It just isn’t summertime without a trip to Ham Orchards! The Terrell, TX staple is worth the trip from Dallas. Located about 45-minutes east of Dallas (and about 20 minutes east of Rockwall), Ham Orchards has incredible BBQ, cute photo ops, pick-your-own peaches, and an adorable store with all sorts of local produce (think fancy farmers market), homemade pies, fudge, and more.

Let’s start with the BBQ. In fact, I recommend you start with BBQ, then shop, then end with ice cream – the perfect summer afternoon at Ham’s! Ham Orchards serves award-winning BBQ by the famed Eddie Deen. In short, it’s out of this world. My personal favorite is the smoked chicken sandwich (if smoked chicken is on a BBQ menu, that’s what I’m ordering). The chicken has an incredible smoky flavor and is practically falling apart, it’s just juicy and tender. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it!

My dad ordered a brisket sandwich (the burnt bits on the edges are divine!) and my mom ordered a peach pulled pork sandwich, which is delightfully sweet. We all got the potato salad, which is nice and light for potato salad. The pickles that come with the sandwiches are also noteworthy, and I’m not even a pickle person! In fact, I should have thought to ask if they have jars of the pickles for sale.

We ate lunch under the covered pavilion, which has fans, string lights, and a view of the peach orchard before heading into the store to browse. Ham Orchard of course sells the peaches from the orchard and let me tell you: Georgia ain’t got nothin’ on Texas peaches. Ham Orchards consists of five orchards with 10,000 peach trees. They grow approximately thirty different kinds of peaches. There’s also many fantastic housemade goodies like peach salsa, peach jam, peach (and strawberry) ice cream, and peach bread.

There’s other local produce like tomatoes and blueberries plus lots and lots of jars of goodies like salad dressing, queso, pickled beets, local honey, and more. Promise me you will not leave without a bag of pecans. Texas pecans are a thing and I’m here to tell you, Ham Orchards has the best pecans ever. They’ve ruined me for pecans. My mom got several bags for her freezer for holiday baking; way to think ahead, Mom!

There’s a cute t-shirt corner and I’m delighted to report that I finally got a Ham Orchards shirt after regretting not getting one last year.

After the t-shirts, there’s a whole array of pies, turnovers, coffee cakes, and other pastries to choose from.On Monday and Tuesday you can also pick up some of their old fashioned fudge in flavors like birthday cake, peanut butter, and red velvet. I was terribly old fashioned and went for classic. They even offer mini pies the size of cookies if you don’t want to commit to a whole pie!

You can’t leave without some soft serve. It’s an unspoken rule. Ham’s makes their ice cream in small batches with orchard-ripe berries and peaches. You can get strawberry or peach made straight from their orchard but personally, I always get them swirled for the best of both worlds.

Ham’s really is the quintessential Texan summer outing. Note that this is a seasonal business running roughly May – September, so be sure to check the Facebook page and website for updates before you go.

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Stay peachy,

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