Old Breed Apples

A few weeks ago I my wife Judy and I agreed that we had just eaten the best apple of our lives. My family comes from the northern German State Schleswig-Holstein. On my Aunt Ilse and Uncle Georg's farm they have a small orchard with a variety of fruit trees, all old breeds. We picked a few of the nice large red apples from one of their trees. This old variety called a Holsteiner Cox is native to the region and has been grown in the region for hundreds of years. The apples are quite large, firm, sweet and slightly tart. The taste made you stop in your tracks. They had a number of other varieties in their orchards many of which will be going off to have cider made. The apples from the area, mostly old breeds, are polled together and pressed into a delicious sweet cider. You can also have it fermented into an alcoholic cider as well.

A few days later we visited my other Uncle Heini. Heini inherited my grandfather's farm which has been in the family for about 900 years. The farm contained a small orchard which provided the family with most of their fruit. My grandfather planted a fruit tree when each of his seven children were born. For my mother he planted a tree that yielded large yellow grapefruit sized apples. These are a beautifully sweet and very juicy apple. When some of the land was redeveloped, my uncle saved all of the old varieties in a new orchard. Branches from all the trees were saved and grafted onto new trees. Some of the trees now have four different varieties of apples growing on them.

Another Uncle, Jörg, brought us some other old breed apples from the south eastern region of Saxony. These were the biggest apples we had ever seen, almost to big too hold in one hand. Again, another apple with a fabulous flavor. When East Germany reunified with West Germany, there were thousands of hectres of old breed apples. Hundreds of varieties were lost forever. Most of these were ripped up and replanted with the new world breeds of apples. The European Union created new standards for almost every product includng most produce. Apples if they are to be sold must fall into a very tight parameter for size color and weight. These standards were brought in to satisfy the lobbying efforts of the large multinational food companies. By standardizing apples into a few varieties the world market becomes easier to access. Apples are a commodity crop now and shipped worldwide. Apples like most other commodity crops are breed for yield and the ability to withstand shipping around the globe. Most of the old breeds can no longer be sold because they do not fit into these standards. An apple like the Holsteiner Cox are illegal to sell in Europe so most people will never taste one. Today when you shop in a European Supermarket the produce section looks very much like that of a North American Market. You will see a small section of varieties, Gala, Golden & Red Delicious, Fuji and a few other varieties. Depending on the time of year these apples are shipped from Europe, North America, South Africa, Chile, New Zealand or China.

Apples can be like a fine wine, these old breeds have their individual characteristics that differentiate them from other varieties. Depending on the regional growing conditions, this years weather, the apples will vary from year to year. Apples are like so much of food we eat today. Large multinational corporations are aiming for homogenized food. Many people will never have the opportunity to eat an old breed apple. So perhaps they will not know what they are missing. What a shame.