A Midwestern Visitor to the Big Apple

Enough with the New York apple-centrism! Time to give the Midwest some love.

Recently I noticed Samascott Orchards  selling a new apple at the Union Square Greenmarket. The apple was a rosy red beauty with a focus-grouped name, EverCrisp. A handwritten sign claimed a parentage of Fuji and Honeycrisp. Was this new apple destined for greatness? Despite my dubious record of produce prognistication, I had to investigate.

The EverCrisp is a strikingly attractive apple, but apples can't get by on looks alone. (The Red Delicious apple, for example, the prototypical childhood illustration of an apple, isn't spared ridicule because of its looks; one apple preservationist denounced "this disgusting, red, beautiful fruit" in an article celebrating the end of its "evil reign.") The name "EverCrisp" suggested a commitment to marketing that some apples haven't earned yet. Samascott, for example, sells plenty of apples with names like NY 428, NY 460, NY 543 and NY 652, but it's hard to cross over into the big time with a New York State Agricultural Experiment Station robo-name.

The "Crisp" in EverCrisp's name not only piggybacks off of Honeycrisp apple - an extremely popular and profitable apple variety - but also emphasizes the attribute that makes the Honeycrisp so popular: its texture. Crispness is king! The goal is to have cells that shatter, noisily and juicily. As a New Yorker article called Building a Better Apple noted,

Although a crisp texture is the single most prized quality in an apple - even more desirable than taste, according to one study - crispness is more a matter of acoustics than of mouthfeel. Vibrations pass along the lower jaw and set the cochlea trembling. Biting into a really crisp apple, one feels, in the words of Edward Bunyard, the author of "The Anatomy of Dessert," "a certain joy in crashing through living tissue, a memory of Neanderthal days."

Some additional research helped me understand the appeal of the "Ever" portion of the name. As one Midwestern seller touts, "Sweet and ultra-firm EverCrisp can sit on your counter for weeks without losing crispness!"

Hardiness is the foundation of EverCrisp, which was developed by a fairly unlikely breeder, the Midwest Apple Improvement Association, a collective of apple growers grappling with the unique climate challenges of their region, whose late frosts kill off apples. [Washington and New York, the "powerhouse apple states" have breeding programs that focus on late blooming apples that benefit from proximity to large bodies of water (the Pacific Ocean and Lake Ontario and the Finger Lakes) that warm up slowly in the spring; ditto New Jersey, which similarly benefits from the Atlantic Ocean. The University of Minnesota's apple breeding program, creator of Honeycrisp and other successful apples like the Zestar! and SweeTango, was designed to address brutal winter weather. The Ohio State agricultural program that developed the Melrose apple no longer develops apples.] With no formal university program for landlocked Ohio/Indiana apple farmers, the growers dedicated themselves to breeding and promoting disease-resistant, late blooming apples that, in their own words, "naturally escape fire blight, scab, powdery mildew, cedar apple rust and late spring freezes thus reducing the use of fungicides, antibiotics, and orchard heating."

I appreciated the irony of this modest Midwesterner, bred to overcome the obstacle of not having New York's maritime apple advantage, being grown in New York. So far I've only seen EverCrisps at Samascott's stand, but if all goes well other farmers will follow, as will Whole Foods and other grocers. 

EverCrisp is a very welcome addition to Samscott's arsenal, especially this winter, when some of my other favorites (Macoun, Ashmead's Kernel, Golden Russet) seem to be having a difficult or truncated season. The EverCrisp is as crisp and juicy as billed, with a good apple flavor (for those of us, however unusually, prize flavor over texture), reminiscent of Fuji but without Fuji's occasional powdery and metallic notes. Its attendance at the Samascott stand has been very iffy, showing up sporadically. Twice I've been told the EverCrisp season was over, then been pleasantly surprised by a repeat appearance.

Nevertheless, Samascott demonstrated its commitment to the EverCrisp by investing in a new, formal sign.

