Adam's Apples

Set the  Wayback Machine  to 1905 and put your finger on the pomological pulse of New York and the world. The New York State Department of Agriculture has just published the latest edition of The Apples of New York, including detailed descriptions of every variety then grown in the Empire State (regardless of place of origin). Today, this work is out of print, in the public domain, digitized, and online. Look in vain for modern favorites, but thrill to descriptions of lost flavors of yesteryear.

The Black Gilliflower is a large medium apple, ribbed and very conical, of which more below. The "Black" in its name refers to the color, which can be a striking deep shade of red if allowed to mature. On my sample this blush covers most of the fruit, except for one streaky segment. I also note a very deep stem well. Many small irregular light lenticels decorate the upper half, and there are a few small patchy streaks of russet. The apple has a sweet cidery smell.

I said King Luscious was big, but see for yourself. His Royal Hugeness looms left; at right is the merely large Macoun, Queen of Autumn. Both flank Wickson just for grins. My King Lush was a full twelve inches around—one foot—and even when you divide by pi that's pretty impressive.

Today's apple runs medium-large-by-large, a yellow-green sphere with slightly raised lenticels, some russeted to brown. Some of these apples have a small faint rosy blush, and my tasting sample has a dramatic splash of russet spilling out from the stem well. Northwest Greening's calyx is open and shallow, and the firm unbroken fruit has a very faint sweet aroma scented with pear.

For some of us I gather this is not a trick question. However, I live in New England, and mine are in my refrigerator. I took a little census earlier today. and here's what I have left: Fifteen russets   Five Blushing Goldens   One American Beauty   Four Cox's Orange Pippins   The Cox's, which I picked at the end of September, have hung in longest of all and are still quite good.

In season, Bolton Orchards ( map ) presses this elegant varietal sweet cider from the Golden Russet. This clear amber liquid is surely filtered, althou h the label only notes that the cider is UV pasteurized and has a little preservative added. There is absolutely no residue, and the cider is as transparent as filtered apple juice. This cider's flavor and aroma are both sweet, light, and with strong pear notes. Had someone told me this was pear juice I'd have believed it. Compared to regular pressed cider, GR cider is lighter and milder, as its appearance suggest. Like other cider, however, it is best served cold to mute an intense sweetness that would otherwise cloy.

The overwhelming impression is size. King Luscious looms like a hulking gas giant in the apple firmament. (Update: More on his size here. ) Certainly his color is not terribly distinguishing, a streaky, somewhat dull red over yellow green. The green of the skin in the stem well is bright and saturated like that of Granny Smith. King Luscious is decorated with many small light lenticels and has no aroma. He sits firm and heavy in my hand.

The season is all but over in my part of the world, where "what to eat" is a question of (1) what keepers you've already stockpiled, plus (2) what you choose to buy at supermarkets. Enterprise A few orchards, however, are still selling what they have left, on winter hours. If you get the chance, you might still be able to stockpile some good keepers for the month. Here's my report on how some of them fared last winter. Phil's, in Harvard, was still picking apples the week of Thanksgiving, though I don't imagine that will go on much longer. He will have his excellent unpasteurized cider, and crisp sturdy Enterprise apples, available through December. Ambrosia This time of year I extend my love affair with fragile Macoun at the supermarkets. The quality can be very good. In the past markets have...

"Is that a really tiny apple or a really big cherry?"—my daughter's reaction to Wickson, which is either a small apple or a large crab.  ¶  With its bright saturated red blush (over a yellow not unlike that of a Rainier cherry ), round, slightly elongated shape, and long stem, this small apple bears more than a passing resemblance to that fruit. Its skin is glossy and the small fruit is firm.  ¶  Wickson has coarse light-yellow flesh that is juicy and wonderfully crisp. It is well-balanced, tartness predominating but tempered by sugar, and with distinct malt-sugar notes. This is not a flavor I have encountered in any other apple and I wonder what kind of cider these would produce. In any case they make an excellent snack, full of snap and spice —but each is just a few bites. I found myself gnawing every eatable scrap of these little gems. Trees of Antiquity says ...

Ida fire-engine Red is decorated with light yellow-green lenticels of varying size. The arresting blush covers the entire fruit, through it grows streaky around the base and my sample has russet in the stem well. Ida is a large medium fruit, globular with just a little ribbing. Unbroken she is firm in my hand.

