Picking Bramley apples

[Blaze]

nobody passing by has responded to a box of apples with a sign saying ‘free apples, help yourself’ nor to the invitation to pick their own.

Ah, but if you put a price on them, they'd go like hot cakes ... probably without leaving any money !

[RobertArthur]

This morning in the supermarket, with a price but not for free.....The Granny Smith comes close to a Bramley. The rest: loads of multicoloured apples. That seems to be more to the liking of the average consumer, healthy rosy cheeks. The image is the message.

[Polly]

Cox apples are my favourites, followed by Russets, but the Cox’s in the photos look a lot more red than those I buy and eat; crisp, juicy and sweet/sharp - delicious!

Blaze said: [/quote]Ah, but if you put a price on tghem, they'd go like hot cakes ... probably without leaving any money !
[/quote]

so funny and could be true!

[Blaze]

The Granny Smith comes close to a Bramley

Bramleys go beautifully soft and fluffy when cooked with a nice acidity : think baked apples and apple sauce .....
We haven't found anything quite like them here. We use Grannies for French style tarts because they don't collapse when cooked as Bramleys do. I find them too acidic and too big to eat here though I used to enjoy them in the UK.
When we first came here, it was very hard to find smaller eating apples and we could only imagine that the French didn't eat an apple as an "eating apple" and only used them for cooking. Cox's, Jazz and Gala are my favourites though I should be more adventurous and try others. I seem to remember Pink Lady as being crunchy, sweet and juicy but they don't seem to keep so well.

From now on is the right time to buy them as they will be fresh and not stored - some varieties don't store well. I remember we used to see apples like Cox's, Galas etc imported from places New Zealand, South Africa and Chile from late spring onwards but much less these days.

[exile]

I confess to not being a great fan of Bramley. Blaze describes it as going soft and fluffy where I find that just a few minutes too long in the cooking and it goes to cotton wool.

As a tree it has a tendency to produce a crop every other year. The tree is sterile meaning that its pollen will not fertilise its own apples (not uncommon in apples) nor those of other apple varieties. You therefore need 2 other apple varieties to fertilise the Bramley and one another.

So having slagged it off, I have to confess we have a Bramley. Despite being on dwarfing root stock it is producing a much bigger tree than either of its neighbours. Ours started off producing every other year but for the last 4 years has produced a good crop every year. While I still prefer other varieties for apple desserts, I will admit that Bramley makes superb apple sauce for use with roast pork or in other pork dishes.

[RobertArthur]

To come back to my last picture: that is the Elstar variety, which is hugely popular in the Netherlands and accounts for around 43% of apple orchards.

I remember well how rich I felt when we harvested fruit for the first time in our French garden: berries, gooseberries, cherries, pears and apples. It was a bit like regaining independence, being back in the driver's seat, not completely dependent on the market and the monetary economy.

As for end products: at the top of my chart last year was a more than exquisite warm 'Apfelstrudel' with icecream, cream and a coffee, not in Austria, but in the old German town of Gotha, famous for Prince Albert. And the year before that there was also a winner. Those are the moments when you think: Please Lord, don't buy me a Mercedes Benz, but please let this moment last a little longer.

[Lori]

Yum !

[Hotrodder]

What a grand harvest! We’ve had a very good crop but can’t manage to collect the majority so most go to insects, birds and then in the garden waste bin which is collected every two weeks.

We have some sliced and bagged in the freezer, but nobody passing by has responded to a box of apples with a sign saying ‘free apples, help yourself’ nor to the invitation to pick their own.

In my previous place we planted a Granny Smith and a Cox (which is my favourite). While waiting for these to mature I discovered a long-neglected French tree that proved to be very good indeed. Both as an eater and a cooker. Plenty sweet for eating but with plenty of "apply" flavour for cooking, and it didn't turn to mush when cooked gently. A great all rounder. I haven't a clue what it was called. It fruited so heavily it would often break the branches due to the weight. We couldn't use them all and to avoid the inevitable wasp problem I would pick up all the fallen ones three times a week and take them to dump away from the house. Early on, I tried leaving a wheelbarrow full of nice ones at the roadside with a "gratuit" sign but never any takers, just like Polly's experience. Maybe the passers by were tailgating so close they missed the sign.

[Blaze]

Early on, I tried leaving a wheelbarrow full of nice ones at the roadside with a "gratuit" sign but never any takers, just like Polly's experience

The French are suspicious of anything just given away. Put 1 euro a kilo or whatever, and they'll disappear .... and they probably won't leave you any money either