Ginger Gold Apples

Last weekend I left NYC to go visit my family in the “country”!  On the way home, we stopped at Golden Harvest, a farmstand in Valatie, NY, where my parents and I have been buying apples and apple cider donuts since I was a little girl.  I was thrilled to see that they had Ginger Gold apples, and as you can see in the photo above, I even had the opportunity to learn of their surprising provenance (they were an accidental cross!)  We picked up the “utility” apples, which are heavily discounted for cosmetic defects, but taste just as great as the pretty ones 😉

On Friday, I had written this whole post about these apples on my iPhone, but all of the text got deleted when my phone ran out of battery and I was really sad.  In trying to fix the situation, the post ended up getting posted empty…reflecting the lost text!  I had written an homage to the Ginger Gold apple, and it went something like this:

Nothing is more evocative of the end of summer and beginning of fall than Ginger Gold apples.  These apples, which begin to appear in supermarkets and farmers markets in mid-late August, are a “potential cross of Golden Delicious and Albumarle Pippin” (see above.)  To me, they are the perfect apple, the answer to all of my sweaty and sticky end-of-summer woes.  The first crunchy bite of a Ginger Gold apple promises sweet cool sunny afternoons at soccer games under the beneficent presence of cheerful red and orange leaves, and long breezy fall nights snuggled under a down comforter.  The apples always remind me of the New Canaan Farmers Market in CT, just a quick drive from my old house, where I first discovered them on a vivid, clear sunny Saturday a few years ago.  I’ve been devoted to this ephemeral apple ever since.  Eat one now…because they’ll be gone in a few weeks.