Resilience for the Long Haul
Our old Fameuse tree has lowered a branch for stability like an elder with a cane. It has been bearing fruit for 120 years despite the fact that the inside of the trunk is full of moss.
As we enter our seventh month of living in a pandemic, I can’t help thinking about the concept of resilience. The dictionary gives two meanings - the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties, and the ability to spring back into shape. I’m surprised that resilience is associated with such short timelines as I have always considered resilience to be demonstrated over a longer time frame. What comes to my mind as the poster child for resilience is the old apple tree that has toppled or bent to the ground in apparent defeat and then risen again from the soil to bear apples once more. These amazing trees are all over Maine. Some have been tipped by the wind, roots and all, and now sprawl prostrate across the earth. Somehow they have enough gumption to shoot young branches up toward the sky from their decomposing trunks to assume the role as the new leaders of the tree. Other times the cavity in the old tree becomes so large that the trunk turns inside out in the most impossible way, yet the tree lives on in defiance of everything we learned in high school biology about how xylem and phloem transport nutrients and water throughout a tree. My favorite ancients are those that seem to gambol across the ground like a serpent in the waves, diving down to the earth, rooting,and rising up into the air with new growth over and over again. Aren’t these trees resilient? There is nothing quick about their recovery; there is no spring in their trajectory. But they have overcome weather, age, pests, floods and droughts and adapted to their new environment or condition with a new shape and new lust for life. They are in it for the long haul.
This 220 year old Black Oxford has done a back bend. It still produces a crop.
Picks of the week:
(Click each variety for more info)
King of Tompkins County
Melrose
Opalescent
Prima
Smokehouse
Spartan
Twenty Ounce
Week #3 apples lined up ready for inspection: (from left) Melrose, King of Tompkins County, Opalescent, Prima, Smokehouse, Spartan, and Twenty Ounce.
This week we take you back to those thrilling days of yesteryear when apple breeding was just beginning at the Agricultural Research Stations across the United States and Canada. Spartan (1926), Melrose (1927) and Prima (1957) all are early products of these programs, and although that may make you think of them as “new”, Spartan and Melrose have been around for nearly 100 years. None of them ever became popular in Maine so we are guessing that you may not have tried them before (except if you have been a longtime member of this CSA or you are from Ohio since Melrose is the official State Apple). As is the case with all apples from breeding programs, these were selected for fresh eating, not cooking. So we were surprised and delighted that Spartan won the taste off for the best apple in the recipe of the week (see below). Maybe these apples would have more of a following if the researchers and orchardists got more creative in how they used them and how they marketed them. Perhaps they don’t have test kitchens at the research stations.
The basins of Melsose and Prima are shaped like stars.
To add some balance to your share, we’ve also included four old favorites from the 1800’s or before. They were all chance seedlings that grew up in someone’s yard or orchard, not the result of careful crosses in the lab. We’ve given you a lot of Smokehouse, an all-purpose apple that is especially good for pies in hopes that you can find time to do some baking now that the temperatures are cooling down. It is pretty good for fresh eating too.
We were not so generous with the other three heirloom varieties, in your bag. Opalescent, King of Tompkins County and Twenty Ounce are all in short supply this year, and some of them look a bit gnarly, but we wanted you at least to get a taste of them. They are very different from one another. King of Tompkins County is dense and syrupy, a bit like white grape juice. Twenty Oz. has more of a lemon-head vibe - it feels green and young with just enough sweetness to cut the citrus. Opalescent is somewhere in between, with a milder, less complex flavor that has a touch of raspberry in it. Cut your Opalescent open in front of a crowd - the inside is the show stopper of the week. Taste them side by side and try to pick a favorite. We rarely can. This is why we love apples - so much choice, so much to love.
Our apples come to you straight from the tree, so, as with all fresh produce, please be sure to wash them thoroughly before eating. Some of the apples are grown using Integrated Pest Management by the orchards we collaborate with throughout Maine, and some are organically grown here on Super Chilly Farm.
Maine Historical Society Presents: A Talk with John Bunker:
An Apple History of Maine
On Wednesday, October 14, 6:00-7:00 PM John will explore the history of apple farming in Maine’s 16 counties from its colonial beginnings to the present. John will read from published and unpublished letters and writings by Maine authors, poets and farmers. This talk is part of the Maine at 200 series.
Cost: Free and open to the public.
Registration is required. REGISTER HERE
Location: online via Zoom. Limited to 500 attendees.
Recipe of the Week
OOAL Crew Member, Josh Hinchman developed this recipe one day last winter when he was livingin VT and working in a bakery. The bakery was famous for its banana bread, and he thought he would make a batch for himself to eat at home. He was part way down the recipe rabbit hole when he discovered he was out of bananas. Searching for another “wet” fruit that he could substitute, he found some old apples in his fridge. Having been to culinary school, he was confident enough to mess with the ingredient list, so he used his immersion blender to turn the finely chopped apples into an apple mash. He threw this into the batter, popped it in the oven, and was so pleased with the result he claimed it was even BETTER than the original. Of course Josh wasn’t quite the apple expert last winter that he is today so when we pressed him, he had to admit that he had no idea what variety he used. To remedy that oversight, he and Alex cooked up four loaves of this tasty apple bread using 3 of the varieties in the CSA this week (Smokehouse, Twenty Oz. and Spartan) and one rogue apple that they found when foraging for cider apples (Pumpkin Sweet). Much to our surprise, we liked Spartan the best. The delectably moist loaf tasted like it had all the fall spices in it in just the right proportions, when in fact the only flavorings added are lemon zest and vanilla. The Spartan gave it its zing all on its own.
Quick and Delicious Apple Bread
(from Josh Hinchman & Alex Mahaney)
Ingredients:
Contestants in the Apple Bread Bake-off waiting to go into the oven. Alex used black sesame seeds to label the apple variety used in each loaf.
1 stick + 1 TBS Butter
1 cup of sugar
1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour (or bread flour if you have it)
1 tsp baking soda
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon zest
¼ cup sour cream
1 ¾ cup small sweet apple - diced or grated (we liked Spartan)
Directions:
Beware of aliens in your apple bags!
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cream room temperature butter and sugar together until it looks like one cohesive paste. You can use a mixer or cream by hand. (Use a mixer if you find yourself tight on time.)
Add eggs one at a time, and mix thoroughly after each addition to make sure the egg is well incorporated.
Add sour cream, and mix to combine.
If you have diced your apple, use an immersion blender to puree it into an apple mash. Grated apple also works.
Add lemon zest, apple mash and vanilla; mix to combine, and scrape down the sides of your bowl.
Delicately incorporate your dry ingredients until just combined; you want to mix as little as possible after adding the flour as this develops gluten which will make the bread tough and chewy. The end product should be light and fluffy.
Spray or oil a medium-sized loaf pan, and coat the inside with white sugar.
Bake for 40 minutes or until a tooth pick pulls out cleanly when poked into the center of the loaf.
Enjoy.