Adam's Apples

Update: These are last year's Mutsus, stored very well. Of course. That was my first guess when I saw them at Farmers Market last week. But when the seller insisted they were fresh picked, I entertained some bizarre theories (below) consistent with that. This week the grower himself was at the market and he told me the truth.

On Monday I bicycled to the Bedford Farmers Market. Only one vendor there sells apples and I was not surprised that he had none yet. On Tuesday I went likewise to Lexington's Farmers Market, which includes three apple farmers. One had these Vista Bellas, frequently first out of the gate here. Unfortunately these were early at best. One was white-pipped-spongey-fleshed unripe; another was just very green and tart.

Disappointment, because there are no apples at Farmers market yet. Last year I got the first local apples of the year on July 14. Relief because last year's early crop, following an exceptionally early spring, proved to the the harbinger of a poor harvest. So, one more week to go!

The crop of southern-hemisphere apples that usually arrives in late April or May was, at last, in full cry in June. I don't know whether it is freshness or terroir or something else, but the Chilean Granny Smiths were much better--crisper, more complex--than their Washington State counterparts.

I saved out one last russet apple from the fall and ate it today, the last of June. The apple was yielding in my hand, and its skin was wrinkled and smelled mossy. It looked like a little rotting pumpkin. But the flesh was sound and the flavors were wonderfully sweet, wildly concentrated pear and honey like ice wine after the freeze.

All About Apples of the U.S.A. and Orange Pippin of the U.K. are joining forces. The two web sites will provide an online catalog of more than 600 varieties, tightly integrated with information about where each kind is grown, a tree registry, and other information. The integrated content will be hosted at orangepippin.com.

These two apples from the past year really look this way: These are, left to right, San Rosé and Rienette Simirenko (aka Woods Greening). They do look distorted, don't they? Not what the eye expects. They are true photos though: the Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy of my collection. I could tweak these images to make them look "normal." It would just require me to edit the html for this post and change four numbers. But, that would be wrong. Oh heck, I'll do it.