J.R.R. Tolkien's elves divided the year into six seasons, not four. Between autumn and winter came fading, an ebb in the tide of nature. Halfway between the cross-quarter day of Samhain (Halloween) and Yule, the trees at Nagog Hill Orchard stand bleak and bare under a gray November sky, so very different than that of early fall. These two trees: are the same as these:

Slow Food USA identifies 129 heirloom apple varieties for its Ark of Taste, from American Beauty (reviewed here ) to Yeats. This is an interesting catalog, including may photos, and I should like to taste every one of them. Unfortunately, there are detailed descriptions of only a few of the selected varieties (seven at this writing), and no simple way to find them! Until now, that is. Links below: Capitol Reef Granite Beauty Harrison Cider Hauer Pippin Newtown Pippin Gravenstein Sierra Beauty To make matters more confusing, not all of these seven are on the list of 129. Slow Food USA, like its international counterpart, promotes local food, biodiversity, and appreciation of good things to eat.

If your idea of a russet apple is small and round, meet Hudson's Golden Gem. These conical apples are medium to medium-large and obviously ribbed. The russetting, like that of other varieties, is a treat to look at: rusty, toasty brown and not entirely opaque, creating subtly shifting colors wonderfully variegated.

On the small side of medium, this cheerful yellow variety recalls both Red and Golden Delicious. Coville has the exaggerated ribbed and tapered profile of the former and the color and dark lenticels of the latter, from which it surely must be descended. Some have a small slight blush, rosy orange. At the base a circle of bumps surrounds an open calyx. These bruise easily and have a lush sweet aroma.

A fellow apple fanatic emailed me recently about a rot- and pest-resistant apple that will stay crisp and fresh for two weeks at room temperature. Breeding will out, and the new variety has great genes, according to its patent. Horticulturalists tout the fruit's green potential to save growers money while avoiding the need for pesticides and energy-intensive storage. But (and excuse me for asking this)  how does it taste?

A pair of apple seeds from a Cox's Orange Pippin, November 2009.

Today's pick is a pretty apple, medium-sized, lobed, and conical, with a blush that is deep red where saturated and studded with tiny light lenticels. It has no aroma that I can smell. Fortune is part of the McIntosh family, and looks it, so I was surprised that its flesh is a light yellow, on the coarse side. (One sample's flesh had a green tint.) It is nicely crisp and juicy but with a little tenderness, and its peel is quite chewy: I imagine this variety travels well.

A vigilant reader provides a link to this BBC photo essay of apples in Kazakhstan, where the fruit originated and still grows wild. Thanks, ascorbic! A friend who has been there tells me of fabulous, huge Kazakh apples--not the ur-apples in ascorbic's link, but maybe shown here , and mentioned in this companion news story .

Matt Gunderson, writing in last week's Boston Globe, describes an experiment in high-density apple farming at Shelburne Farm and ten other orchards in Massachusetts. According to the UMass Extension Program , this technique entails using dwarf rootstock and training, rather than pruning, to direct tree vigor into the production of fruit rather than wood. Trees are small and close together, and very high yielding; furthermore they produce earlier, and yield larger fruit. Gunderson describes, for example, a 1.5-pound honey crisp specimen - the size of a small pumpkin - from the new orchard. Acromegalic Honeycrisps? I admit to mixed feelings about that. But I am glad to see apple journalism in my newspaper, and this seems to be the season: the Globe also published a recipe for apple cider sorbet. Yum!

This antique variety (more than 200 years old) is beloved, even legendary. It has a wonderful name, at once old (think Nodhead or Hubbardston Nonesuch) and new ( Honeycrisp, Jazz ). I have never tasted one before, so you can imagine my keen interest. I am holding a large, classically shaped apple with a red blush, both saturated and streaky, over yellow green, a little on the dull side. Light lenticels, mostly at the bottom, decorate the blush; they are barely visible elsewhere. There's some ribbing and, on my sample, flyspeck. Its calyx is closed, but not tightly, and it sits firm in my hand, with a faint cidery aroma.

From October's explosive bounty, the transition to November is stark. One week there might be nearly a score of choices at the market. Next week the harvest is in, the apples are picked, and the market is closed until June.* There are still late season choices, at orchards, in supermarkets, and at the farmers markets (mostly in cities) that remain open. Not everything has been picked, and much of what has been picked keeps well. Early November is also a chance for a last bite at varieties that don't do well in storage, at least not the storage that you or I can provide . Sometime this month the quality of the Macouns in supermarkets, industrially stored, will surpass that of those available from the farmers who grew them.

With its cherry-red blush, tapered profile, and prominent light lenticels, today's photo suggests nothing less than an enormous strawberry. Coromandel is a medium-large apple, ribbed and conical. The lenticels are rough and slightly extruded, providing an unusual tactile sensation.

This variety wins a spot in my unwritten list of especially marvelous apple names. It came my way courtesy of a generous reader. Specifically, Seek-No-Further reached me via U.S. mail, carefully packed, eight scarred apples of small-medium size. Each has a ruddy red blush, streaky over green yellow, and an oblate shape that is ever-so-slightly ribbed. There is a dull brownish bloom, which is not terribly attractive (it washes off), and large light lenticels that are widely spaced.

