New apple variety discovered in UK
December 3, 2020 12:04 PM Subscribe
Archie Thomas stumbled across solitary windfall fruit that could be cross between cultivated apple and European crab apple. Thomas admitted he may be biased, but said he thought the apples tasted great. “Tart but not wincingly-so, and with enough sweetness to eat raw … They speak of the terrain of Wiltshire; unimproved chalk grassland and chalk streams,” he added. As for the name, Thomas said he felt pressure to get it right: “I have too many ideas. My seven-year-old son wants me to call it Cristiano Ronaldo but that’s not happening. My wife, Hannah, is the apple of my eye, so she’s in contention.” (via The Guardian)
Arbury said it was “a very interesting apple .. It tastes quite good. It’s a cooking apple or dual purpose, you can eat it, it’s got a bit of acidity but it’s got some flavour, and some tannin, which is what you have in cider apples,” he said, adding it could be used with other apples for cider.I think this is a tactful pomological way of saying it's not awfully nice to eat. But it's still a great discovery.
Even in my local London suburb there are hopes of finding lost apple varieties in people's gardens:
“We want gardeners and residents to be on the look-out for long forgotten apple varieties that we know were once popular in North London and Hertfordshire. One variety we are searching for is an apple cultivar known as the Finchley Pippin, but we fear we might be too late. Another is known as the Voyager, a Hertfordshire raised apple that was developed by A.R. King of Barnet. We think there might be a Voyager on one of the allotments in Barnet. But who was A.R. King?”posted by verstegan at 12:26 PM on December 3, 2020 [7 favorites]
I quit eating refined sugars in June of last year. Then crabapple season came along, and I tried one, and it was fine! So I went back and harvested a whole bunch. They were fine! Appletastic.
posted by aniola at 12:31 PM on December 3, 2020 [4 favorites]
posted by aniola at 12:31 PM on December 3, 2020 [4 favorites]
Apples are extreme heterozygotes, so wouldn't any apple grown from seeds become a new variety? The picture of Archie in the article perfectly aligns with the image in my head about the kind of person that would get excited about stumbling across a mysterious apple.
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 12:37 PM on December 3, 2020 [12 favorites]
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 12:37 PM on December 3, 2020 [12 favorites]
Oh. Glancing at the headline I was like, oh isn't any wild seed apple unique? Then they actually mention that in the article. The actual story is that this guy likes this particular apple that he found. And It does look like a nice apple. A bit bumpy but that's part of the charm.
posted by ovvl at 12:48 PM on December 3, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by ovvl at 12:48 PM on December 3, 2020 [3 favorites]
Nice! Reminded me of this apple orchard in Northern Illinois.
posted by zerobyproxy at 12:50 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by zerobyproxy at 12:50 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
MiltonRandKalman, agree entirely about the image of Archie. Plus reading about where he works (wild plant and fungi conservation charity Plantlife) makes him look and sound like a poster guy for a ramblin' apple man. I love that people sometimes do this both accidentally and professionally. It's swell!
posted by Bella Donna at 1:05 PM on December 3, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by Bella Donna at 1:05 PM on December 3, 2020 [5 favorites]
they're bright yellow, it shouldn't be hard to spot the tree it came from for cuttings.
posted by Clowder of bats at 1:37 PM on December 3, 2020
posted by Clowder of bats at 1:37 PM on December 3, 2020
Cristiano Ronaldo
This would actually be a decent name if the apple was huge. That's guy's adams apple is like a goiter.
posted by srboisvert at 1:48 PM on December 3, 2020 [1 favorite]
This would actually be a decent name if the apple was huge. That's guy's adams apple is like a goiter.
posted by srboisvert at 1:48 PM on December 3, 2020 [1 favorite]
New Apple? With the M1 processor?
posted by bz at 1:54 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by bz at 1:54 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
Apples are extreme heterozygotes, so wouldn't any apple grown from seeds become a new variety?
Yes, but most crabapples don't make very good eating (too hard, too tart, too bland, too small to be worth the trouble, etc). They can be added to cider in combination with some sweeter varieties or made into jelly, but they aren't great eaten out of hand or baked.
Orchards trying to develop a new apple variety will typically start with several thousand crosses. Stumbling across one that can be eaten out of hand is pretty unusual, even if it might not be the next Cosmic Crisp or whatever.
posted by jedicus at 1:58 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
Yes, but most crabapples don't make very good eating (too hard, too tart, too bland, too small to be worth the trouble, etc). They can be added to cider in combination with some sweeter varieties or made into jelly, but they aren't great eaten out of hand or baked.
Orchards trying to develop a new apple variety will typically start with several thousand crosses. Stumbling across one that can be eaten out of hand is pretty unusual, even if it might not be the next Cosmic Crisp or whatever.
posted by jedicus at 1:58 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
If you're into unique apples, you should check out @pomme_queen on Instagram. Gorgeous apple portraits galore!
posted by oulipian at 2:07 PM on December 3, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by oulipian at 2:07 PM on December 3, 2020 [1 favorite]
What abt calling it a "Crispiano"?
posted by awfurby at 3:03 PM on December 3, 2020 [7 favorites]
posted by awfurby at 3:03 PM on December 3, 2020 [7 favorites]
New Apple? With the M1 processor?
sorry you cant tell whats inside without root privileges
posted by lalochezia at 3:18 PM on December 3, 2020 [7 favorites]
Oh, great, another new apple product that's going to be worthless in a year or so.
posted by SansPoint at 4:48 PM on December 3, 2020
posted by SansPoint at 4:48 PM on December 3, 2020
I’m always interested in new apple and pear varieties. It’s insane how much time and effort goes into bringing a new variety to market. I wish this new (or newly rediscovered) variety success!
