bobp@petfe.UUCP (Bob Philhower) (09/24/85)
<<>> IT'S APPLE TIME, BOYS AND GIRLS!! With the apple season upon us, I thought I'd ask a few questions to the experts. 1. (And this is the imnportant one) What type of apple makes the best apple pie? 2. There is an orchard nearby that sells about 10 different types of apples (e.g. Macintosh, red delicious, stayman, etc.) Can anyone enlighten me as to the characteristics of different apples? Which are tart? Which are sweet? Which are good for eating? Which makes the best apple pie (see #1 above)? 3. Does anyone have any apple-filled recipes to share? Streudel? Pie (see #1 above)? Thanks. Dan Masi ...!vax135!petsd!petfe!bobp
gml@ssc-vax.UUCP (Gregory M Lobdell) (09/25/85)
> IT'S APPLE TIME, BOYS AND GIRLS!!
Hooray!!! Medical science may have proved that an apple a day may
not keep the doctor away, but it's still my favorite time of the
year.
My family has a small orchard (5 trees) in our back yard. With a
number of varieties. I think the best varieties for pies were the
red delicious though I never actually baked them. What my mother
used most for pies were the windfalls which meant that each pie
would be a mix and she would sweeten each batch to taste. (Yes,
with sugar, the white stuff.) Make sure your recipie for apple pie
includes the magic ingredient, cinnamon. This is what seperates the
good from the mediocre.
My favorite apple product is apple cider. The clear stuff that you
buy in the supermarket is a fraud. Real cider is about as clear as
milk and is best made on a cold November day. We once squeezed 120
gallons in a day. Hard work but well worth it. Our apples consisted
of a mix of sweet, soft, natural apples and crisp, tart gravensteins
(gra-ven-steen[s]) (sp?), and both red and golden delicious. The best
cider made was when we mixed the varieties about evenly. The best
way to keep fresh squeezed cider is to freeze it, canning is a poor
second. Yield varied, depending on the water content of the apples
from 10 to 20 pounds of apples to a gallon of cider.
The best eating apple is one that is crisp and slightly tart. In my
book this is the gravenstein. It has the taste of a Granny Smith
with the crisp crunch of a good Red or Golden Delicious. I don't
think that I have ever seen it in stores. It is green in color with
some red vertical streaks when ripe. The second best eating apple
is probably the Golden Delicious, when they are crisp. Though
storage technology has gotten better over the years, some of the
apples that you get in June can be well past their prime. This time
of the year, the best bet is the Red Delicious, which stores better.
The Macintosh is also a very good apple, available mostly in the
Northeast. Good and crisp when fresh but my experience is that they
tend to go soft rather quickly.
Well, happy eating,
Gregg Lobdellmel@inmet.UUCP (09/26/85)
Which kind of apple to use for pies? The best kind of apples for making pie are Jonathon apples. These apples are great for eating raw and baking. They are an old fashioned apple--they're small so you have to peel a lot to fill up your pie dish. When I lived in Michigan these apples were easy to come by, unfortunately no one in the East seems to grow them, and here Courtland apples are the recommended pie apple. However, I've found that Courtland mush up when baked, and have had better luck with Granny Smith. Recipe for apple pie: Make a double crust, cut together: 2 c flour, 2/3 c shortening, 2 t salt; subsequently bind together with scant half cup cold water, taking care to not overwork the dough. I make almost all my crusts in the food processor after watching Julia Child do it several times on the tube. A well floured pastry cloth works great for rolling out pie crusts. Peel, core and slice apples into dish, piling apples high since they sink when cooked. While you're piling them in, layer altogether 1 cup sugar, sprinkling about 1 t cinnamon and maybe some nutmeg. Dot the top with a little butter before putting on the top crust. Cut vent holes in the top crust and bake in hot oven (450?) for 10 minutes, 50 minutes at 375F.
george@sysvis (09/26/85)
> With the apple season upon us, [...] a few questions to the experts. > 1. (And this is the important one) What type of apple makes the > best apple pie? Rome and Winesaps are best in my pies. Opinions vary, choose your flavor. > 2. There is an orchard nearby that sells about 10 different types of > apples (e.g. Macintosh, red delicious, stayman, etc.) Can anyone > enlighten me as to the characteristics of different apples? Which > are tart? Which are sweet? Which are good for eating? Which > makes the best apple pie (see #1 above)? Red-Delicious (aren't they) apples are sweet eating, right off the tree. The rest are not commonly used by me, so I don't know. Rome apples make deli- cious (no pun) apple dumplings. Recipes abound in good cookbooks everywhere. :-) Experts do not exist, only learners. (And others of `Lowe' character)
figmo@tymix.UUCP (Lynn Gold) (09/27/85)
When I was growing up in south Jersey, we used to go picking apples and other goodies at one of the local farms -- a place called Larchmont Farms, if you've ever heard of it (I don't know if it still exists; last I heard, they were bought out and the land was going to be turned into a housing complex...sigh). Anyhow, here goes some of my knowledge: Good cooking apples are pungently flavored, somewhat tangy. These include the Stamen Winesap, Granny Smith, and Golden Delicious. The Red Delicious are better for eating than cooking, although they do work acceptably. Another type of apple you'll see alot in the fall is Rome Beauty. These are crummy for eating -- they're bland and mealy -- but they keep well throughout the winter (store in a cool place) and are fine for cooking. Hope this helps. --Lynn Gold ...tymix!figmo
jeff@rtech.UUCP (Jeff Lichtman) (09/29/85)