Today's apple grew in the same orchard where this variety was first discovered one hundred and fifty years ago. American Beauty, large, round, and ribbed, has a dark red blush, sometimes streaky, over yellow green. Russet, rough to the touch, gives this fruit a sandblasted aspect. Lenticels are light, on the large side, and numerous. My apple feels quite firm and smells of cider.

A reader asks whether another name for Pomme Gris is "Grey Pearmain." My answer follows, but if you know better, drop us a line in the comments.

Available nearly year round, this durable variety is a personal mainstay in the winter and spring, when they are shipped from controlled-atmosphere storage to the supermarkets. I've already reviewed Empire, but since I eat so many of these felt I should, for once, try one fresh from the orchard.

This year's annual celebration and exploration of apples in the state of Maine is this Saturday the 24th. The event is sponsored by the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association and the University of Maine Cooperative Extension, in Unity, Maine. Activities include cooking workshops, apple and cider tastings, an expert panel (to identify your mystery varieties), and the fellowship and good cheer that ripens where apple lovers gather. Thanks to Kenn for this information!

A local apple—Roxbury today is part of Boston—these are medium to medium-large and only partly rusetted over spring green. Some have a coppery blush. The patchy russet is a grey brown and the underlying colors show through a little. Roxbury's lenticels are small and often rusetted; some are larger and slightly raised. My samples run from ribbed to slightly ribbed, with a closed calyx, and are quite firm in hand.

This medium-sized apple has a splotchy, streaky blush that is quite a deep purplish red in places; the unblushed skin is a light yellow-green. It is slightly ribbed. The lenticels are tiny, sparse, white, and insignificant, and there is a good deal of harmless flyspeck, perhaps because this apple grew on an organic farm. The apple has a sweet vinous smell mixed with cider.

This apple is on the large side of medium, ribbed and conical. Its coloring is subtle, a dull faint pink blush over light green, with green lenticels. Splendour's flesh is quite crisp and medium-fine-grained, white tinged with green, and juicy. Bites chunk off satisfyingly.

They stopped making these in 1938. This one was minted in 1923, a year before my mother was born. You could buy an apple for a nickel back then. Baldwin was still the most popular apple in America.

This medium-sized apple, bought at farmers market on September 30, has a glossy deep red blush that is half saturated and half washed out.  Lenticels add a sparse decoration of tiny light spots, and one of my tasting samples has a few crackles of russet on the skin. Spartan's flesh is medium-fine-grained and white with yellow highlights. It is very crisp and juicy, sweet with just a little tempering tartness.

It's been nearly a year since I briefly described the searchable catalog of apples in the National (UK) Fruit Collection. This database profiles nearly 2,000 apple varieties, the most extensive available online. It had been hosted by Brogdale Farm, in Kent. Since then, Brogdale and the Collection have reached a new relationship. The National Fruit Collection, including the catalog, is today curated and administered by the University of Reading.

The growers around here seem to harvest Suncrisp in mid to late October. All but Nagog Hill Farm, who had these for sale on September 19.  I asked about this, to be told, Just let them sit for a few days. I waited a week, but I'm not convinced these were really ready to eat. Read and judge for yourself.

October roars in like a pride of lions—at least in terms of the breadth of choice in what you can pick or buy at the orchard, farm stand, or farmers market. By Halloween, however, the riot of choices will have dwindled. In the mean time, enjoy! McIntosh and Macoun, king and queen of autumn, belong at the top of any list of apples to buy this month, at least in the Northeast. Indeed these beauties are at peak now, depending on where you live. What are you waiting for? Also towards the beginning of the month it is worth seeking out Cox's Orange Pippin , the more so if you have never had the pleasure. This variety is wonderfully complex and satisfying.  Cox keeps well, and is said to improve with some time in storage, but their harvest is very soon--and they go fast. October is a great month for heirlooms, keepers, and winter apples--which will be harvested today and eaten int...

True to its name, this handsome apple has a very deep purplish-red blush, accented with light lenticels. The apple itself is a large medium of classical shape with just a suggestion of ribbing. The blush on my sample is its full deep saturated color over half of the apple, and the rest is light and streaky. The only unblushed skin, in the stem well, is a light and vibrant green.

Yesterday I pedaled out to Nagog Hill Orchard in Littleton. This is an agreeably bare-bones pick-your-own place, but of course you can buy by the pound and they have a lot of trees and varieties from which to chose. There's not a lot of room in my bike bag and I only bought one, a Macoun. The woman behind the table helpfully offered a paper towel to protect the apple, a nice thing to do because Macouns bruise easily.

