Mesa, Arizona takes up a huge swath of land in the Southeast Phoenix Valley. It’s Arizona’s third-largest cities and actually has more population than better known cities like Cleveland, Minneapolis and Tampa.
Not long ago, Mesa’s primary commodity was citrus - like many areas of the Phoenix Valley in the early-to-mid twentieth century. In fact, many neighborhoods in north Mesa still have citrus trees lining the subdivision property and filling in the medians. Driving through this area you’ll find many suburban neighborhoods with citrus-inspired names.
While many citrus groves are long gone after being replaced by suburban homes and strip malls - a few groves remain. One of those is the Orange Patch in Mesa.
My wife, son and I visited the Orange Patch for the second time this weekend (we went at the tail-end of the season last year after stumbling upon it). Citrus-picking season, like in California and Florida, is in the winter months in Arizona.
The Orange Patch doesn’t have a website from what I can tell but neighbors a citrus nursery - Greenfield Nursery. While the Orange Patch isn’t something you can make a day of it does provide Southeast Phoenix Valley residents a quick and easy supply of fantastically fresh oranges, lemons, limes and grapefruit. The small store also has fresh squeezed orange juice, fresh honey, ice cream and other gift-shoppy type items for sale. But the fruit is “where it’s at.”
12 x 10 x 12 inch boxes (that’s a solid estimate) of ruby red grapefruit were only $6.75 yesterday - probably about thirty to forty grapefruit per box. I’ve loved grapefruit since I was a kid and my grandpa would spend hours cutting it for me when I visited their place in Florida. For some reason, we only bought six grapefruit yesterday and there’s only two left.
I have a sneaking suspicion that I’ll return this week to get a box…
The Orange Patch is located at:
2717 E. Lehi Road
Mesa, Arizona 85213
(480) 962-4490
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