Extremely Serious Fruit Discussion

[AlexanderDitto]

Not long ago I was made aware (via Twitter) of the fact that Jer only recently discovered the perfection that are Pink Lady apples.

I was shocked and horrified! Flabbergasted! That someone could be living their life consuming any other sort of apple, unaware of the quintessence of the good Pink Lady! The perfect sweet-tartness! The delicate, easy to consume skin! The firm, crisp, crunch of its juicy flesh!

So this thread is about fruit.

People are picky about their fruit! You might not think it, but when pressed, people seem to have super strong opinions about them! I would like to hear your elaborate, scholarly fruit-pinions, expressed in the most eloquent of text, including, but not limited to:

Why Pink Lady apples are supreme among apples (if you are to refute this claim, it had best be made with vivid description and justification);

At what point of ripeness you enjoy your bananas (yellow with plentiful brown spots is, I believe, the penultimate hour for banana consumption: nearly all starches have been converted to sweet, delicious sugars, leaving the flesh pliable and sweet, yet with enough body to refrain from being mushy and disgusting);

Why pears are vile, disgusting things that deserve to be gazed upon only with repulsion;

Why pineapples are delicious but such a serious pain in the ass to prepare;

Questions as to what ever happened to seeded watermelon, which was far sweeter than its "seedless" counterpart, and seriously, the seedless stuff still has those disgusting white seeds that I end up picking out anyway so what's the point?;

Vigorous debate as to whether green or red grapes are superior (I hold myself above such petty squabbles);

Wondering why honeydew reminds me of a timid schoolchild playing alone, shyly in the corner.

Etc etc.

[Sable]

Did you know that pineapples only develop into...pineapples...when their natural pollinators, hummingbirds, are absent? This is why importing hummingbirds to Hawaii is a get-fed-to-the-pigs kind of infraction.

~The More You Know~

[Metcarfre]

Stand back; I worked for a couple years as a produce clerk, so my knowledge is pretty good and my opinions are deep-seated and fierce;

As mentioned on twitter, my apple preference falls towards Braeburns and Royal Galas in general; I find Pink Ladies too tart and a bit crisp (it could be that when they arrive they are not entirely ripe). Back at my old store we had a sweet deal with a particular orchard that drove us boxes and boxes of incredibly ripe, sweet apples. As I recall the breed was a subset of Golden Delicious, but so sweet, tender (yet crisp!) and beautifully coloured that I doubt that identification.

One apple, of course, is the worst; the Red Delicious. Mealy and starchy, thick-skinned and bland, the Red Delicious doesn't even have the saving grace of being a decent cooking apple (the saving grace of the normally reserved Golden Delicious, Granny Smith, and McIntosh [in fact due to its tartness the Pink Lady is usually a pie apple, but I digress]).

Bananas I definitely err on the side of less ripe. Any sign of brown spots relegates a banana to bread-making duty. I like firm, fresh bananas that are bright, uniform yellow (Protip; bananas that are slightly gray-shaded or patterned green and yellow rather than fading from one colour to the other have been frozen or overly chilled and are no good). I hate squishy bananas, their overwhelming flavour, and slimy texture. Firmer bananas, of course, lend themselves to cooking as well.

Pineapples I love, and once you get used to handling them, are easy to prepare with a good chef's knife.

Always remember to buy in season; apples in the fall, oranges in winter, etc.

I love all stonefruit; peaches, nectarines, apricots, cherries, etc. Rainier cherries, if you can find them, are worth the price.

When it comes to my favourite fruit, hands down I have to say the Blood Orange. Sweet and tangy, it combines the flavours of orange and raspberry, and has the most incredible flavour. It's only really good for a few weeks at the end of January and beginning of February (depending on your location) so get it when you can!

If you live in BC; the local strawberry season is REALLY short. Like, two weeks, max. So don't wait for them to come to you (they will be mushy and rotten anyways); go to a U-Pick. Can't go? Buy California strawberries, they're better.

I could go on, but that's wall enough for one post.

[Telaril]

Have you ever had an Empire or Macoun apple picked directly off a tree in New England?

Ok, it doesn't necessarily have to be that fresh, but the best apples I have ever had were when I was living in an orchard town in Connecticut. Empires and Macouns, when fresh from the tree, are incredible things. They are spicy and sweet, tangy and complex, the firmest, juiciest, crispest apple you will ever have. When you bite into one you can tell why humanity would give up paradise in exchange for a taste of an apple.

