St. Lawrence

St. Lawrence is another very old variety that most likely originated in northern New England or Canada sometime in the 19th century or much earlier.  Recent DNA analysis shows that one of St Lawrence's parents is the old Canadian variety Fameuse. The other parent is still unknown. Fameuse is also a grandparent of McIntosh which presumably makes St. Lawrence an aunt or uncle of McIntosh.   St. Lawrence, a classic old summer apple, is still found here and there throughout Maine and is even grown in some northern commercial orchards. We think you’ll agree that St Lawrence is one of the most visually distinctive apples.  The ground color (background) is a flat light green, and the red stripes are almost like colored pencil lines.  The contrast is striking.

We recommend St. Lawrence for fresh eating and for sauce.  It has good texture for a dessert fruit - crisp and tart with hints of lemon. Often recommended for pies, we do not think it is as firm after baking as the best pie apples should be, nor as flavorful.  One year when we tested a St. Lawrence pie against several other varieties,  a pie-taster commented, “This is the pie I would have liked when I was a kid,” an assertion supported by the 10 year old who voted it the best pie in the taste-off.

The extremely hardy tree bears good to heavy annual crops, ripening unevenly over several weeks.  Like most other early season varieties, St. Lawrence is not a storage apple