Adam's Apples

Scarlet Crunch, large and conical, wears a streaky warm red blush over green-tinted yellow.  ¶  They are only slightly ribbed (you have to hunt for that) and are decorated with nearly invisible lenticel dots.

I have a healthy batch of these pale yellow apples courtesy ( again !) of Michael Wunsch of North Dakota. Medium to large, they have a small red-orange blush that is speckled and spotty.  ¶  They are slightly ribbed and only slightly asymmetrical (the significance of which will perhaps become clear below). Each is so glossy with wax that they are what apple nerds call "greasy," though none of it will come off on your fingers.

If October is Peak Apple, this coming holiday weekend is peak agroturismo at orchards in the Northeast. (Photo: Part of the crowd lining up to order cider donuts and other treats at Shelburne Farm in Stow, Massachusetts, on Saturday. ) ¶  Come for the apples...but also the donuts, hayrides, goats, corn maze, musical performances, and other delights. Resources below, but also a report from last weekend.

I'm able to share Red Baron with you today thanks to the generosity of Michael Wunsch, an orchardist in east-central North Dakota.  ¶  Glossy with natural wax , these run the gamut from the large end of of small to the smaller part of large. The red blush (streaky in spots) mostly covers a yellow peel tinged with green. 

A modern fruit breeder would never name an apple anything like "Anton Poulter." It would be trademarked as "HoneyCluck" or "Sweet Chicks" etcetera.  ¶  But today's apple dates from a gentler time, when a farmer might discover a new apple growing on his* farm (*for surely Anton was a man) and bring it to the state fair or horticultural society.

The Jerseymacs have been very good this summer, and I am both obliged and pleased to reconsider my 2008 take : There is a moment when you take a bite that you can convince yourself it is going to taste like a McIntosh....  ¶  This year's is the same round, oblate, modestly ribbed apple, its red blush, streaky in spots, over spring green and decorated with light lenticels and a light bloom.

Today's apples are small and medium sized, round with no ribbing but flattened so they don't roll. What looks like ribs in the photo are small bruises.  ¶  The blush lies streaky red over a green that sometimes leans towards yellow, and the resulting variation in saturation of blush over variable shades makes for a variegated surface, sometimes dull red-green, sometimes orange, or yellow or green.

Stillman's Farm, my source for Mollie's Delicious , pulled a little rebrand last week.  ¶  I guess the crop was a little bent this year. The apples, normally just round or tapered, had this little atrophied base (or crown if you prefer).  ¶  And they were sold as "Molly Sheep Nose."

I've got two of these, medium and large, pale yellow-green with small faint peach blush. They are round, with flattened tops and bottoms, those of the larger one especially so.  ¶  Flyspeck and a few small bruises join many filled grey lenticels decorating the peel. They do not come from a big industrial orchard. These apples have a lovely sweet aroma.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE ?  Mislabeled apples at Arlington's farmers market on September 9.  ¶  Quite a radical design departure today for Apple Computer (which spells its desktops "Macintosh"). Where's the USB port? If this had been only a hand-lettered sign....  I should not complain, I guess, the point is McIntosh (bonus: spelled right!) is here. Be glad! But it shakes one's faith in farmers.

There are some great farmers markets near me, and in season they are the source of most of the fruit I eat. You never know what new apples, or old favorites, might show up there.  ¶  All of the apples for sale, by date, from July to the end of the outdoor markets in November of 2024. It's from this spreadsheet .  ¶  For the past few years I've reported regularly (with a few gaps) about all of them. It is kind of thrilling to track the harvest as it unfolds, and to feel through that the solemn turning of the year from summer to winter.

The Boston Globe, anticipating pomological fall , on Wednesday published a two-paged guide to some of New England's most interesting orchards and apple experiences.  ¶  Cider donuts too, of course.

This handsome apple blushes deep red, at its most saturated as dark as any Arkansas Black or Black Oxford .  ¶  It is decorated with many small light lenticel dots, and the unblushed portion is streaky over yellow.  ¶  Soluna is sightly tapered and slightly ribbed, firm in hand with a pleasant fruity aroma.

