We first planted Honeycrisp trees at our research lab in 1995, and we’ve added
more HC in various plantings over the years. From my perspective, we are a bit
too far south (90 miles north of Manhattan) to get consistently high quality
with Honeycrisp. Some years they color well and taste great, but in many years
the quality is only fair (at least compared to the best quality Honeycrisp I
have eaten), and color can be unimpressive (to put it kindly!). Over-cropping
HC is definitely one way to kill eating quality, but I think that harvesting
prematurely is a close second. In some years, Honeycrisp show quite a bit of
preharvest drop in our region, perhaps because of water stress created by high
temperatures between late July and August. In any case, many folks have
difficulty delaying harvest to achieve optimum quality when apples worth a
dollar each are dropping in large quantities. Folks in northeastern NY
(Champlain Valley) can grow excellent HC and they initially reported that they
did not have drop problems. However, significant drop also occurred in that
region after an exceptional late-July heat wave several years ago. I’m not
certain if anyone has really done the definitive study on how daytime temps,
nighttime temps, water stress, rootstocks, crop load, spray programs (including
foliar nutrients), and maturity at harvest interact to create either
exceptionally good or exceptionally bad Honeycrisp. We all have some general
concepts from observations, but it would be nice to know the acceptable ranges
of the multiple variables that impact fruit quality (i.e., good-tasting) fruit.
Honeycrisp was my favorite apples for a number of years, but eventually I tired
of buying “crunch” at the expense of the more complex flavors that exist in
other cultivars. At this point, I’d compare Honeycrisp to a modest quality
champagne (some folks always go for the bubbles) whereas better cultivars have
the more complex flavor profiles one would expect in an expensive Cabernet.
Currently, my personal favorites are freshly harvested SnapDragon, SweeTango,
and (perhaps a surprise here) Pixie Crunch. All three of these cultivars have
both crunch and complex flavors, especially at harvest when the aroma volatiles
that provide much of the flavor complexity are at their best. For a variety of
reasons, I doubt that any of these cultivars will ever rise to the level of
Honeycrisp in consumer consciousness. First, HC was the first cultivar to
stake out totally new territory in the apple market because of its unique
texture, and being first has advantages. (Many folks still refer to paper
tissues as “Kleenex”.) Second, good HC hold up well in storage and eating
quality of HC can be excellent after 6 months of storage whereas my three
favorites noted above all tend to lose some of their flavor volatiles during
storage. SnapDragon and SweeTango are still good apples out of storage, just
not quite as good as they are at harvest. The managed cultivar status of
SweeTango and SnapDragon almost ensure that they will never gain the world-wide
visibility that HC has, although those who can find them in stores will
hopefully get a more consistent quality apple than has been the case with HC.
Finally, most consumers right now seem to want “sweet, juicy, crunch” and are
less selective when it comes to the nuances of good apple flavors. Thus, I
would guess that those of us who have experienced top-quality fruit and can
differentiate between “exceptional” and “good” fruit will always be a minority
in the market place.
Now, if someone can come up with an easy-to-grow cultivar that has both the HC
crunch factor AND complex aroma volatiles that persist through 6 to 10 months
of CA storage, that will be the apple that will ultimately displace HC in the
marketplace.
****************************************************************************
Dave Rosenberger, Professor of Plant Pathology
Cornell's Hudson Valley Lab, P.O. Box 727, Highland, NY 12528
Office: 845-691-7231 Cell: 845-594-3060
http://pppmb.cals.cornell.edu/people/dave-rosenberger
****************************************************************************
On Jan 30, 2014, at 11:52 AM, Fleming, William
<[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Back when I grew apples in North Central Washington they always said you
couldn’t grow good apples down south in the Columbia Basin so hardly anyone
did. Then someone came up with idea of overhead cooling during the hottest
days, the Gala and Honeycrisp planting boom started. Huge plantings in the
Basin and their efficiency of scale flooded the market putting many growers in
the traditional apple growing areas of Washington out of business.