> > 1. (And this is the imnportant one) What type of apple makes the > best apple pie? I like Rhode Island Greening. They are tart and hard, with a lot of flavor. > > 2. There is an orchard nearby that sells about 10 different types of > apples (e.g. Macintosh, red delicious, stayman, etc.) Can anyone > enlighten me as to the characteristics of different apples? Which > are tart? Which are sweet? Which are good for eating? Which > makes the best apple pie (see #1 above)? > Dan Masi Most orchards will let you taste the apples before you buy them, but here are my recommendations anyway. I consider Red Delicious to be a travesty. They are like water-soaked styrofoam. Golden Delicious are very good if tree-ripened. They have less tendency to turn brown than most other apples do, so they're good for salads. My favorite apple for plain eating is the Gravenstein. This variety is very nice-looking, with red and yellow vertical stripes. They have an distinctive and intense acid/sweet flavor. You might have trouble finding them outside of the San Francisco Bay Area; I've heard that 95% of all Gravensteins are grown locally. Another one I like is the Jonathon. These are pretty tart when ripe, and are quite juicy. -- Jeff Lichtman at rtech (Relational Technology, Inc.) "Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent..." {amdahl, sun}!rtech!jeff {ucbvax, decvax}!mtxinu!rtech!jeff
wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly) (09/29/85)
In article <238@ssc-vax.UUCP> gml@ssc-vax.UUCP (Gregory M Lobdell) writes: >The best eating apple is one that is crisp and slightly tart. In my >book this is the gravenstein. It has the taste of a Granny Smith >with the crisp crunch of a good Red or Golden Delicious. ... A few months ago, I purchased and consumed my first Granny Smith apple. It was like an apple I'd always dreamed existed: crisp and slightly tart, and with a heady apple flavor that was the very essence of appleness. My own experience with the Granny Smith is that it's a far more crispy and crunchy apple than ANY red or golden delicious apple I've ever eaten. It's by far my favorite apple for eating out of hand, and seems to work well as a cooking apple too. Now if only I can find a peck of Gravensteins somewhere ... -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly
randy@ssc-vax.UUCP (Randy Chun) (10/01/85)
There seems to be a strong preference on this group to crispy apples, with Granny Smith and Red Delicious leading the way. If you are lucky enough to live in an area that produced a lot of its own apples before Washington State and New York State monopolized the industry, try some of the native apples. There is no such thing as a universal apple that is good for all purposes. For just eating, my favorite is the Winter Banana. The Orange Pippin and Newtown Pippin are also quite good. Ken Finney @ Boeing Aerospace
pjc2@nvuxb.UUCP (P J Carstensen) (10/02/85)
I've recently discovered Ida Reds and McCuens (sp?) Returning to the original topic, a friend of my mother and grandmother's says "I always sneak a little vanilla into my apple pie"...so I've been adding that with the cinnamon and really enjoy it... Pat
gml@ssc-vax.UUCP (Gregory M Lobdell) (10/02/85)
> A few months ago, I purchased and consumed my first Granny Smith > apple. It was like an apple I'd always dreamed existed: crisp and > slightly tart, and with a heady apple flavor that was the very essence > of appleness. ... > > Now if only I can find a peck of Gravensteins somewhere ... > > -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly The Granny Smith is this way because it is a special hybrid that was made to ship well, thus it gets to you in wonderful condition. Good Goldens are better (in my opinion) as are Gravensteins since they aren't so hard and are just as crisp, however, they may not make it to your area because they are delicate apples and bruise easily. Someone asked how to make apple cider. To make non-alcoholic apple cider you simply squish apples and catch the liquid that runs off. Usually this squishing process is done on a piece of equipment called a press, which is able to apply a large amount of pressure to the apples while still allowing the liquid to run off. Many presses also include machinery which chops, shreds or otherwise mutilates the apples so that the maximum amount of liquid is removed. Alcoholic cider is just the above let sit for a while until it ferments. The difference between the apple juice and apple cider that you see on the shelf in Safeway (or your other local grocer) is that apple juice is this clear liquid that seems to be the result of straining all the yummy solids out if apple cider. As has been said before, cider should be about as clear as milk. Apple juice is a clear and insipid drink, concocted for wimps. Gregg Lobdell
polard@fortune.UUCP (Henry Polard) (10/04/85)
> IT'S APPLE TIME, BOYS AND GIRLS!! > >Hooray!!! Medical science may have proved that an apple a day may >not keep the doctor away, but it's still my favorite time of the >year. Hear, Hear! All kinds of apples have been mentioned on the Net. Does anyone know of a book on the different varieties of apples, their uses and availability? Two varieties of eating apples I'm particularly fond of are the McCowan, somewhat of a cross between the Macintosh and the red delicious, and the snow apple. I've been able to get them only on the east coast; does anyone know where I can get them in the San Francisco Bay area? I've heard that a good apple for pies is the Greening apple. Happy crunching! -- Henry Polard (You bring the flames - I'll bring the marshmallows.) {ihnp4,cbosgd,amd}!fortune!polard N.B: The words in this posting do not necessarily express the opinions of me, my employer, or any AI project.
trb@masscomp.UUCP (Andy Tannenbaum) (10/04/85)
In article <180@nvuxb.UUCP> pjc2@nvuxb.UUCP (P J Carstensen) writes: > I've recently discovered Ida Reds and McCuens (sp?) That's Macouns, pronounced ma-cow-ans or ma-gow-ans. They're crispy eating apples. The skins are a mixture of red and green and they have measly little specks all over them. They're grown up here in northeastern Mass, at least. I bought a peck this week for $3.25. They're only around from about 89/15 to 10/15. Andy Tannenbaum Masscomp Westford, MA (617) 692-6200 x2274