There's an orchard near me that takes an interest in apples that are still in development (and may never graduate to wider cultivation).  ¶  These generally have names like "WA 38" (which you know as Cosmic Crisp ) or "NY 428" (which you probably do not know at all).  ¶  My local grower, for example, got its hands on one of these and, since it did not have what you might call a name, called it "Early Jonagold." (It later got fully commercialized as Autumn Crisp.  ¶  ) It also sold Early Spy and Early Macoun that were not these named apples picked early, but something else.  ¶  So when I found "Early Crimson Crisp" there this week, I had to ask: is this another unofficial nickname for an uncommercialized apple, or is "early" just an adjective describing the true Crimson Crisp?

A WHOLE LOTTA NOTHING  ¶  All supermarket apples are good looking, and Dazzle, with its cool red blush decorated with many small lenticel dots, is no exception.  ¶  The apple is large and blocky, with only a slight taper keeping it from a completely cylindrical profile. The blush mostly covers a yellow peal, and is thinner (and warmer) on the shaded side.  ¶  Its calyx is open.

Travel has kept me from the early apples this year. I've missed the local farmers market where it is likely at least one vendor has offered Lodi or Vista Bella, or maybe even Pristine.  ¶  Left to right: Vista Bella, Yellow Transparent, Puritan.  ¶  This week, my wanderings took me past Red Apple Farm in Phillipston, Massachusetts, which did not disappoint.  ¶  About a minute after I took the above photo, I was eating one of those Vista Bellas. So fresh, so tart, so local , so good.

I was traveling last week, and thus missed farmers market, where there were probably some early apples: Lodi at least, and maybe Vista Bella .  ¶  I made it to an orchard on Friday. Things looked pretty good there!  ¶  Hutchins Farm, in Concord, Massachusetts, did not have any apples to sell yet, but will soon by the look of things.

Eighteen is something like 180 in internet years. I never imagined when I started this blog in 2008 (an experiment writing about "a year of apples" ) that I'd learn so much, or that I'd still be learning and blogging in 2026.  ¶  Possibly that year year-long commitment is what kept me going. I bagged 44 apples in the first six months (a number I have never matched in any subsequent full year). It would have been easy to quit when things inevitably got harder to write about in the winter.

After several years of neglect, these apple trees show signs of care.  ¶  Some are even bearing fruit:  ¶  The state of things at Nagog Hill Farm in Littleton, Massachusetts, last week.  ¶  Alas, the farm has moved on, an orchard no more.

Surrounded by the plastic and newsprint that kept it over the winter, this 2025 GoldRush apple proved still good to eat in June of 2026.  ¶  As things turned out, my eyes were bigger than my stomach when I squirreled away a score of these apples last fall to eat in April.  ¶  But no matter: GoldRush is a phenomenal keeper apple , still good in June. This is my last one.

" From now on I will no longer be a monogamous apple consumer; instead, I will be in a harem with bedfellows by the name of jazz, yello, pink lady and envy." That was one of several lessons learned by Nicholas Jordan, a Sydney food writer, after a group tasting of 16 apple varieties from local markets and grocers.  ¶  Not Australia: A tasting table at Clarkdale Farms in Deerfield, Massachusetts in 2016.

SO FAR FROM THE HARVEST  ( GoldRush (L) and Empire ) ¶  The late spring used to be enlivened by imports of (relatively) fresh apples from Chile, New Zealand, and other points south .  ¶  Today these apples are swept away on the ebb tides of global commerce. (Tariffs? Hormuz Strait?) Things are a little bleak.  ¶  This year I've found myself gravitating to the last of my GoldRush from the fall, and, unexpectedly, Empire.

A friend alerted me to a short broadcast about apples that aired on Boston's WGBH radio last month.  ¶  The focus was on New England apples. It's streamable any time and available as a podcast.  ¶  The April 27 episode of Under the Radar with Callie Crossley includes a 25-minute interview with Amy Traverso and Sean Turley that quickly gets into the good stuff.

