Adam's Apples

This week I have augmented my hoard of apples with two pecks of winter fruit. With some gaps, I expect my supply to take me through to April. The acquisitions are a half peck each of Cripps Pink ("Pink Lady" to you) and Blushing Golden , and a whole peck of GoldRush .

Gnarly Pippins is both website and nom-de-pomme of site author Matt Kaminsky. Kaminsky (aka Pippins) was profiled this past fall in the Boston Globe . He brings an enthusiasm for wild apples in the spirit of  Henry David Thoreau . Kaminsky's layered, meditative prose style also reminds me of apple-blogger Chris's Life of Apples (on hiatus, perhaps permanently).

There are tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of Gala trees in the world today.  ¶  They are clones, genetically identical to the first Gala bred in New Zealand and grown from seed nearly 100 years ago. Indeed, they are that tree, in that each is a link in an unbroken chain of living tissue from the mother tree, grafted and regrafted onto countless sets of roots .

This week marked the last of my Baldwins and Ashmead's Kernels. The Ashmead's were in top form this year, the Baldwins not so much but still worthwhile.

In Massachusetts, the day before the American Thanksgiving is the last for shoppers seeking produce and other goods direct from the farm.

The 2020 harvest, plagued by pandemic and drought, has not been a total bust. The selection at farmers market has been limited. The Baldwins were not so great this year. However, Cox, Ashmead, and Stayman have been particularly good. Alas, barring some last-minute discoveries, this is not going to be a big year for new apple reviews.

A tasting table at Clarkdale Farm in less fraught times (Cider Days 2016).  ¶  The season's traditional gatherings of apple and cider enthusiasts are virtual this year, in Maine, Western Massachusetts, and Colorado.