The problem is that two days later, they aren't. Two days later they're a very good apple, and in another three they are just good. Living in Pennsylvania and Virginia I still ate empires and macouns, but they weren't the apple nirvana I remembered, they were merely quite good. The farther I got from Connecticut, the less wonderful they got.

A lot of what we consider to be the best apple is determined by how well an apple travels, and our proximity to certain growing regions. For instance, Golden Delicious apples grown on the East coast tend to be firm, crunchy, and almost honey sweet. Ones grown on the West coast are bland, soggy, tasteless things. Instead, in the West they're better off with Jonagolds or Galas, which almost completely fail to be appetizing if grown in the East. (Edit: Metacarfe, I wouldn't be surprised if the apple you describe was a Jonagold.)

My mom grew up in the south, familiar with only two kinds of apple: Red Delicious and Granny Smith. These are the best apples for keeping, for travel and storage, and for appearance. The Red Delicious is an awful, tasteless thing but it will last forever and is very red and very shiny, so it could survive a week long train ride and months in storage. The Granny Smith is similar, though I actually praise its ability to maintain taste if stored properly.

I've enjoyed a Pink Lady from time to time... a nice variation and a vast improvement over the Golden Delicious from which it gets a substantial portion of its DNA. They're best the closer you get to their growing regions and they grow in a lovely manner in regions that don't support more fiddly heirloom varieties, but the best of all possible apples? They are nice, and consistent, and have more flavour than you generally get from apples with comparably long shelf lives, but nothing can beat an orchard fresh Macoun or Empire, especially one of the tiny ones they don't usually ship out.

[kikkas]

I'm fairly lacking in my apple knowledge and don't really go out of my way to find all these other apple brands that I've never heard of.. but I have to say that I'm partial to Granny Smith apples. Sour over sweet any day for my taste buds. Are there sour 'red' apples out there?

[aeric90]

...

The title of this thread is misleading.

>.>

[goat]

I greatly dislike raw apples. Applesauce? fine. Apple pie? super fine. But a normal old, polished on the sleeve apple? no way.

Based on the other opinions about Red Delicious and knowing that that is mainly what grows here, I think it is small wonder.

Now berries on the other hand. Oh, how I love berries. Where I grew up there were blueberry fields as far as the eye could see. And up north? Cherries. And when I went to visit family a few states over? Fresh raspberries. Pure heaven. And imagine my luck when I found blackberries on sale yesterday.

I'm very fond of peaches as well. Mainly canned or in yogurt or processed some other way (which I'm sure is nigh on blasphemy to some of you), but dealing with the raw fruit is such a pain. Same goes for mangoes, but I've got a little more patience there.

Bananas need to have not a trace of green before I'll eat them, and I'm certainly one to overlook more than a few brown spots. I draw the line when you can start to taste the alcohol.

Citrus fruits are great! but mainly for drinks and seasoning, though I do like a slice of lime now and again. I can't actually eat oranges though. Too fleshy. I'll massacre a box of tangerines, though.

[Telaril]

I'm fairly lacking in my apple knowledge and don't really go out of my way to find all these other apple brands that I've never heard of.. but I have to say that I'm partial to Granny Smith apples. Sour over sweet any day for my taste buds. Are there sour 'red' apples out there?

It depends a bit on where you live. Mcintoshes can be nicely tart and travel pretty well, but where you are in the country determines your apple selection pretty heavily. Macs are pretty ubiquitous, though. Try 'em in the fall.

If you can get an Arkansas Black, do it. It's lovely tart apple that is also gorgeous: after a few weeks in storage it turns a deep, almost "black" red.

[iamafish]

Why pears are vile, disgusting things that deserve to be gazed upon only with repulsion;

This is Blasphemy! This is Madness!

Most pears are ok, especially when just ripe, however Conference Pears are wonderful. You want them when they're just a little but soft on the outside. They're sweet, slightly crunchy and so so juicy.

I am also a lover of apples, in particular Braeburns and Granny Smiths, although i also like Cox's. They're all nice and crunchy and sweet and i especially like the tang of a granny smith, although they can be a bit much; braeburn is a more soft and light flavour.

I love banana, usually when they're just ripe, maybe a bit of brown, but not too much.

I adore a good melon or watermelon.

