August turned into September just a few days ago, but the apple pie season in Vermont is well under way, although I suspect few Vermonters realize it. Head into City Market in Burlington or Hunger Mountain Co-op in Montpelier or the Hanover or Brattleboro co-ops and you should find a crate of Gravenstein apples in the fruit section, next to the fading peaches, plums and nectarines.
In Burlington, the Gravensteins sit next to a bin of Duchess of Oldenberg and another of Dolga crabs. You can buy a Gravenstein or a Duchess to eat for lunch, but the secret to these uncommon varieties is that they are best for pies. And they are the harbingers of dozens of heirloom and uncommon apples that will flow through the local markets between now and mid November.
Some of these apples, like Espopus Spitzenberg and Rhode Island Greening can be eaten out of hand as well as being great pie apples. But others, Bramley’s Seedling, Belle de Boskoop and Calville Blanc d’Hiver are mainly cooking apples. You can make pies from combinations of these that are better than you have ever eaten before.
Without knowing the full scientific basis for this claim, I believe that it rests on the fact that many of these apples have relatively high concentrations of acid and tannins that in combination with sugars and other apple flavor elements turn into ambrosia when cooked. A similar transformation takes place when you ferment juice from these types of apples into hard cider, but that is a story for another time.
I could make the case for this proposition in several thousand well-chosen words, but it makes more sense to me to just pass along the apple pie experience that I’ve garnered over the last (too many) years working on a book about the American apple. And it isn’t just me — in fact, I haven’t made that many pies myself. But I have eaten a huge number, and I’ve been working with what I think of as my pie panel — my wife, although she keeps threatening to withdraw from the field; Pete, an apple pie aficionado of vast experience from Walpole, N.H.; Larry from Norwich, who is a constant threat to win the annual local apple pie contest, and Kerry, my next door neighbor in Burlington, who is just plain a terrific cook.
What I do is check weekly through the season with Zeke Goodband at Scott Farm in Dummerston on what is available. Zeke is the Zen master of the heirloom and uncommon apple world in the northeast. He grows 70 varieties in the 6,000-tree orchard just north and west of Brattleboro. I have talked to growers from New Hampshire to Vermont, New York, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Washington, Normandy and Brittany in France and Somerset in southwest England, and I’ve never met anyone who knew more about apples than Zeke. One or two knew as much, and several thought they did, but Zeke is as good a guide as you’re likely to find.
The better the pie apples, the less you need a heavy dose of sugar and spices.”
I mentioned at the outset that the season was well under way as we entered September. The season started, however, in mid-August, when the Red Astrachans ripened, followed closely by Duchess of Oldenberg. Imported from Russia in the mid 1800s, they became classic New England pie apples. My late father, the best apple pie maker I ever knew, said that the best pie apple was Red Astrachan. They also illustrate the pie apple conundrum: Astrachan and Duchess are wonderful pie apples, but if you want a snack, you might want to try bread and water. Eating them out of hand doesn’t exactly take courage, but I try to avoid it.
You can make great pies out of either Astrachan or Duchess, but to get the best out of the very early season, we’ve found it best to combine them—half Astrachan, half Duchess. The whole panel loved this year’s vintage. Pete rated his pie and eight or nine on his personal scale of 10. Larry thought his was terrific. Kerry stuck her head in her door one evening as she was headed for our basil patch and said simply: “That was the best pie I’ve ever had.” I loved mine.
It’s too late now to get Astrachan; in fact, they are very difficult to get during the harvest. I get them from Zeke Goodband at Scott, but I’ve almost never seen them anywhere else. There are still some Duchess around, however, and you can get those in some markets, especially those that sell Zeke’s apples. The key pie apple in the markets now is Gravenstein. Scott Farm Gravensteins are available now at City Market in Burlington and Hunger Mountain Co-op in Montpelier, and I suspect that the Brattleboro Co-op has them also. They cost more than ordinary apples, but they are worth every penny. They are not available at the Hanover Co-op, however…too bad.
At City Market, the “shelf talker” on the Gravenstein crate contains this description:
“A very old apple from Italy. The combination of both tart and sweet flavors makes this a wonderful culinary apple as well as a sprightly flavored eating apple.”
Actually, there is no consensus on the history of Gravenstein. Beach’s Apples of New York says that Gravenstein originated in either Russia or Germany, along with Red Astrachan and Duchess of Oldenburg. A footnote in Beach, however, refers to some historical evidence that this variety was imported from Holstein in Germany to Boston in 1825-26 by a Captain John DeWolfe of Dorchester, Mass.; that it was later replanted in Bristol, R.I., and radiated out from there. For our purposes, the key point in Beach is its conclusion: “For culinary purposes (read pie) it is perhaps unexcelled by any variety of its season.”
Over the last five years, the pie panel has made some terrific pies with Gravenstein. Many of those were single variety pies—just Gravenstein. Others had some blending apples, like Duchess of Oldenburg, or for very serious players Dolga Crab. Dolgas are bigger than most crabs, but still very small for an apple — smaller than a golf ball. And coring them takes the patience of an Obama liberal and the small motor skills of a brain surgeon. But if you can get them into a pie, they deliver a terrific apple taste kick.
So, give Gravenstein a try in a pie. If you’re up for two and you’re in the Montpelier area, try a ratio of 75 Gravenstein to 25 percent Lamb Abbey Pearmain. Pearmains are pear-shaped apples; the Lamb Abbey is intensively flavored and has a good amount of acid and sugar that would contribute to the Gravenstein.
A couple of additional notes. The better the pie apples, the less you need a heavy dose of sugar and spices. Watch the cooking time; it can vary widely based on how firm and juicy the apples are. Enjoy.
Comments, even hostile ones, are welcome. Apple pie, after all, is a critically important issue in America.
