Favorite apple

Mine’s a La Crescent. What’s your favorite eating apple?

On Weds Ma and I took a tour down Highway 30 from Chatfield thru Rushford [stopped at the lefsa factory for a roll and coffee and bought a couple loaves of phenominal rye bread], then wound our way up thru the valley along Highway 16 to La Crescent. There, we spent an hour at a couple of the many apple stands that helps to make the town so unique. There’s a lonely little stand on the very south end of the town as one travels along the highway that we like to give our business so that was the first stop. And she had my pet apple, the La Crescent, on hand. After checking everything out I grabbed a couple 5 pound bags and we continued up thru tow with out last stop at the antique shop to browse.

Up Highway 61 we stopped in Winona for a couple hours to check out a few places Ma likes and I checked out the pawn/gun shop for black powder stuff. Ma found a book and I drew a blank so we wrapped up the day with the drive back home and a take home pizza.

The La Crescent apples are like the new First Kiss apples, an early variety. I wasn’t sure we’d find any this trip since its already mid-September and these babes are ready in mid-August. 2 years ago we were too late. Last year I got the last three bags in town. This year they were abundant as a few places had them on hand. They are not a soft apple but will get somewhat softer with age in cold storage. They’re very sweet and the skin has no bitterness if you like the skin. While they’re best as an eating apple they do make a mean sauce and pie. Carole makes an apple bar very similar to a pie since pie crust is used and the apple filling goes right on top but left uncovered that is tastier than heck using these apples. Personally I just like the apples peeled and eaten….a great tv snack. The sauce is great as it goes with any food and is nice all by its lonesome.

What with a million varieties of apples out there, what’s your favorite?

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Honeycrisp without a doubt. Eat one almost every day for lunch!

Gala. Not a close second.

I enjoy all apples really but the honey crisp I find are super sweet for this guy.

Doesn’t everyone eat the skin?

SWEET TANGO and sweet sixteen that first kiss is good also a bit more tart

Chestnut crab gets my vote for fall favorite, especially after a light frost! Makes me think of grouse and goose hunting!

Billy’s favorite are Gala. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him eat a different kind. I prefer the Pink Lady apples and Granny Smith. I know some people find them to be too sour but I love that puckered face once can’t help but make when biting into a crisp Granny Smith.

Snow Sweet then Honey Crisp.

I kinda like this apple????

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Unknown.. wild apple tree along a river I fish. Apples are hard and somewhat sour until a hard killing frost. After a hard frost, the skin has some red “veins” that show up and they are super sweet and juicy

Randy Wieland wrote:

Unknown.. wild apple tree along a river I fish. Apples are hard and somewhat sour until a hard killing frost. After a hard frost, the skin has some red “veins” that show up and they are super sweet and juicy

Ohh I forgot about free apples. Free apples are some of the best too.

I like a sweet apple sliced and dipped in Caramel.

Red delicious from the trees right by Bauers market in La Cresent. Those apples are the best i’ve ever tasted, honey crisps are right in there too but those red delicious from Bauers are hard to beat for a slicing eating fresh with salt apple.

X2 on Gala

Minnesota grown Honeycrisp is my go to apple. If I can find good Chestnut crab apples they are right up there with the Honeycrisp.

Honey Crisp.

rwilliam wrote:

If I can find good Chestnut crab apples they are right up there with the Honeycrisp.

honeycrisp was developed from the humble chestnut crab so it stands to reason!

