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Oct. 5th, 2008 10:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickIt really is fall out there. The leaves are starting to change colors. I can sometimes see my breath in the mornings. My horses are getting furrier. And, like every October, the Mile Level Market has Stayman Winesaps in stock again. Yay!!
Regular readers are well aware that these are my favoritest apple in the whole world. (If you live in a world where there is only one kind of apple and that is the Red Delicious, I pity you.) To my mind, the Stayman Winesap is the epitome of appleness. It's crunchy. If you've never eaten a fresh one, you have no idea what I'm talking about, here. You might think you know, but you do not. It's hard. You have to work to bite into one. OTHER PEOPLE can hear you eat this apple. There's a lot of crunch in a Stayman Winesap. It is slightly sweet but more wine-like and tart than sweet. It's not the unrelenting sour of the Granny Smith, though. It tastes kind of like good cider, with layers of flavor. I really like these as a for-eating-raw apple but most people don't. (Wimps.)
Where the Stayman Winesap shines is in baking. It is a fine baking apple. It makes really good apple pies, good apple crisp, good baked apples, good applesauce. It has excellent structure and retains its shape and texture well when baked. Some apples turn to mush when they are cooked. This one does not.
If you would like your apple pie to retain structure, so that the cross-section of a slice looks like a road cut through shale, then you will like Stayman WInesaps. If you cut your apple pieces so small that they FALL OUT of the pie slices in a sloppy glistening mess of overly gooey cornstarched cinnamon sugar, I do not want to know about it. (Doin' it wrong.) Similarly, if you use one of those peeler-corer-slicer deals, I don't want to know. (Doin' it wrong.) We are not going to do more than mention (in a mocking way) those who use canned apple pie filling, who are Doin' It Wrong in a "Christ, why are you even bothering" sort of way.
Proper apple pies (yes, I am an authority on the subject.) are made with huge, flat, uniform slices of apple that are carefully layered on top of each other for good packing so that they settle gently, with the crust on top, and so that there is no damned AIR PIE going on when you cut the damn thing. My apple pie holds its shape when sliced and the apple pieces do not fall out. A body could, if so minded, pick up a slice by the fat end, supporting the thin end with a thumb, and eat it neatly without a damn plate. Now *that's* an apple pie, damn it. Anything else and you're doing it wrong. Use Stayman Winesaps, folks. They've been around since 1866 and are still in commerce. There's a reason for that and it isn't that I am unable to buy "modern" apples in my grocery store.
Regular readers are well aware that these are my favoritest apple in the whole world. (If you live in a world where there is only one kind of apple and that is the Red Delicious, I pity you.) To my mind, the Stayman Winesap is the epitome of appleness. It's crunchy. If you've never eaten a fresh one, you have no idea what I'm talking about, here. You might think you know, but you do not. It's hard. You have to work to bite into one. OTHER PEOPLE can hear you eat this apple. There's a lot of crunch in a Stayman Winesap. It is slightly sweet but more wine-like and tart than sweet. It's not the unrelenting sour of the Granny Smith, though. It tastes kind of like good cider, with layers of flavor. I really like these as a for-eating-raw apple but most people don't. (Wimps.)
Where the Stayman Winesap shines is in baking. It is a fine baking apple. It makes really good apple pies, good apple crisp, good baked apples, good applesauce. It has excellent structure and retains its shape and texture well when baked. Some apples turn to mush when they are cooked. This one does not.
If you would like your apple pie to retain structure, so that the cross-section of a slice looks like a road cut through shale, then you will like Stayman WInesaps. If you cut your apple pieces so small that they FALL OUT of the pie slices in a sloppy glistening mess of overly gooey cornstarched cinnamon sugar, I do not want to know about it. (Doin' it wrong.) Similarly, if you use one of those peeler-corer-slicer deals, I don't want to know. (Doin' it wrong.) We are not going to do more than mention (in a mocking way) those who use canned apple pie filling, who are Doin' It Wrong in a "Christ, why are you even bothering" sort of way.
Proper apple pies (yes, I am an authority on the subject.) are made with huge, flat, uniform slices of apple that are carefully layered on top of each other for good packing so that they settle gently, with the crust on top, and so that there is no damned AIR PIE going on when you cut the damn thing. My apple pie holds its shape when sliced and the apple pieces do not fall out. A body could, if so minded, pick up a slice by the fat end, supporting the thin end with a thumb, and eat it neatly without a damn plate. Now *that's* an apple pie, damn it. Anything else and you're doing it wrong. Use Stayman Winesaps, folks. They've been around since 1866 and are still in commerce. There's a reason for that and it isn't that I am unable to buy "modern" apples in my grocery store.
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Date: 2008-10-06 11:01 pm (UTC)