I wonder: will you find any almond flavor in them if kept past Christmas?
As I understand it, Api Etoile might be a seedling (bud sport?) of Api/Lady. When I bought a bunch of Lady a few years back I kept some that long and was delighted with the additional taste.
Nope, Api Etoile is the original. They are a French apple and they do taste delish. Yours is a sport. 
I had a graft of Victoria but accidentally pruned it off. Your Victorias look beautiful- well done.
Iâve learned grafting up a Franken-tree of many varieties sounds great until pruning time. Hard to give each variety sun, space as the limbs grow unless you were really careful where you grafted originally.
Curious to know if your Victoria LT is good to eat off the tree or needs storage. Iâm shifting to apples that are really good right off the tree. So far my top ones for this are Goldrush, Keepsake, Belle de Boskoop. All my limbertwigs need storage to taste good- consistently every year. Maybe 7B is too warm for them to taste good off the tree???
Iâve found that to be true of most of mine as well, but there are some exceptions here: Myersâ Royal LT and especially Red Royal LT are excellent right off the tree, and Caney Fork LT and White LT are pretty good if left to hang into early winter.
It was 21 F for a couple of hours and 22 F for several more hours last night. Only persimmons and 10 Gold Rush are left on the trees through that freezing cold temp.
@hambone,
I will see if we could try one of the Victoria soon and keep another one for a few more weeks. They are small apples.
After picking Hereforshire Russet around Oct 12 or 13, we ate the first one today, 11/19/20. It is a medium to large apple. A good looking apple. I had 3 this year with varying degree of russeting.
Texture was crisp but not crunchy. Good texture with and without russeted skin. Taste is led by tartness and followed by some sweetness. My husband said it has well rounded taste. He likes it a lot I found it a bit on a tart side, it is like eating Gold Rush right off the tree with Gold Rush having a bit denser texture.
Brix was at 16, which is nice for an apple. If you like Gold Rush, you are likely to like this variety.
@HighandDry,
We tried HR. What is your opinion on its taste and texture. Am I far off the mark? Your growing condition and my are quite different,
Pixie Crunch, another late one.
I have about 20+ varieties of apples setting fruit this year. I only have 5 semi dwarf, full-grown apple trees. I went overboard on grafting3-4 years ago. A couple of trees have 20+ grafts on them.
If I were to do it again, I probably would graft 4-5 varieties max per tree.
Wow! You went crazy!
My sanity has been questionable since I started growing fruit.
I have learned many lessons from grafting too many varieties.
I heard you said several times that Calville Blanc is one of the best cooking apples. My mind went into a wrong assumption that it must not taste good for fresh eating.
I was quite surprised that it tasted very good fresh off the tree. Needless to say, I donât not have enough of them left for cooking.
This is a new one called Prairie Sensation developped by University of Saskatchewan, so itâs early and hardy. I had only one, and I think I picked it too early.
Big and beautiful. How did it taste?
Mam it one of the best all around tasting apples. It is sooo old yet so fresh today. It is the classic Tarte Tatin apple. Please have Charlie make one for you. Skip a huge step by buying Pepperidge Farm puff paste sheets for the top.
I only have two apples left!!!
I hope it will fruit for me again next year. Then, Tarte Tatin could be a reality.
Right now, we eat apple crisp, a lot of them, less work than an apple pie. I also donât care for pie crust, to begin with.
Hi @mamuang ! If you are asking about the taste of Prairie Sensation, here are my notes:
âIt is juicy, but firm. Sweet and sour. However, it has an aftertaste which I find unpleasant. I canât describe what it is. Suppose to have lots of aroma, but mine doesnât.â
Again, it might be because I picked it too early⌠Will see next year, Iâll wait until they become golden.
Prairie Spy x something?
I doing that as well. I need apples I do not need to store in a fridge or in a root cellar to enjoy. I have only so much room in my house and do not have a garage to try and store them. So I need apples to be ripe when I pick them.
Old timers with no refrigerators used to put potatoes and apples in hell.
(Yep, thatâs one of the English definitions of the wordâŚa hole in the ground.)
You dig a holeâŚwheelbarrow size or larger, line it with straw, put in the produce to be storedâŚthen cover it with soil, straw, then cover with whatever (metal, timbers, plywood, whatever) to deflect rain and keep your produce reasonably dryâŚand the depth needed would be whatever depth modern water lines need to be so they donât freeze in winter
Anyone with energy to âdouble digâ a garden should have not trouble with this old fashioned storage solution.
