Favorite tart-sweet apple cultivar?
4 months ago
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- 4 months agolast modified: 4 months ago
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Sweet Apple Cider
Comments (27)Sorry, correction, 200 liters, not 500 liters. 200 liters is just enough for an entire season, that's about it. Here's a picture of the container: You can't see from the image, but there's a floating lid inside the container, it's basically like a flat round piece of steel with the edges lifted up. The paraffin oil floats on top of the juice in between the lid and the container. You can't use vegetable oil since it goes rancid. You heat it with a pasteurizing rod: The beauty of this thing is that you can pasteurize a bunch of juice, and then you can literally just get it by the glass and not worry about it. It's a year-round supply of apple juice. I use mostly gravs for my juice, no other apple even comes close to Grav. based juice. (No, it's not cider, cider has alcohol, non-alcoholic cider is not cider, it's juice. We can all thank the puritans and their campaign to stamp out cidermaking in the US for this nonsense in nomenclature .) You can order this stuff from Germany, that's how I got mine. The main annoyance is paying the wire transfer fee of $20 because US banks are still in the Stone age and don't really deal well with wire transfers which is the rest of the world's way of paying for stuff. Sorry, I am German myself, seems we have some sort of complaining gene built-in. :) The only drawback of this entire setup is that it's not earthquake proof, a real consideration here on the West Coast....See MoreName your top favorite apples
Comments (42)Axel, I generally agree that nowadays no one goes to the expense of patenting and releasing a variety unless they're quite certain that they can consistantly obtain high quality in a wide range of climates, but that doesn't mean that they don't vary greatly in quality season to season. Goldrush was released as a commercial variety and it might just still make it (even if it's too late for royalties). The season before last my Braeberns were exquisite while this year they were completely worthless- really annoying because I had a great crop. The person here complaining about the quality of Goldrush this year doesn't seem to realize that we barely had a summer in NY last season, and in Z5 there just wasn't enough heat to properly ripen Goldrush. Of course I know I'm not telling you anything you don't already know....See MoreFavorite Heirloom Apple?
Comments (23)Carduus: As an apple grower who went through an "antique apple" phase (heirloom is for seeds), I would suggest that you keep an open mind and also consider some of the better more modern cultivars before making your final selections for planting. That is not to say that you should exclude consideration of antique varieties, but you should be sure to try them first, and to understand the special disease and physiological problems they may bring before planting them. Nursery descriptions from people who sell these cultivars are not reliable sources of information. The principal objective is to plant apples that are appropiate for the use you have planned for them, that you really enjoy eating, and that are best adapted to your location and climate whether they are antique or modern. Quite a few antique apple aficionados consider the russeted apples to be the peak of perfection, but more people think they are off-putting, which is why they have disappeared from the commercial market. I like them myself, when the underlying apple is good, but they are often difficult to grow. The Holiday apple described above sounds very good, found, as it was, in Ohio where you live, but Southmeadow Fruit Gardens is not, repeat not, the place to buy them or anything else. The list of people who have sent Southmeadow their money and received nothing is very long. I purchased some trees from Southmeadow years ago, in the days when they were actually filling orders and shipping out trees, but ownership has changed and now they just cash your check. Good luck if you order from them. I still have quite a number of antiques out there in the orchard, including Ashmead's Kernel, Kingston Black, Albemarle Pippin, Virginia (Hewes) Crab, Cox's Orange Pippin, Kandil Sinap, Yellow Transparent, Calville Blanc d'Hiver, and Pomme Gris, as well as some moderately antique types like Stayman Winesap. Some of these I planted with the specific intention of blending them into the cider I make in fall. But for fresh eating, I like Pomme Gris, a small, russeted French apple, best of all. Some antiques, like Esopus Spitzenberg, turned out to be so horribly susceptible to fireblight that I took them out. Others, like Calville Blanc, have been very shy bearers. Albemarle (Newtown) Pippin is a very hard, decent tasting apple, and keeps well in refrigeration longer than nearly any other, but Fuji also keeps a long time, and is a better fresh eating apple. Yellow Transparent, a very early summer apple, has always been our number one apple for applesauce, and makes wonderful pies, but it would not appeal to most people for fresh eating because of its tart character. All I am saying is go slow before you get totally wrapped around the antique apple axle. To get an idea of some of the problems I have experienced growing just one antique variety -- Cox's Orange Pippin, see the adjoining thread. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA...See Morecrab apple cultivars
Comments (1)Centennial, Kerr, are top favorites here - both seedlings of Dolgo - which is pretty good in its own right. Chestnut, Trailman get good reviews. Jim Bastian has an 'Orange Crab' that's very similar to Centennial, but may be even better(sweet, with dense yellow flesh). Whitney is widely available - but there seem to be two 'Whitney' selections in the nursery trade, one better than the other. Wickson also gets good reviews, but has not fruited for me here. Callaway, an ornamental type with heavy production of 1-1.5" fruits, has long been a favorite for my kids; I think Evereste is similar in size and production, with good quality fruits. You can probably find some, if not all of these, at most good mail-order nurseries, like Cummins, Raintree, etc. Here is a link that might be useful: Culinary Crabapples...See MoreRelated Professionals
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