Thursday, December 10, 2009

The great apple hunt!

I'm still in a quandary about which kind of apple tree to buy. I've been buying different kinds of apples and sampling them. See, it's not all that bad. ;^) Tonight I've been noshing on Winesap. I've decided that it'd make the *perfect* hard cider apple. So, yeah, won't work this time around. Oh well! Another concern for me is that it has a diploid chromosome number of 34; however because of very defective pollen, it acts like a triploid of 51 chromosomes and therefore shouldn't be relied on as a pollinizer. Which it needs to be! So out the window with that one.

Out of hand eating apples I snacked on yesterday: Honey Crisp and Ambrosia. I sooo love the Honey Crisp Apple, Ambrosia is a very close second. Both bright, crisp and sweet. Neither has a long storage life and aren't so good in baked goods so while they're quite delicious fresh I really need a better all around apple since I've got room for just one tree.

I'm leaning toward Elstar today. But tomorrow? Who knows? I still have till spring to decide.

4 comments:

Randy Emmitt said...

Jenn,

Granny Smith is a good choice, not the best looking apple but great to cook with.

Just Jenn said...

You're right Randy, Granny Smith is the première baking apple. However I really want a good all around apple. I'd like one that's also good in baked goods as well as out of hand eating, long storage life and maybe even good for making hard cider (if I'm feeling adventurous someday I might give that a whirl), juice and apple sauce. The Granny Smith comes up a wee bit short in a few of those areas. Of course no apple can be all things but I'm tryin' to find it anyway. ;^)

KiraAJ said...

this fall we went apple picking this was b4 halloween and i picked granny smiths honey crisp and jonathan and golden delisious all of which fared pretty well stored in my cool garage currently i still have granny smith that look as good as the day i picked em sittin out there and a couple golden delish but im extremely impressed at how well the jonathans have lasted (The honey crisp didnt have a chance we gobbled those babies up quick!) :) i 2 wanted to plant an apple tree next spring but those plans have now changed boo... :)

Jeff Vandiver said...

Jenn - I have 2 different varieties (as my local extension agent suggested) - red and golden delicious. I'm not sure what i'll be able to do with them later, but they should be good eatin'!