This conical, medium-sized apple has a light red-pink blush over a bright green yellow peel. Its "ribs" are apparent in the photo. The blush has two discrete parts, a light translucent pink and a more-saturated orange red. There is some russet on the blush and in the stem well. Lenticels are dark, and the apple has a faint sweet smell.

Excellent Milton is a medium large apple with a blush that runs to a deep red over a green yellow. Its many irregular lenticels are a darker green (though not in this photo: see below). The fruit is classically shaped with just a little ribbing, and there are some minor scratches that look like fine lines of russet. It has a faint grassy smell.

"Ugly, but sweet," said the sign for these little gems at Farmers market. Ugly? I beg to differ. These small ribbed apples have an orange red blush over yellow, with light green lenticels. My three tasting samples are each different. One is mostly blush, and one is mostly russet (with little blush). Today's photo showcases the one with some of everything. "Striking" I would say. "Not airbrushed barbie-doll perfect," I grant you. But ugly? Click here (or on the photo) for the close up and say that.

This striking small medium fruit is light yellow with light green lenticels. It is ribbed and has little bumps, or "chins," around the calyx.   My sample has some russet in the stem well and a mellow aroma that suggests pear and Golden Delicious.

Bonus question first: With the name "Jonamac," what could the two parents of this apple be?  This variety is a straightforward blend of many of Jonathan's and McIntosh's fine qualities, with an emphasis on the Mac. Jonamac has a streaky dull red blush over a bright spring green, decorated with light lenticels. It is medium large and ribbed. My sample is slightly conical and wears a few spots of flyspeck.

The name refers to this apple's (a) color and (b) resistance to disease and its general ease of care. Red Free is a classically shaped apple, ribbed and medium large. Its red blush ranges from streaky to saturated over light yellow green.

We spent last week in New York City—not for the apples but, happily, apples there were. New York is a great enough city to draw all good things to it; moreover it sits near farms and orchards in the fertile Hudson Valley, Long Island, and New Jersey. Travelers who want to touch the land and lives of the places they visit could do worse than to visit markets where local food is sold.

September is a transition month. Some orchards don't grow any early apples. But by the end of the month high season is well underway. Some of last month's picks are still in season. I was surprised to find some good Gravensteins at Nagog Hill Orchard yesterday, and there are Gingergolds and Zestars. Opalescent I also look forward to finding more Tydeman's , reviewed last week, and handsome, elegant Opalescent, one of my favorites from last September. The big event of September, however, has to be the debut of Macintosh and Macoun, two magnificent apples with rival fan clubs. (You can compare them side by side and judge for yourself.)

Large, ribbed, and lobed, this cross of McIntosh and Worcester Pearmain wears a red blush over spring green, with many light lenticels visible in the blush. One sample is lopsided, with odd lobes and scars; the other more regular and with russet radiating from the stem well.

Today's variety, Duchess of Oldenburg, runs medium-sized with a pinkish blush in pronounced streaks over yellow green. The apples are ribbed and wear many green lenticels a little darker than the skin. My tasting sample has a little russet in the stem well, and her calyx is closed. The Duchess is renowned as a cooking apple, especially if picked a little early (as I suspect mine may have been). But what would you have me do? Suppose I did cook some into a pie (or a pancake ). Yummy for me, but there would be no frame of reference to compare these apples with the other sixty-odd varieties I've reviewed. So I'm just going to stick to my old habits and eat this one raw.

Beautiful Gould Hill Orchard , which had apparently closed for good as the owners prepared to retire, is again open for business under new management. Gould Hill, in Hopkinton, New Hampshire, grows many heirloom apples. Efforts by the Leadbeater family to sell the farms to a community trust fell through last June. When their web page went dark, it seemed a sure bet that the 80 acres, with their beautiful view, would be chopped up into lots and developed. What a loss! Gould Hill has been a farm for more than 225 years. The Leadbeaters have run it for the last 70.  In addition to such old apples as Hubardston Nonesuch and Ribston and Cox's Orange Pippin, their Hampshire was discovered there. Kearsage grows only at Gould Hill.

With one exception, this blog has been about apples, anchored by my reviews of apple varieties. It's worth noting, though, that most growers grow other fruit. My favorite farms, maybe yours too, are selling some very fine peaches, plums, and apricots right now. If the peaches aren't ripe, put them in a paper bag overnight.

It's still early days for apples, of course, but at least in New England there will be some interesting choices at the markets as early as next week. I will be on the lookout for four varieties this month.

Appreciating the all-too-short Vista Bella season is easy: in July, they are the only game in town. But these apples would be noteworthy any time of year, and today I found a new taste in Vista Bella's sweet-tart berries-and-wine mix: fake watermelon notes. Not true watermelon, but something very like the artificial watermelon flavor you might find in a child's sweet. (But in a good way!)