Adam's Apples

May and June, so far from the harvest, make an especially bleak season of the apple year. High-tech industrial storage only gets you so far, and the supermarket apples are really showing their age. These babies are months away. June 6 photo. This year where I live the problem is exacerbated by an inexplicable absence of apples from New Zealand, Chile, and Argentina. Usually these fruits, fresh from the spring harvest below the equator, provide a welcome relief. The imports  ride in around the end of April and tide us over until the real thing begins here in late July. Though unwelcome, this year's absence creates an opportunity for me to report on apples that I would otherwise avoid: those that have been in storage for as much as 9 months (and counting).

Macoun in autumn Even in a good year, the delightful Macoun cannot be had for love or money after the end of March. Yet I am eating one today at the tail end of May. It's a wonderful apple in inferior shape, and eating one today is both rewarding and disappointing. Nonetheless I eat for pleasure and by choice, not from obligation or loyalty.

Here's what you do: Get a couple of half-gallons of sweet apple cider in season, from an orchard that presses its own. Put one of 'em in the back of your freezer and forget about it. The plastic jug will swell and, chances are, stuff will melt and re-freeze over it. Don't worry, it's still good. Wait until a summer heat wave and thaw.

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?

Back in November I froze a half gallon of fresh apple cider from Red Apple Farm in Phillipston. When I buy something tasty and special that keeps well, I never know when to eat or drink it. So I thawed this cider out this week because it's my birthday. (Was, actually.) Cider keeps very well frozen and this is delicious. I don't drink enough cider to be able to spout off about it the way I do about whole apples, but I found it sweet without being cloying the way some cider can be. Whatever they made it out of had something to balance all that sugar, because cider is sweet. Indeed there were hints of citrus and melon swimming about in the rich cider taste. This treat is very welcome this time of year, with local apples still a good six weeks off and high season not until September.

The big distributors keep apples fresh by refrigerating them and by suppressing the fruit's natural production of ethylene. This relatively simple hydrocarbon is in effect an apple hormone that triggers ripening, overripening, and rotting. One widely used technique is to store apples in airtight rooms from which oxygen has been reduced (from 21% to about 5% or less). Storage facilities also may control humidity and carbon-dioxide content, and use ethylene scrubbers. These techniques are know as controlled atmosphere storage and facilities are licensed (here are some typical requirements ). The apple industry often just refers to this as "CA."

A grower once shared this rule of thumb with me: An apple ages as much in a day on your kitchen table as in a week in your fridge. The effect is probably even great than that, depending on the warmth of your kitchen and the coolness of your refrigerator. As DeEll, Saad, and Khanizadeh (1999) put it, Temperature is the single most important factor governing the maintenance of postharvest quality. Therefore, rapid cooling after harvest greatly improves firmness retention in apples during storage. Low storage temperatures are equally important. McIntosh apples have been shown to soften as much as 20 times faster at 21 degrees C than at 0 degrees C. So even if you like to eat your apples at room temperature, refrigerate your apple purchases as quickly as possible if you want to keep them fresh.