I believe that I had previously read about an anise like flavor from this apple when I ordered it. I like the flavor of anise and was frankly curious if an apple could really have strong anise tones, so I purchased it then (and have since purchased 7 or 8 more Sweet Sixteen trees) and I have yet to taste anise. I’m not suggesting that you haven’t, perhaps your palate is a lot more evolved than mine or perhaps it really is dependent on soil conditions or geography.
I’ve only gotten apples off of SweetSixteen once. (I bought it, potted it, forgot about it and it fruited in the pot. Next season I chopped the roots and planted it in the ground and it hasn’t fruited since (2 years)
It was the wife and kids’ favorite and I detected a cinnamon flavor, but do not recall twizzler or anise favors. It was eaten the day it fell from the tree.
Scott
Yes, I have had SoS/S16 with anise/licorice flavor. Though artificial cherry is the more usual flavor. They are a popular apple around these parts. IIRC the drops I’ve picked up and tasted at the U-pick typically had more of the anise flavor from sitting in the sun.
Yes, the cherry Twizzler. I guess I should have been more specific. However, I did not know there was a black licorice Twizzler. It has been that long since I have looked at candy I guess.
I have a limb grafted high on a tree here in zone 8a (I thought until recently we were 7b) and I will sure let others know what its like here…when it fruits. I see blooms coming out on many varieties grafted in the last couple years. Maybe it will be this year for Sweet Sixteen.
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I have sweet sixteen scions this year but not sure if I’ll graft it. I have limited space and what seems like more interesting apples to use instead. It may be a candidate for my dad’s apple trees though.
I grafted Sweet 16 onto Siberian apple rootstock in 2104 and in 2016 it fruited with one apple. I was itching to taste it but hesitated too long and some rodent or other took it. If Sweet 16 can survive here and still produce flowers and fruit it certainly is a good choice for more northern growers.
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He likes cherry Twizzlers?
It certainly has a better chance to survive there than many. It is a U of Minnesota release. And their initial program was to breed hardy apples.
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I have fruited Sweet 16 for 2 years. It is one of my favorites, up there with Suncrisp. Freyburg and Pixie Crunch. I have not noticed any licorice taste in Sweet 16. For me, Freyburg has clear licorice taste in the skin. Same for some of my GoldRush nowadays, after being stored for about 5 -6 months, especially around areas that are showing some rot. I like Sweet 16 more than Ashmead’s Kernel and Golden Russet.
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Interesting to hear you like Sweet 16 better than the other two, Ashmead’s Kernel and Golden Russet. I have both of those latter two planted but no fruit as of yet. I should try out a Sweet 16 and see what I may be missing. I can’t store a lot of apples. Having some that require months of storage before they reach their “peak” taste would not work out for me. I’ve not picked some apples simply for that reason. Some apples that store like that would be nice to at least try out. I may put a branch of some of them on some trees later on. At least taste them here at my farm instead of how they taste from somewhere else. At times they do not taste the same from place to place.
I have been interested in growing the Pixie Crunch apple. Sounds like it is just an eating apple but not used for anything else.
How can there be an apple which is more interesting than one where people taste anise, cinnamon, cherry Twizzler and Zestar, all in the same apple.
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I don’t like the taste of anise so if there is a chance it tastes like that I may want to pass.
Sweet 16 does fine here in western Montana- but I’ve never noticed much anise flavor in the ones I’ve had. Could be mislabeled, could be the weather, the soil, who knows?
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Here’s the Sweet 16 description from Steven Edholm of Skillcult.com (I know Steven is on the site at times, but I love this description):
“Sweet 16: This is a pretty, bubble gum smacking precocious girl of an apple. It often has intense candy like flavors including bubble gum, almond, anise and cherry, though the flavor varies considerably from year to year and even apple to apple. Sometimes it seems like the best most delicious thing ever and other times it is just annoying and cloying and I want it to get out of my face. When it goes overripe, it is terrible, mealy, and as my friend put it, “everything I don’t like in an apple”. My other favorite quote is from a girlfriend “It’s like holy shi§ what’s going on in my mouth?!”. Short window of eating. Probably great breeding potential. A modern UofM apple supposed to have some disease resistance. Mid season.” (link: Apple and Pear Scion Wood — SkillCult)
Link to a video where he discusses it here: https://youtu.be/LIAM1_1z5IU?t=4m59s
Steven has some really interesting apple breeding videos for those who haven’t seen them before.
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Grown here in Maine, it is a first class apple. Too sweet for some folks. Not for me!
I got a cherry bourbon flavor from the ones I ate last year.
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So, maybe the year I was overwhelmed by the anise taste was just an off year. I assumed the earlier harvest the following year was the reason for the subduing of the “unpleasant” flavor, but you know what they say about assuming.
I live in mn, its my best tasting apple bar none,
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I guess I’ll have to be the odd one out on this thread. I grafted Sweet Sixteen from the Catholic Homesteading movement years ago. It fruited for two or three years and I didn’t like it. My wife didn’t like it either. I cut it down.
It was a pretty big disappointment to me because I was expecting something sensational. It has always had a lot of fans.
Maybe I have weird tastes in apples. I like sweet crunchy apples. I’m not looking for complex flavors. Sweeter/crunchier the better.
Not crunchy, or not sweet? Here it is both but, to me, not an exceptional apple, just a good one- so far. My favorite out of the program is Zestar. Very grower friendly, unlike Honeycrisp, and more precocious than HC. Much more precocious than SS which has weird tendencies on the one tree I manage. I’ve had scaffolds with no fruit while other scaffolds are loaded on a fairly young tree- and it took a long time to bear at all. I’ve lost track of the rootstock but it’s probably 111, but it bore later than any other variety other than N. Spy on that rootstock in an orchard with many other varieties. N. Spy is also on 111, as I recall. I was trying to order as much as possible on that rootstock, and Adams used to sell N. Spy on it in spite of it’s long juvenile period.
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