Orin 94202 - organic

I stopped into my local organic market today and of course, checked out their apple selection, all the standard apples were there (gala, fuji, golden delicious, red delicious) but there were two other varieties, the Orin and the Aurora Golden Gala, that I have not seen before, and I've never tried them.

I ate an Orin today, it was nice. Upon biting into it, I noticed that the skin was really tough, but it had this interesting flavour, sweet and kind of like a golden delicious crossed with a pear.

It wasn't particularly tart, but it was crisp and juicy. Plus they are such a beautiful colour.

Spartan - 4177

Ah the Spartan, normally when I see this apple in grocery stores it's waxed and polished. This time, I was lucky. It's dark red colour stood it's own, no wax, no polish on these Spartans from Ontario. There is certain entertaining drama about this apple, and I'm not talking about flavour.

The Spartan was cultivated as a part of the canadian agriculture breeding program in British Columbia. Originally thought to be a breed of MacIntosh crossed with Newtown Pippen, forensic evidence shows that Newtown was not the father (i.e. the pollen didn't come from the Newtown, but some other mystery apple.)

For more information or to watch a video about the Spartan, visit the Government of Canada Science site.

Grāpple® - It looks like an Apple... it tastes like a grape.

I went grocery shopping today and as I often do I look for new apple varieties. This store carried something that I just had to try: the Grāpple®. The one I bought was an Extra Fancy Fuji Apple, flavoured with Concord Grape.



These are interesting, as soon as I opened the package I could smell that wonderful grape scent. I found the smell to be more significantly grapey then the actual flavour. They said that the Royal Gala and Fuji apples were used because they take on the flavour better then other apples, but I found the apple itself was powerfully flavourful, rather then the added grape. But it was definitely different, and I enjoyed it.

Though a few other people tried it and said they could really taste the grape. I think Fuji apples really compliment the added grape.

The Food Network's "Unwrapped" had a show entitled "Grapeful" showing how the Grāpple® is made, the companies website has a short clip from the show where you can watch the process in action.

Visit the company website for more information.

Ambrosia - 3438

This exact apple was DELICIOUS. It was honey sweet, crisp, and juicy. Breathing it in is heavenly as it's very aromatic and just an all around pleasant apple.

Ambrosia apples are a rather new variety of apple. A chance discovery in late 1990 at the Mennell Family Orchard in British Columbia’s Similkameen Valley in an area previously occupied by Red and Golden Delicious apples.

Since it is significantly sweeter then most apples, if you use Ambrosia apples in cooking, you can use less sugar then with a standard apple, and even less if replacing Granny Smith apples.

For more information Visit the Ministry of Agriculture in British Columbia or you can read BCtree Variety Fair: All About Ambrosia Apples (it is a PDF file.)

An Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away.

Apples. I love apples. Oftentimes I eat more then one per day. One of my goals for this year is to eat 100 different varieties. Which seems like a large number, but considering there are over 7500 cultivars of apples, it's not as unreasonable as it sounds.

I hope to keep track of every variety of apple I eat, to document each with a photo, and maybe an attempted description of it's flavour, and any other information about it.