Adam's Apples

Good old Mother Earth News , still composting after all these years, has published Tom Brown's account of heritage-apple hunting in North Carolina . Brown is a fruit detective after the manner of Southern heirloom hound  Lee Calhoun , knocking on doors and searching newspaper archives to locate old apples and budwood. Here's one I never heard of: Black Beauty, so called because its extreme susceptibility to sooty blotch renders it as black as coal (if not sprayed) when ripe.

Last summer I ranked the world of eating apples from zero to three stars. Life does not stand still, fortunately, and it's time to make my first set of adjustments to these ratings. I expect to do so annually about this time of year, when the trees are still sleeping and there's plenty of time for review and reflection.