Hurrah - English apples are back!

It's good to see them back in the shops if not in my small garden*. Both my local Asda and Lidl are actually quite adventurous about stocking English apples - so far I've enjoyed bags of Worcester Pearmains and a red stripey apple called Robijn, which was new to me (a recent mutation of Jonagold Delcosta, when I looked it up. Crisp and a good sweet but mellow flavour.)

We don't have a convenient farmers' market but I will also be checking out our local independent honey shop, as that offers a wide variety of English apples in season.

Meanwhile I have been able to pick enough lovely dark red crab apples from a neighbourhood tree to make 24 jars of crab apple jelly - some traditional, some with chilli for a zip of heat. And a friend's promised to give me a bag of Bramleys from the tree in her garden next week.

I'd be interested in hearing what apples everybody grows - which are your favourites? Are any of them ready yet? How good's your crop going to be?

My own all-time favourite is the Egremont Russet - too early for those yet but I will be looking out for them - indeed a friend who shares my passion for them and I usually text each other when we see the first ones! But alas I think a lot of other commercially-grown varieties have become pretty disappointing - Cox's Orange Pippins for instance, bigger than they used to be but nothing like as firm and flavoursome, surely?

*I do have a crab apple tree, a variety called Jelly King which is meant to be great for, you guessed it, making jelly. But I only planted it last autumn, so no fruit yet.

 

A great idea for a thread, Clare. I have a very old apple tree in the garden which produces over 1000 small, hard, bitter apples each year. No idea what variety it is, and no idea what to do with the fruits, beyond the few hundred we leave on the grass for our visiting fieldfare in the winter.

 

@Irmemac said "A great idea for a thread, Clare"
Agree

Same here have inherited Apple trees, that are delicious and i use and gift as many as i can -but have to confess since one of the lovely families ...8 kiddies and counting in the
neighbouring village emigrated.. i have no one to legally apple nob...it was fab seeing them scramble up the trees i used to tell them to take them all as they loved them-now quite a few get left to the birds when they fall, no bad thing plus my own chickie's and anyone who wants to scramble up the Trunks

 

The workshop where I work is situated amongst apple and pear orchards.
Things are pretty hectic there at this time of the year.

I've been looking at what varieties they are picking at the moment, Discovery was about three weeks ago, followed by Windsor, and now they seem to be picking Cox, the Cox go into cold store to be taken out around March next year.
All the Conference pears were picked a couple of weeks ago, bigger and earlier than last year, the Comice seem to be left until later.

Got a few apple trees on the allotment a Fiesta which will be ready next month, a Laxton, and a couple of cookers, Bramley and Arthur Turner.
Must admit I rarely pick many and most go to the birds these days.

 

I've picked already picked enough Bath Beauty [1] and Worcester Pearmain [2] to press about 15 gallons of juice, had a few rucksacks of crab apples to blend with others for cider making, and picked nearly 100lbs of Sunsets [3] yesterday, with another 100lbs further up the tree and an unknown variety of eater that only crops every few years but is laden with apples ready for picking, might start later today.

That leaves my Russets, Blenheims, Cooking Apples [4] and Cider Apples, plus about 4 or 5 eaters bought from Lidl/Aldi that are now producing reasonable crops. Then there's some local woodland with several trees we pick from and there's a massive crop this year that'll be ready in about 3 weeks, and various other trees around the village where we get given the excess and share the pressed juice and or cider/wine produced.

[1] Can't stand the apple, but they produce beautiful drinking juice.
[2] Good eaters, but they go soft, so excess produced for a very tastey juice.
[3]Can't stand the apple, nor the juice, but it adds a wonderful to white wines.
[4] Mrs Scrungee makes fantastic apple pies, the pressed juice is used blended with other apples for wine, cider, and mixling with overly sweet juice from esters for drinking juice.

 

My all time favourite is Lord Lambourne; it's Cox like but doesn't suffer the disease problems of Cox but it doesn't keep as well or as long either. It is delicious and juicy. I had one in my garden until I moved and have since planted another one in my new garden....no fruit yet though. Hopefully next year.

 

I have had a Braeburn Apple tree now for several years and never really got much of a crop so last year gave it a good prune and this year loads of apples too much for us so have been giving them away.A Braeburn is our favourite apple

 

Went round Morrisons this morning, still selling Pink Lady from New Zealand, lets face it, they are over 6 months old now.
But I think it is a supermarket "thing" as most apples grown here and heading for the supermarkets are pretty much inedible when picked.
Basically very hard and unripe, then for the most part they get put in a cold store for 3 or more months so what is the point?
Beats me, ripen them on the tree and sell them when good to eat, but they have to control it all, which results in hardly ever selling fresh fruit.

They also had pears from Spain and somewhere else, and a few local ones.

 

I have had a good crop on my Jonagold this year, I always cook them as not keen on eating any apple, picked about a third so far, my Coxs` is and always has been useless, I only leave it in case it`s a pollinator.

 

Folks, just curious of your experience with dwarf varieties? My Granda and I had talked about planting and orchard in a small field we have fenced off, however I am wondering then on spacing for these types of trees and whether itd be better going with dward varities for more options or letting the big tree's work away with less work?

 

No personal experience but I have found this a useful site for identifying apple varieties, and it has advice specifically on spacing: Fruit tree spacing and planting distances The oldfashioned orchard with big trees looks lovely but it will be easier picking apples from smaller trees, plus you can fit more of them in as you say. Eventual size is largely determined by rootstock. Some apple varieties should be available on more than one of those, so hopefully you will be able to plant your favourites whichever way you go.

More generally, I've really enjoyed reading about everyone's apples and am happy to report that I am currently enjoying a first batch of russet apples - from Asda. Not the same as homegrown but they are actually pretty good on their English apples.