Worm Hole

Do you purchase apples with worm holes?

As I try to make a point of buying locally grown, organic apples, I generally find many of the apples have worm holes in them. I've eaten plenty an apple with a worm hole, especially as our house in Berkeley had tart, tasty apples that were frequented by worms (and squirrels, but those ones were always on the ground, natch).

I didn't mind the holes at all from the apples in my yard, but maybe that's just cause the apples were free. I'd just pick the apple and cut out the worm hole. When I'm at the store, though, I avoid the worm holes like the plague. Guess it's just cause I'm paying for them.

This post is apropos of nothing in particular.

Baird Farms Gala

Just back from the produce market, where I bought a Gala for the first time in ages. I pronounce it Gal-uh, for what it's worth. Polished one of them off with my sandwich for lunch, and I recalled why I don't generally buy the Gala. It's bland. A little sweet, I guess, but really not much to it. Texture was fine, not super crisp, but not mealy (I'll generally just toss a mealy apple into the trash rather than finish eating it).

Thankfully I have some dark chocolate covered walnuts from the Berkeley Bowl (just returned from a trip to the Bay Area) to leave my mouth with a good post-lunch flavor.

No clue where this Baird Farms is. I initially thought they were local, but am not finding anything relevant from Google. Oh well.

#4 Organic Ambrosia (BC)
#3 Baird Farms Gala
#2 Organic Fuji(WA)
#1 Organic Honeycrisp (WA)

Gala

While eating a Gala yesterday (by the way, do you pronounce it Gay-la, or Gal-uh), I noticed that an advantage of and apple with a softer texture is that you can eat in much more quickly. Had mine polished off in about 2 minutes (while driving home, which is my preferred method for eating apples nowadays).

Honeycrisp Review

Had a Honeycrisp for the 3rd consecutive day yesterday. This one was marred with minor bruising. The apple fared rather well (as opposed to a Red Delicious, which seem really sensitive to bruising), and was still a pleasure to eat.

The texture of a Honeycrisp is really similar to a Pink Lady. I recommend that all readers of this blog (3 persons currently, but hopefully growing every day) do a texture comparison.

On a side note, here's a discussion topic:

What do you dislike more?

• Really "chewy" apples? (those with super thick skins)
• Apples with excessive wax

Organic Fuji (Washington)

The fuji was my standby until I discovered the honeycrisp a couple weeks ago, and I was seriously enjoying them. So I'm not sure if the apple I had today was lacking in comparison to the honeycrisp or just a subpar fuji. I think the latter is more likely, as this apple may have been in the crisper for a couple weeks, suffering beneath a pile of rotund honeycrisps.

Flavor was mildly sweet, but a little bland overall. The texture was borderline mealy -- not quite mealy, but not fully crisp either. A better texture would have saved it, although wouldn't have impacted its order in the current rankings:

#3 Organic Ambrosia (BC)
#2 Organic Fuji(WA)
#1 Organic Honeycrisp (WA)

Thankfully I have some leftover dark chocolate from Halloween to wash away the memory of that disappointing apple.