Any apple from an orchard is superior to store bought apples. Honeycrisp are my favorite but over priced. My grandparents farm was in central Wisconsin, they had wolf river apples, not a popular tree or apple for eating but if you were making an apple pie those apples are king

honeycrisp but ill admit im not much of an apple connoisseur. after reading this thread I did a little research and discovered there are 7500 different varieties of apples! who knew! wish we had more options to choose from at your average cub store. This reminds me I should bring the kids to a local orchard and pick some. Always a good family fall activity

Fireside… they are an old varitey, not many orchards have them. they are a late apple and a good frost improves the flavor. some say they have a more pear like flavor. My parents had a tree when I was growing up. Honeycrisp probably come second.
I think I just read that the red delicous was booted off the number one apple spot By the Gala, this year. I really dont understand how the red delicous maintained that spot for so long. They are My least favorite apple. Gala are good also
I dont beleave I have ever had Toms Favorite

Fireside. Haven’t heard of those in a long time. Love going to the orchard and taste the wares. Off subject story. As a freshman in high school my first job was working at Rims edge Orchard in Germantown Wis. My buddy and I were pickin on a Saturday morning and we hear a bunch of commotion on the North edge of the orchard. There was a mob type hit with a dead guy laying in the ditch across the road with his jelwery on and a wad of hundys in his pocket as we found out later. The detectives working the murder scene had the road closed in all directions but they could do little about us watching behind the tall orchard fence!

I like a nice crisp cortland. But I like a lot of other apples I cannot name. I know all the trees near my house and which ones taste good and when.
I can eat all the apples I want just going for a walk right now.
I did notice a new one at the store called Rave and its REALLY good, but huge.
If you like Honey Crisp, try a Rave.

Anything that’s crisp or crunchy – doesn’t matter to me if it’s sweet or tart as long as it’s not soft/mealy like Braeburns, Red Delicious or Jonathons, I’ll eat it.

Cripps Pink/Pink Lady are always a go-to at the grocery store but we’re probably headed to Apple Jack near Rockford this weekend with the kids to pick out a bunch, can’t wait to make some apple crisp.

bigpike wrote:

Fireside. Haven’t heard of those in a long time. Love going to the orchard and taste the wares. Off subject story. As a freshman in high school my first job was working at Rims edge Orchard in Germantown Wis. My buddy and I were pickin on a Saturday morning and we hear a bunch of commotion on the North edge of the orchard. There was a mob type hit with a dead guy laying in the ditch across the road with his jelwery on and a wad of hundys in his pocket as we found out later. The detectives working the murder scene had the road closed in all directions but they could do little about us watching behind the tall orchard fence!

took me about 15 minutes of investigating but that seems to have been Sam (The Gobber) Guzzino. He was murdered on Oct 3rd 1981, a Saturday. Based off your birthday on your profile you would have been 16 years old

suzuki wrote:

I did notice a new one at the store called Rave and its REALLY good, but huge.
If you like Honey Crisp, try a Rave.

The Rave is a knockoff of First Kiss and grown out of state. The U of M learned from the Honeycrisp when the patent expired and then was grown elsewhere with lesser quality. Hence the Honeycrisp lost some of it’s reputation. Same with the SweeTango…all developed by the U of M horticulture.

From the Strib article last Sunday…

“As the U prepared to release its newest apple, called the First Kiss and presented for the first time at the Minnesota State Fair last month, it obtained a trademark that will reserve the name for Minnesota-grown apples. The same variety grown elsewhere will go by the name Rave, and out-of-state growers will be closely monitored.”
When the SweeTango was released, the university used a managed licensing system that allows Bedford to call growers and demand they do better. The next step in the U’s fruit marketing evolution is the dual naming rights for the First Kiss.

crappie55369 wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>bigpike wrote:</div>
Fireside. Haven’t heard of those in a long time. Love going to the orchard and taste the wares. Off subject story. As a freshman in high school my first job was working at Rims edge Orchard in Germantown Wis. My buddy and I were pickin on a Saturday morning and we hear a bunch of commotion on the North edge of the orchard. There was a mob type hit with a dead guy laying in the ditch across the road with his jelwery on and a wad of hundys in his pocket as we found out later. The detectives working the murder scene had the road closed in all directions but they could do little about us watching behind the tall orchard fence!

took me about 15 minutes of investigating but that seems to have been Sam (The Gobber) Guzzino. He was murdered on Oct 3rd 1981, a Saturday. Based off your birthday on your profile you would have been 16 years old

I guess I was a soph. Sounds about right…