In these parts (San Francisco area) the Berkeley Bowl market has a head-spinning variety of apples and pears and it sometimes makes me think I picked the wrong side of the bay since it’s just too far away. When I lived in New Jersey there was a fruit stand (which does not do it justice because it was huge) that had so many local varieties not sold on the national market. I wish I could have tried them all but I didn’t live there long enough.
I often think about the debt we owe to the people who’ve given us our heritage of domestic plants, not least the Native Americans who were botanical geniuses. The history of foodstuffs is fascinating and somehow both ancient and surprisingly new. White button mushrooms are less than a hundred years old and are now ubiquitous.
posted by sjswitzer at 5:54 PM on December 3, 2020 [4 favorites]
In these parts (San Francisco area) the Berkeley Bowl market has a head-spinning variety of apples and pears and it sometimes makes me think I picked the wrong side of the bay since it’s just too far away. When I lived in New Jersey there was a fruit stand (which does not do it justice because it was huge) that had so many local varieties not sold on the national market. I wish I could have tried them all but I didn’t live there long enough.
I often think about the debt we owe to the people who’ve given us our heritage of domestic plants, not least the Native Americans who were botanical geniuses. The history of foodstuffs is fascinating and somehow both ancient and surprisingly new. White button mushrooms are less than a hundred years old and are now ubiquitous.
posted by sjswitzer at 5:54 PM on December 3, 2020 [4 favorites]
I think this is the most British thing I've ever seen
posted by babelfish at 9:16 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by babelfish at 9:16 PM on December 3, 2020 [2 favorites]
Apples are extreme heterozygotes, so wouldn't any apple grown from seeds become a new variety?
Glad you said that, that's what I thought when I read the article*, and I thought I was being stupid and missing something!
* not the 'heterozygotes' bit. I've learned a new word today!
posted by penguin pie at 5:47 AM on December 4, 2020
Glad you said that, that's what I thought when I read the article*, and I thought I was being stupid and missing something!
* not the 'heterozygotes' bit. I've learned a new word today!
posted by penguin pie at 5:47 AM on December 4, 2020
AWWWWWWWWWW THIS IS SO WONDERFUL
The whole article made me so happy. Thank you for sharing it, Bella Donna!
posted by brainwane at 7:04 AM on December 4, 2020
The whole article made me so happy. Thank you for sharing it, Bella Donna!
posted by brainwane at 7:04 AM on December 4, 2020
It's cute that the Guardian reporter and their editors ran this as a news story, but I think they would have done well to better underline that since apple trees don't breed true, every seedling is a new variety. Ninety-nine percent of seedlings (we called them 'volunteers' where I grew up) taste terrible, but that last one out of a hundred can be magical.
On the ranch were I grew up, we would feed our groundfall apples to the cows if they couldn't be juiced or eaten. One volunteer made the passage through a steer, and out the other end into the manure pile at one end of the corral. Somehow it poked up just on the outside of the boards and started fruiting before it got knocked down or uprooted by cows or humans.
It's a new variety and it's the most spectacular apple on the ranch. The tree is probably 25 feet high now, and in late August it turns out these beautiful mottled red apples with just the right mix of tart and sweet. I've thought for years we ought to name it and enter it at the county fair. In fact was planning on doing just that this summer but of course the pandemic nixed the county fair just like it nixed every other nice thing.
posted by jackbrown at 12:25 PM on December 4, 2020 [5 favorites]
On the ranch were I grew up, we would feed our groundfall apples to the cows if they couldn't be juiced or eaten. One volunteer made the passage through a steer, and out the other end into the manure pile at one end of the corral. Somehow it poked up just on the outside of the boards and started fruiting before it got knocked down or uprooted by cows or humans.
It's a new variety and it's the most spectacular apple on the ranch. The tree is probably 25 feet high now, and in late August it turns out these beautiful mottled red apples with just the right mix of tart and sweet. I've thought for years we ought to name it and enter it at the county fair. In fact was planning on doing just that this summer but of course the pandemic nixed the county fair just like it nixed every other nice thing.
posted by jackbrown at 12:25 PM on December 4, 2020 [5 favorites]
If you take it to the fair next year you should root some cuttings and take them along to give away, spread good apple-ness!
posted by tavella at 2:41 PM on December 4, 2020
posted by tavella at 2:41 PM on December 4, 2020
Having read The Botany of Desire, I thought I knew a thing or two about fruit trees. But when I moved to my current home there was a dying lemon tree that finally died completely. But then a new tree grew up 4 feet away, presumably from the rootstock. Now, rootstock varieties are selected for hardiness rather than flavor, size and productivity, but... it’s starting to fruit, not very productively yet, but the lemons are actually pretty good. Maybe I just got lucky, but I am seriously considering grafting other citrus varieties onto it. It seems to be determined to survive and TBH, I could use some limes and mandarins.
posted by sjswitzer at 6:33 PM on December 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by sjswitzer at 6:33 PM on December 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
Stumbling across one that can be eaten out of hand is pretty unusualOh good point.
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 3:34 PM on December 5, 2020
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posted by Bella Donna at 12:06 PM on December 3, 2020 [3 favorites]