Can the EverCrisp "remain crisp for many months"? I'm not planning any testing at my house. That's not the fate of produce (not even longevity champs like red cabbage) in my clutches. But I am encouraged by the sentiment.

Equally encouraging: EverCrisp's modest price. For fans of the notoriously expensive Honeycrisp, and similarly expensive (albeit less popular) SweeTango, EverCrisp offers a similarly tasty, crunchy apple but without the price bite.

That's another Midwestern approach that is always welcome in the Big Apple.

Pink-a-boo! I can see you! (Or, The Big Apple, Continued)

Evidently 60 varieties of apples are not enough.

Last apple season, I counted 60 varieties of apples sold at the Union Square Greenmarket and wrote about it in a blog entry, "The Big Apple." 
(Of course 60 varieties are but specks of sand on the beach: the forthcoming seven-volume encyclopedia, The Illustrated History of Apples in North America,  identifies 17,000 apple varieties grown between 1623 and 2000.)

This season, I've seen four new varieties: the bland and crisp SnapDragon, an offspring of Honeycrisp created by Cornell University's apple breeding program; the very decent (and remarkably blight-resistant) Crimson Topaz; and  - let's cut to the case - much more interesting Pink-A-Boo and Pink Delight. 

Don't confuse either of these Pinks with Pink Lady, a fairly random Golden Delicious offspring also known as Cripps Pink.  They are far more intriguing.

From the outside, Pink-a-Boo looks nice enough. The photo above could be of Granny Smiths or another green apple that sometimes has a rosy cast. But it's the insides that count here.

Cut open a Pink-a-Boo and discover its Cherry Vanilla surprise!

Our other fascinating newcomer, Pink Delight, looks like many other reddish apples from the outside, distinguished mainly by being a bit less photogenic than usual (even for low-spray apples).

 But inside, Pink Delight had the same marvelous surprise!

I had never heard of red-fleshed apples until this season, but the eccentric British website suttonelms.org.uk lists many varieties, mostly with charmingly lurid names - Red Love, Red Moon, Scarlet Surprise, Purple Passion, Purple Wave, Vampire, Firecracker and Red Devil. A red-fleshed apples few go the Disney route, with names like Pink Sparkle, Pink Beauty and Pink Princess. Here's the site's description of Pink Pearl: 

Rich flavor..the flesh is an attractive light pink and white. The apple is to my taste but if it was put in a child's lunch box it would probably be half eaten.

A comment about the plan for Tesco, a major British supermarket chain to carry red-fleshed apples (yes, I'm envious) included this pithy description of the apples: 

They look pretty damn insane yet wonderful.

Most red-fleshed apples are believed to be descended from malus niedzwetzkyana or Niedzwetzky's apple, a wild apple native to the Caucasus with red leaves, flowers and flesh. Beginning in the 1920s, Albert Etter, a California horticulturalist, used the Niedzwetzky offspring Surprise (sometimes called Surprize) to breed around two dozen red-fleshed apples. In case you were wondering, the red color of red-fleshed apples are caused by our good buddy anthocyanins, the antioxidants also present in a variety of deeply-pigmented produce, including purple cabbage and sour cherries. 

And what about the taste? Pink-A-Boo, the smaller apple above, has more dramatic coloring than Pink Delight, but rates only a "pretty good" in flavor. In other words, I wouldn't rush to buy it for myself if I had better alternatives -- and considering the only place I could buy it is Samascott's stand at the Greenmarket, which consistently has an incredible selection, so of course I would have better options. But I'd still buy it as a gift for others or simply to wow them.

Pink Delight is another story. Close your eyes and open your mouth. Pink Delight (okay, one you pare off the blemishes) tastes like the Granny Smith of my dreams (but seldom found in real life). Tart, but not astringent. Deep in its apple flavor. Desirable beyond its superficial charms.

I can't wait to see what Apple #65 is like.