King blossoms on an apple tree at Hutchins Farm in Concord, Massachusetts, yesterday.  ¶  First to come forth, the king blossom heralds the harvest to be.  ¶  Blogger Chris, of A Life of Apples , tells us  ❝ Every fruiting spur on an apple tree produces a cluster of six buds; five centered around a central blossom known as the King Blossom.  This blossom is the first to open and pollination of it is key in insuring good fruit set.

ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠώς: The buds on the trees at Hutchins Farm in Concord, Massachusetts earlier today blush like eager debutantes  While some in other climes report blossoms , we are in the chill stasis of a Massachusetts April.  ¶  The cool temperatures slow the rhythms of spring. Magnolia, forsythia, and even cherry persist; apples are standing by.

A bud is opening on an apple tree in Lexington, Massachusetts yesterday.  ¶  Some are reporting apple blossoms , but where I live things are still mostly buttoned up, though that is changing.  ¶  It's still forsythia and cherries here, though just a few towns farther from the sea the magnolias are in full bloom. The apples cannot be far behind.

Tomorrow's apples take shape on a tree at Hutchins Farm in Concord, Massachusetts earlier today.  ¶  Pomological spring is a hopeful time, made dear by uncertainty.

Whan that April with his showres soot is when (whan?) GoldRush, that king of keepers, is ready to eat.  ¶  It's also when I see how the ones I laid down in my refrigerator in December have fared in my home newsprint-and-perforated-plastic-bag storage system.

Yes that's snow! March 9 at Hutchins Farm in Concord, Massachusetts.  ¶  Temperatures here shot up from the 20s to the 70s (Fahrenheit) in the past week, so I hopped on my bicycle and peddled through the melt to Concord.

The Cortland apple has an ardent following. In September and October, I like Macs and Macouns, close Cort relations.  Photo: McIntosh (L) and Cortland  ¶  But lately, in February and now March, I have been enjoying Cortland's crisp vinous goodness.  ¶  Let's see how it stacks up agains the Mac at this time of year.

Would you like to know an old-time apple recipe for Norfolk Biffin (or other fruit recipes , some from antiquity)?  ¶  Perhaps you'd be interested in a deep dive into claims that some apples date from Roman times ?  ¶  How about an introduction to apple and pear identification ? From a fellow who grew several score of different apples last fall?

Behold:  ❝ A pineapple fucked a pear and somehow made a baby that looks like an apple. That is the Cox’s Orange Pippin . ❞  or this:   ❝ Maiden’s Blush : Wet sad sandcastle heralds the death of summer, but at least it smells nice, so stick a wick in it and use it as a candle. ❞ 

Three apples rate a star. Two earn two.  ¶  I tasted nine apple varieties for the first time last year.  ¶  Alas, may of my examples were clearly past their prime. Consequently, I'm not able to give them the recognition they probably deserve.  ¶  But first: What's going on? I rate apples every year at this time , using my own qualitative system, one to three stars .

Last fall I was invited to identify some apples growing in a neighbor's yard.  ¶  Not to beat around the tree: these proved to be Northern Spy, something that the home owners had suspected.  ¶  I'm not actually a great apple detective , so just as well! But my payment was a nice ration of these apples, reminding me of how good they are.  ¶  Why did I need to be reminded?

Granny blushes, if you let her.  ¶  You would not know it from prowling the supermarket, however: She is a late apple usually picked too soon.  ¶  Today I will assay one from a local orchard. It was, maybe, allowed to ripen fully, though I am eating it more than a month after it was picked (and publishing this account even later than that, sorry!).

I begin 2026 with a refrigerator full of apples, and a number of half-finished blog posts and ideas from 2025. Several things, including some delightful travel, kept me away from this blog this fall.  ¶  Photo:  A Bramley's Seedling takes in the view from the walls of Edinburgh Castle.