of the apples, some of them they make applesauce. A few they eat like that. In the neighborhood some more apples are handed out but a lot of them remain." You can leave those hanging on the tree until they fall down rotten, or you can turn them in to have them made into Maasheggen juice. That way, fruit waste is also avoided.

Individuals who have an apple tree in their backyard may not make it to 10 kilos. "But you also have apple trees on old farms that produce many times 10 kilos. Those apples and pears are what we want."

Craft processed

The Brembroeken and Luuk Geurts' artisanal fruit and vegetable company Groenings Hofke take care of collecting and processing the fruit. This is kept refrigerated for processing at a later stage. So now also with the addition of fruits from the Maasheggengebied. "Fruits from blackthorn, hawthorn berry, elderberry." There is no exact composition yet. First of all, it is a matter of "experimentation. But at least a full-fledged drink worth drinking should come out of it.

Anyone with fruit left over can hand it in at De Brembroeken (Brembroeken 1, Vortum-Mullem). This can be done on a number of fixed days: August 26, September 16 and 30 and October 14. Otherwise, you can hand in by appointment. Fruit must be edible, clean but unwashed. The aim this year is to collect between 2000 and 2500 kilos, in the past between 750 and 1000 kilos have been collected.

Under the banner Taste of the Maasheggen, more regional products will be sold in addition to regional juice. These include beer, gin, honey, syrups and tea blends. Here too, flavors from the Maasheggen area are added to the products.