Speaking of apples...

My solitary flowering apple tree - Gravenstein - produced about a dozen apples. My other trees, too new to blossom and cross pollinate. It must have been an immaculate conception. Nevertheless, this is by far the most interesting apple I have tasted and cooked with. I babied 6 of them for a tart - wonderful. I bought a 1/2 peck of Lodi
at the farmers market thinking I would mix it up. The lodi were the most perfectly tastless and mealy apples ever. The resulting pie was soupy.
I am ordering another Gravenstein for the spring and hope that the developing Spitzenberg and Tollman Sweet are as good and produce next year.

Gravenstein is, to my mind, the quintessence of cooking apple. It's good eating, too!
Of course, it's sort of ugly looking, and it doesn't keep well.
Get another tree! It will reward your patience.

BTW, when I make a pie with Gravensteins I usually don't add more than half the standard recipe sugar. Its flavor comes out better if it's a bit on the tart side.

John

Gravenstein is, to my mind, the quintessence of cooking apple. It's good eating, too!
Of course, it's sort of ugly looking, and it doesn't keep well.
Get another tree! It will reward your patience.

BTW, when I make a pie with Gravensteins I usually don't add more than half the standard recipe sugar. Its flavor comes out better if it's a bit on the tart side.

I agree: Gravensteins are the best apple to cook with, period. One of the few down sides to the burgeoning wine industry (and growing development) in lower Sonoma county is the loss of those wonderful Gravenstein orchards there. Now, when I drive through Sebastopol, it's grapevines if anything there

Mark Lipton
(Who'd gladly exchange 100 cases of insipid Chardonnay for a few bushels of Gravensteins)