Six of the Best

I was going to title this 'Ugly Sisters', but I suppose I chose the best of the surving apples and they look better against ancient oak, under the kitchen uplights, than they do in the shed with the reluctant grey light of another miserable day filtering through the window. A lot have spots and blemishes that look unsightly, but disappear when peeled

Some lines of poetry... 
William Crump
Adams' Pearmain
Brownlees Russet
D'Arcy Spice
Tydeman's Late Orange
Sturmer Pippin

We have never had a year when so many varieties have retained their flavour and interest for so long. Several of these would usually be bland and lifeless by now. We have several friends who are taking the trouble to trek out here and collect rather than buy flavourless visual perfection in a supermarket

The Sturmer Pippin are a particular revelation. They are expected to be eaten at this time of year, when the dry fibrous pre-Xmas flesh has broken down to release juice and flavour. But they are especially spectacular this year - like eating a summer apple straight off the tree. I think it is the inspired husbandry pure blind luck of leaving them on the tree until December (and a warm November), building up plenty of sugar and acid, that is now being released. We will see if we can repeat the trick 

Feeling a bit ground down by another day of bitter cold greyness, I asked MrsM if she had read any good news amid the Trump-porn and flailing politics. She said she found a report about volunteers searching through blackthorn hedgerows and finding more harestreak butterfly eggs than in previous years. That'll do: give me spots on my apples, but...