Cooling addressed the problem caused by 100° plus days but did little for cool
nighttime temperatures which I feel are essential for growing a good tasting
apple. Apples from the Basin of all types can look beautiful but taste foul,
sort of ruins the market for growers nationwide. Fortunately the current trend
is removing apples and planting wine grapes. Also because of new food safety
legislation surface canal and irrigation ditch water isn’t allowed to get on
the fruit, overhead cooling water must be treated or come from a well. I
suspect that even more apples will have to come out due to this. Probably good
for all of us to get inferior fruit off the market.
Here where I now live in western Montana at 3000 feet we can grow excellent
Honeycrisp, it’s almost like they were bred for the area. Night time
temperatures are almost always in the 50°s no matter how hot the day.
Bill Fleming
Montana State University
Western Ag Research Center
580 Quast Lane
Corvallis, MT 59828
From:
[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of George Brinson
Sent: Thursday, January 30, 2014 6:19 AM
To: Apple-crop discussion list
Subject: Re: [apple-crop] honeycrisp prices
Same story here on the east coast of Canada ........ maybe it is the climate in
which it is grown. HoneyCrisp tastes horrible!!
George Brinson
From: David Doud<mailto:[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2014 11:35 PM
To: Apple-crop discussion list<mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [apple-crop] honeycrisp prices
" how did anyone find a Honeycrisp that doesn't taste good?"
Unfortunately, it's not that hard - We were visiting our son in San Diego in
October 2012 (no fruit here, might as well take a trip) and visited Whole
Foods, actually caught an upper level produce employee and chatted - he really
wanted to turn me onto HoneyCrisp, there was a big display of 4" ones - insipid
- and not that good of texture either - On to Trader Joe's, big display of
nasty green 2.25-2.75" HoneyCrisp, obviously off overcropped trees - wish I
would have taken pictures, but I was on vacation...
The ones in the local stores recently have been respectable @ $2.49 to
$2.99/pound
It's hard to grow good ones - twice the price but half the pack-out - a real
temptation to lower standards -
HoneyCrisp has generated apple excitement like none other in the last 30 years
and has reset the bar - it is the new standard by which other varieties are
measured and the traditional varieties don't measure up - Jonagored may compete
in its week, but there's no comparison a couple weeks later -
David
On Jan 29, 2014, at 8:05 PM, Shoemaker, William H wrote:
Now the question is, how did anyone find a Honeycrisp that doesn't taste good?
Is it the variety? Is it how its grown? Is it postharvest handling? Is it all
the above? In our markets around Chicago it is really difficult to find high
quality apples of any variety from Washington. They look beautiful, but lack
flavor. I think Washington growers produce great apples. They don't show up
here. I've had excellent Honeycrisp from local orchards in northern Illinois.
In southern IL, they aren't as good. We get Fuji from MI in our local Aldi that
are cheap and outstanding to eat. I think local Red Delicious are just
delicious. But then, everyone knows, Red Delicious is a terrible apple. Why do
we have so much acreage of this apple?!!
Bill
William H. Shoemaker
Retired fruit and vegetable horticulturist
University of Illinois
[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>
________________________________
The problem is, poorly grown HC are just not good tasting apples. They need a
cold winter, heavy thinning to avoid over cropping, calcium sprays every 4-6
days and careful handling. ///
On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 2:59 PM, Steven Bibula
<[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
In Hannaford (a major regional supermarket) today, all apples were 99 cents per
pound, except some smallish, mediocre-looking honeycrisp at $2.49 per pound.
How long can an apple coast in the premium price range on little more than the
name?
Steven Bibula
Plowshares Community Farm
236 Sebago Lake Road
Gorham ME 04038
207.239.0442<tel:207.239.0442>
www.plowsharesmaine.com<http://www.plowsharesmaine.com/>
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