If there are grapes in the house i will eat them. whenever i walk past them i will take one or two and usually within a few days they're gone. I prefer red grapes, but green can be nice too.

In fact i like most fruit.

I have very fond memories as a child going out into the fields and hedgerows around where i like around autumn time - around September usually and picking blackberries by the bucket load, literally. Then all through the winter we would (and still do) make Blackberry and Apple Crumble, the most divine of puddings.

So in conclusion: fruit is amazing, I will eat almost any fruit, except for grape fruit.

[Telaril]

Ahh, berries. Another great thing about the northeast... I grew up in a town where the woods were simply filled with blackberries. black raspberries, wild blueberries and huckleberries. Many a summer I left in the morning with an empty bucket and return in the afternoon with a full one; covered in scratches, maybe, but so worth it.

I love all sorts of berries. Black Raspberries are my favorite, but they are extremely hard to come by. I've seen them in stores only once in a blue moon, and though they still grown naturally in many places their bushes tend to be smaller and harder to find than the massive walls of blackberry brambles. My berry ranking is as follows: black raspberries, wild blueberries, huckleberries, conventional blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, mulberries. I've had wild strawberries only two or three times and they were exquisite, but I've only ever found a stray two or three in a patch somewhere.

I'm also a huge fan of cherries and plums, especially when they are that perfect level of firm darkness.

I have a problem with grapes: unless they are ridiculously fresh most grapes taste fermented or moldy to me. It's not overpowering but it's definitely there, so I don't eat them very often.

I like Bananas completely yellow, erring on the side of brown speckles. An even slightly green banana tastes very strange to me, and leaves an lingering aftertaste of unreadyness that can last for hours.

I like all fruits and may actually eat far too many of them. During prime apple season I've been known to go through a bag in two or three days and I once ate two quarts of blueberries in a single day. I'm not proud.

[ExplodingSims]

Being from Florida, I have just about all manner of citrus fruit quite literally just lying around. The best of these though?

The wild tangerine. There are these tangerine trees that grow in a forest behind my neighborhood, and they produce these extremely sweet, juicy little tangerines. The nice thing is that they grow a lot of fruit on one tree, and stay on there for a while.

They make great juice too.

[Bananafish]

Tomatoes are okay

[theDreamer]

Why pears are vile, disgusting things that deserve to be gazed upon only with repulsion;

I...I...I thought we were friends.

Pears are delicious, sweet and juicy.

Never even heard of a "pink lady" but I might try it. For apples, Green or Gold Delicious all the way. The snap and tang of a green apple is just to die for.

Strawberries are fantastic, but I've been burned so many times by genetically mutated monstrosities to trust what my parents bring home.

White grapes("green grapes" as a term has always confused me. First, if red grapes make red wine, then _white_ grapes make white wine. Second, "green" implies it isn't ripe yet) are amazing and I love them and I can eat an obscene amount. Similar reason to why I love green apples and strawberries.

Also, for some reason, I only like red wine, but only eat white grapes.

Bananas, as metcarfre has said, should be eaten when they just turn yellow, because otherwise the flavour is overwhelming and gross.

I love, love, LOVE grapefruits.

Possibly my favourite fruit of all time was introduced to me as a Dinosaur Egg. I've since learnt they are "pluots," half plum, half apricot. They are delicious and tangy and juicy and the red flesh is amazing and holy shit they are almost in season!

Oddly enough, with the exception of of the smaller, tangier plums (white, tangy reds), I dislike plums, apricots, and peaches.

I love dried apricots though.

I think we can conclude that I like my fruits tangy and juicy.

[WBAGNR]

Well if no-one else will:

http://xkcd.com/388/

[auberginequeen]

I must be some sort of abomination or something but I really like my fruit to be on the bland side. Especially apples... any apples that are sweet are always sickeningly sweet and I hate things that are tart. I don't know if it's just that the apples I've eaten suck or if it's just my dislike of sweetness/tartness.

Same thing with strawberries. I dislike strawberries due to their tartness. It's only when they're really ripe and slightly sweet that they're enjoyable to me.

Most berries (blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, etc) are too sweet/tart for me too.

However I really like grapes, cherries, kiwi, and melon. They're sort of a different kind of sweetness; one I can tolerate. Though I still really love cherries that are only somewhat sweet and red grapes because they're not as sweet as green/white ones. (though I eat both)

Pears are okay... a little disappointing in their texture imo.

