North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Alan Haigh" <alandhaigh@gmail.com>]

I was actually excited when I checked my mail and saw 4 new NAFEX entries but dismayed to find they were almost entirely devoted to a tuber and not fruit- oh well.  Most of us on the list have vegetable gardens, myself included, so I can see how this would be of interest here but this being harvest time for many apple varieties I thought I'd get back to topic one- tree fruit.

 

Much of my childhood was spent in southern California where my favorite apple became something the grocery markets called Green Pippin.  It was marketed by one chain as "the ugly apple that tastes good".  By ugly, I guess they meant it looked nothing like Red Delicious which should be marketed as "the beautiful apple that tastes bad".

 

In recent years I have learned that the apple of my youth was actually Abermarle Pippin which is actually Newton Pippin, at least according to Beach in "The Apples of New York".  A while ago I heard about this apple being grown in the Northeast and looking into Beach's book found it was an important commercial variety in warmer parts of NY up until the early 20th century.  I also learned at the NAFEX meeting in Santa Cruz Ca. that it is still grown in the Santa Cruz area which may have been the orgin of the apples of my childhood.

 

At the NAFEX meeting in Charlottsville VA. I tasted this apple for the first time in my adult life when Tom Burford offered me a slice at Jefferson's Monticello estate.  It was an apple that Jefferson had grown.  I savored its rich flavor but made no connection to my original Green Pippin, perhaps because this apple was yellow.  Beach explains that the yellow and green versions are so much alike that one is almost certainly a sport of the other.

 

Shortly after putting the Newton Pippin story together I decided to try to grow it and harvested the first apples this year from my tree.  It is very good right off the tree and reputedly a wonderful storage apple so I'm guessing it might be a winner here- a green tart apple that far surpasses Granny Smith in flavor in my opinion. 

 

I'm wondering how reliably it crops and if it will turn yellow in storage.  If it stays green and tart and crops reliably I really have to wonder why so many commercial growers around here bother with the chalky Granny Smith which tastes like an unripe apple to me even when grown in Washington State.

 

I look forward to any comments by other members on their experience with this variety.