Annie ate 48 Sour Green Apples

Growth habit is very good, moderate to high vigor and it sets a variable number of apples each spring. The most recent release from U of S, Slightly tarter apple, pleasent flavor complexity.

Growth habit is good, moderate vigor and it sets a reasonable number of apples each spring. This variety is the least hardy apple we grow, you will notice trees missing in the row. A favorite at our orchard, a variety we named ourselves. This variety started producing one to two year before the other varieties and is warmly remembered by friends we have given apples to. Great apples for baking. Growth habit is good, vigor is high and it sets a prolific number of apples each spring.

Lots of labour thinning the apples on this tree but we get a reliable bountiful harvest each year. I wish I had planted more of this variety. Not sure where the name originally came from for this variety, Bernie Nikolai mentioned the name so we continue to use the name. This the largest apple we grow, it is a Westland cross. Flavor is variable from year to year, and it was wonderfull, in was dry in August and it did not seem to ripen properly.

Growth habit is challenging, very leggy, vigor is high and it sets significant numbers of apples each spring. My son really likes this variety so I think I will have to keep it for a while.

One of the non U of S apple varieties we have snuck into the orchard since we like it so much. A very crisp texture, great fresh eating apple but mediocre cooking apple. Finally have a few for evaluation in For those that like an apple that is tart. Has promise as a cider apple because of its high tannin content. Another non U of S variety. We removed this variety from the orchard in , it was not hardy enough for outside the city.

Highly recommend this variety for growing in the city, it does not seem to be bothered by apple maggot as much as the other varieties for some reason. Background Notes At Attracted 2 Apples, we specialize in producing high quality fresh eating apples. Prairie Sensation 18 10 32 Released in Usually ripe about the second week of September. Misty Rose 4 11 48 Released in Autumn Delight 4 10 43 Released in Usually ripe mid to late September.

Festive Treat 18 7 10 The most recent release from U of S, Usually ripe early September and is still just as good late into September.

Jane Grigson recommends reinette or, like Tamasin Day-Lewis, cox's orange pippin ; Marcus Wareing bramley and braeburn or pink ladies, and Angela Boggiano bramleys and cox's. I'm unable to find the first but try all the others, and decide that I like Boggiano's combination best. The cooking apples break down into a sharp, pleasingly fluffy mush, while the spicy flavour of the cox's seems more fitting in a pie than the crunchy, sweetly effervescent pink ladies, or the blander braeburns. The bramleys need cooking before adding to the pie, as Boggiano and Wareing suggest, but, like the latter, I'm going to use the dessert apples raw, for the maximum contrast of texture and flavour.

The two should remain distinct in the finished dish, though I'm not going to add them in two separate layers, as in Wareing's recipe; his pie is so deep that it's possible to eat it without ever mingling the bramley and cox's in one bite. Grigson thinly slices her apples, while White expressly warns against this on the basis that "the juice will boil out before the apples are cooked, and the result will be tough and tasteless". I certainly don't find this to be the case, but I do prefer the texture of larger chunks. Grigson uses puff, while everyone else chooses a variety of crumbly shortcrust, which, though less visually impressive, I prefer — the rich stodginess is a better match for the autumnal apple.

Given this is a dish better served warm or cool than piping hot, the shortcrust keeps better too. White's recipe has a puzzling pastry that is halfway between a shortcrust and a bread dough, so wet it's almost impossible to shape, but, once baked, beautifully crisp thanks to the addition of lard. Again, however, the texture is one best appreciated straight from the oven.

Wareing and Boggiano both go for a rich shortcrust, yellow with egg yolk and sweet with sugar, while Day-Lewis chooses a plainer pastry, which she suggests making with spelt flour for its "nuttiness and texture". I like the almost crumble-like richness of Wareing and Boggiano's pastry, but the contrast between the sweet and sour fruit filling and the more savoury flavour of Day-Lewis's version is ridiculously pleasing; I can't stop picking at it.

An enriched but unsweetened spelt pastry seems the way to go here. Wareing flavours his pastry with lemon zest, which is a nice touch, while Boggiano goes for mature cheddar, citing the Saxon proverb that "apple pie without the cheese is like a kiss without a squeeze". I wholeheartedly agree with her in theory, but it's a bit weird with custard, and apple pie is naught without a drop of Bird's.

If you're more of a cream or creme fraiche person, however, I'd urge you to give it a whirl. Boggiano, Day-Lewis and Wareing all encase their pies in pastry, while Grigson and White only deploy a pastry lid. This seems like cheating to me: That said, give the bottom a fighting chance at crispness by doing as Day-Lewis suggests, and sprinkling the pastry with flour and sugar before adding the fruit. Saveur magazine informs me that, as the filling cooks, "this extra layer will protect the pie dough from absorbing too much moisture".

Grigson adds raisins to her filling, some of which I decide to soak in rum in obedience to Annie Bell's recipe. They look pretty, but I find them too sweet, booze or no booze — unlike White's rose petals, which get entirely lost in the welter of other ingredients. If you'd like a floral note in your pie, a little rosewater would be a better bet.

COLLECTIONS

Her pie is too heavily spiced for my liking, but just a hint perks the whole thing up considerably without detracting from the apples. The same goes for sugar: Day-Lewis uses a mixture of dark and light muscovado, but the treacly bitterness of the latter is overpowering. The light brown sugar, however, adds a more interesting, caramel flavour. As extra insurance against that apple flavour getting lost, I'm taking a tip from White's recipe, and stewing the cores and peel in water to make a kind of apple stock, which gives her pie a marvellously intense flavour.

It may sound like a bit of a faff, but given you have to peel and core them anyway, it's only a matter of sticking the results in a pan of water and leaving them to bubble for 15 minutes, and the results are truly remarkable.

Day-Lewis adds more flour to the fruit itself, possibly as a thickener, but, save for the base layer, I don't think this is necessary: Grigson, White and Day-Lewis add lemon zest, which has a natural affinity with apples, to their fillings, with Day-Lewis using it in combination with orange zest.

As I've included zest in the pastry, I won't be using it here, but a spritz of lemon juice, as Boggiano suggests, is an easy way of brightening the flavour. Grigson and Day-Lewis baste the apples with butter, which gives the whole dish a lovely, silky richness — elevating it from a simple, homely pleasure to something really quite special.

1. Background Notes.
2. Freckle Supreme Cake?
3. Apple Annie's Bake Shop, Wilmington.
4. Gothic Blue Book: The Haunted Edition?
5. Lost Within Myself.
6. The Making of Her.

Which is as it ought to be. Serves 4 bramley apples 2 tbsp butter, plus extra to grease 1 cinnamon stick 4 cloves g light muscovado sugar, depending on taste 3 cox's apples Nutmeg 1 tbsp flour 1 tbsp demerara or granulated sugar 1 egg white, beaten For the pastry g spelt or plain flour, plus extra to dust g cold butter, grated 1 egg plus 1 yolk, beaten 1 lemon. Peel and core the bramleys, reserving both.