Friday, January 28, 2011

Pong's Orchard -- Kyle Gets His Kaffir Lime Tree From Fulton

Kyle was the first to tell me about the Asian fruit trees that you can buy in Fulton, and he finally hooked up to buy his own kaffir lime tree.

The trees come from Pong's Orchard in Fulton, a family-run business that grows fruit and trees on 27 acres:
I finally got my kaffir lime tree from Mr. Pong at his Fulton orchard.  I'm going to use the uniquely-flavored double leaf in some Southeast Asian recipes. 
Mr. Pong has a couple heated outbuildings where his citrus trees live in the cold weather.  There were dozens of different trees, and a lot had fruit on them in various stages of ripening.  He gave me half a satsuma tangerine off one of the trees. It was quite the treat eating it outside in the cold air with the setting sun.
Mr.  Pong figured out I was somehow associated with a nice blog. He wanted the blog to write about his go-to Chinese restaurant in Fulton -- Hunan China. He's especially fond of the chow foon, Singapore noodles and dumplings. I've had all those dishes from there, but it's been years since I've been.  I'll have to check it out again.
If someone wants to visit the orchard, I would email asianpearmd@verizon.net or call him at (301) 854-9969 to arrange a time to meet.
(Update: I fixed the reference to Hunan China above.  Kyle had heard Mr. Pong say Hunan Manor, then we thought it might be Hunan House.  But Al Pong confirmed in the comments that it's Hunan China.  Check out his comment for his contact information and for more details about the types of trees that you can buy.  Thanks for the fix.)

This is part of a week of guest posts highlighting finds that other people have found around Howard County.


8 comments:

Julie said...

I have seen this guy at the Howard County farmer's markets selling Asian Pears and giving out free samples. Yummy!

Anonymous said...

Bought several plants from Pong's end of last spring. The kumquat plant and the meyer lemon plant are doing very well; they both have fruits on them and are about to ripe. Pong's plants and trees are very well maintained and the family is super nice & friendly too!

sherringham said...

The chinese food place at 29 and 216 is Hunan House, cousin to Hunan Manor in Columbia. Hunan House has great steamed veggie dumplings and awesome white-meat honey sesame chicken!

Anonymous said...

As somebody who does not get a lot of sun where I am(except during the summer on the deck) are there any good indoor trees? I'd love a lemon or even a hot pepper plant.

JohnD said...

Does anybody know if he has a calamansi plant?

Anonymous said...

We bought a calamansi plant at the Manila Asian Mart in Laurel (the same shopping center as the Dutch County Farmers Market). Granted, we did have to pay careful attention to the selections because some of the other plants had yellow leaves. So far, our plant has been thriving indoors this winter and it CONTINUES to bear fruit.

Al Pong said...

The Chinese restaurant in fulton is Hunan China. There is another restaurant that we go to is Tyson's Buffet in Rockville. It is one of the bigger ones in the area. It has dim sums, a large selection of Chinese dishes including some you never heard of, fruits and salad as well as a few American dishes, sushi and Pho noodle soup, etc. The price is reasonable - 10% discount for seniors amount to $8 including tax.

We do have Calmonsi and several varieties of lemons and other citrus.

As for the avid gardener, we are trying to add an element that has not been emphasized in the American garden, i.e., fragrant flowering plants and trees. We also try to help those gardeners whom are health conscious to grow high anti-oxidant super-foods organically.

If you are interested in growing figs, we found a new way to grow them and we will be very happy to share it with you.

Above all, we like to thank our happy customers and we will continue to do our very best to serve you.

If you need more information or help, send us an email - asianmd@verizon.net or alpong@verizon.net or go to Maryland's Best "Pong's Orchard"

Happy New Year!

Al Pong
Pong's Orchard

Al Pong said...

Correction on my post
My email is asianpearmd@verizon.net rather than asianmd@verizon.net

Al