Pomegranates are awesome, though I never get a chance to eat them.

I also hate bananas, but that's due to my being scarred for life as a child rather than a hatred for them in general.

Then again I'm also someone who (if not for nutritional concerns) could eat plain steamed sushi rice for every meal and be content, so maybe I just have a terrible sense of taste.

[2stepz]

I love fruit. Period.

My mother has been on a kick of buying a type of apple called "Honey Crisp." So much so, that she searched and bought herself apple trees of that variety for Mother's Day. I hope they work out for her.

[The Jester]

Yeah, that'd be cool. A mini orchard.


Personally I like fruit well enough but I'm not crazy about it or anything. Grapes are nice, apples can be most agreeable, watermellons most tasy, bananas diffuclt to spell while drunk but otherwise very nice.

I don't believe my digestive system gets on well with citrus fruits any longer though, unfortunatley, since I used to love tangerines and satsumas.


In summary, fruit's nice but nothing I get excited over.

[empath]

...

The title of this thread is misleading.

>.>

No, it's not.


Met - I have to agree with you on the blood orange; my only experience with it so far has been a bottled 'blood orange teriyaki sauce' we use with some of our prepared foods in the deli; it's MUCH nicer than straight teriyaki (but not as good as a 'honey sake teriyaki' that the wife and I found, but I digress)

As for apples, Fuji or Braeburn are good, but my favourite is the Royal Gala; perfect texture, consistency and flavour. Of course, I've been known to tolerate McIntosh and both varieties of 'delicious', so what do I know?

And I'm gonna sit the fence on banana ripeness, even though it's m favourite fruit; solid yellow maybe starting to pick up a few brown specks. A compromise between the sweetness of extended ripeness, and the firmer, more reassuring consistency of the starchier banana...

[Evil Jim]

The obligatory XKCD related comic.


source

[The Jester]

Uh, dude, WBAGNR posted a link to that like five posts above yours. Just sayin'.

[empath]

The obligatory XKCD related comic.

{duplication of WBAGNR's efforts}

*ahem*

Let me provide a distinct substitute on your behalf?

[Matt]

i'm going to weigh in briefly in defense of the red delicious. Most of them are atrocious, but when you get a good one, they're perfect. The perfect red delicious is like a 1:1000 ocurrence, but there's nothing better than a good red delicious. They're crisp, tender, and almost candy-sweet.

They're goddamn amazing. Unfortunately the other 999 are pulpy, starchy bleh.

-m

[Evil Jim]

The obligatory XKCD related comic.

{duplication of WBAGNR's efforts}

*ahem*

My version is easier to read & therefore superior.

[WBAGNR]

Braeburn apples are the sex. When they are slightly chilled, on a hot day, so they are crunchy, but not grainy, which makes apples horrible and inedible, it makes them so lovely. Sorry but I have to disagree about Pink Lady's- I personally don't like them at all, due to the texture rather than the taste. I find them to be very grainy and the stuff you bite off doesn't come off as one piece, it sort of crumbles and is horrid.

Got to agree with fish on pears. They are so lovely when crunchy- I actually prefer them just before they are ripe, because I don't like things that are overly juicy.

Not too keen on raw bananas...they aren't bad per se, but I prefer bananabread, rather than the fruit itself.

Pineapple is lovely, but can be sour occasionally, and I find it hard to eat a whole one in one sitting- you need to eat it over a few days. I might be alone but I really like the core of pineapple.

Watermelon is very nice but again, very big- need to share it around or eat over a long time.

Oranges are lovely. They are tangy, sweet and sour all in the right balance. If you have a knife handy then peeling them is no problem either.

Satsumas/tangerines etc are all lovely...like a cheap round, to quote Eddie Izzard. Good size, nice flavour, easy to peel.

Grapes are nice, but I am quite picky about the firmness of them- too soft and I won't eat them. Prefer red grapes to green.

[iamafish]

White grapes("green grapes" as a term has always confused me. First, if red grapes make red wine, then _white_ grapes make white wine. Second, "green" implies it isn't ripe yet) are amazing and I love them and I can eat an obscene amount.

actually white wine is usually made with red grapes.

For white wine the skins are taken off at the start of the wine-making process (or early on) and for Red they're kept on for the duration. Rose is made by taking the skins off mid way through.

I believe some whites are made with green grapes, but this is not the majority.