Ambrosia

How to Enjoy Gloriously slow to oxidize, the Ambrosia is a great choice for fruit trays, salads, and fresh displays. Naturally sweet, they not only hold their shape well for cooking, they require very little sugar.

Braeburn

Originally developed in New Zealand and available commercially since 1985, the Braeburn is an excellent keeping apple with a wonderful blend of tart and super sweet flavours with very firm, crisp, and juicy flesh. Medium to large, with a barrel shape, Braeburns are most commonly red with gold sections.

Peak Freshness early November to early March

How to Enjoy While it can be used in a number of ways (i.e. desserts and juices), the Braeburn is superb for eating out of hand and is one of the best all-around cooking apples, holding their shape. Whether it is used for its juices, sliced into salads, or cooked into desserts, a nice applesauce, or apple pie, you will enjoy a perfected sweet and tart balance. Oh, and it doesn’t brown as quickly as other apples, once cut, so is nice for fruit platters.

Braeburn

Originally developed in New Zealand and available commercially since 1985, the Braeburn is an excellent keeping apple with a wonderful blend of tart and super sweet flavours with very firm, crisp, and juicy flesh. Medium to large, with a barrel shape, Braeburns are most commonly red with gold sections.

Peak Freshness early November to early March

How to Enjoy While it can be used in a number of ways (i.e. desserts and juices), the Braeburn is superb for eating out of hand and is one of the best all-around cooking apples, holding their shape. Whether it is used for its juices, sliced into salads, or cooked into desserts, a nice applesauce, or apple pie, you will enjoy a perfected sweet and tart balance. Oh, and it doesn’t brown as quickly as other apples, once cut, so is nice for fruit platters.

Empire

The Empire is well-named since it was developed in New York State and shared with the public by 1966.

This medium-sized apple is a cross between the McIntosh & Red Delicious. It’s intense red colour that overlays a light green background is so attractive when rubbed to show off its shine. The creamy tastes slightly tart yet sweet apple with a crisp texture.

Peak Freshness August until late September

How to Enjoy A fine dessert apple, superb for making cider and an ideal lunch-box apple..

Fuji

With an undercurrent of honey flavouring, both sweet and spicy-tart with extra crisp, juicy, firm, cream coloured flesh characterizes this medium-sized, round Japanese apple. Good quality Fuji apples will be firm with smooth and clean skin. The base colouring is usually vibrant yellow and green overlaid, with orange-red highlights, but will sometimes have a pinkish blush or be nearly red.
They are excellent eaten fresh and store longer at room temperature than most varieties. This fruit has an appealing flavour, versatility, and shelf life. It’s no wonder that it has been an extremely popular apple in North America since 1980.

Peak Freshness late October to late February

How to Enjoy It is quite versatile and can be eaten raw, sliced into salads when cooked into a nice applesauce or apple pie, use less sugar than called for.

Gala

This heart-shaped crisp, firm fruit is as beautiful as it is delicious. A 1980 Golden Delicious hybrid originated in New Zealand is one of the world’s favourite apples, smelling fresh, sweet and perfumed when you sink your teeth into it. With a distinctive, thin yellow-orange skin with red striping, its fine-grained texture, and rich, intensely sweet juicy flavour contains a hint of spiciness that makes it the perfect crunchy tasty snack.

Peak Freshness late August through March.

How to Enjoy Their skins make it easy for mom, since your kids will eat them without being peeled. Though it can be cooked, it is so wonderful fresh in salads and as snacks that it seems a shame.

Gingergold

Ring in the apple season with this delightful sweet, tangy, and juicy-crisp fruit that may have a faint taste of pears. Gingergolds are a recently developed apple that is medium sized smooth oval with a fresh golden-yellow hue with a hint of red blush.

Peak Freshness As one of the earliest varieties of apple season, gingergolds tell us that fall is on its way. The growing season of this variety is short – a few weeks from August into September.

Good-quality Ginger Gold apples will be firm with smooth, clean skin and have good colour for the variety. Resist the temptation to push with your thumb as you test the firmness of the apple by holding it in the palm of your hand. It should feel solid and heavy.

Avoid product with soft or dark spots. Also if the apple skin wrinkles when you rub your thumb across it, the apple has probably been in cold storage too long or has not been kept cool.

How to Store It doesn’t store in controlled atmosphere well, so be sure to enjoy this wonderful apple with a hint of spice while you can! To store, keep apples as cold as possible in the refrigerator. Apples do not freeze until the temperature drops to 28.5 degrees F.

How to Enjoy Yay! It doesn’t discolour when cut, maintaining its crisp white flesh. This makes gingergolds a perfect multi-purpose apple great for snacking, excels sliced for salads and fruit plates, as well as holding its shape, amazing flavour & consistency  well for baking a wonderful pie, and even a very finely textured sweet apple sauce.

Of Interest

• The discovery of gingergolds was by mere coincidence in the orchards of Clyde and Ginger Harvey in Albemarle County (in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Charlottseville, Virginia).
• Some say that the seedling was deposited by Hurricane Camille in 1969. However, it was not commercially marketed until 1982.
• Speculation states that it is a cross between Golden Delicious and Albermarle Pippin varieties.

Golden Delicious

Developed at a West Virginia, USA farm around 1900, this apple is unrelated to the Red delicious. Pale green initially and ripens to become pale yellow, sometimes with light brown flecks. It is semi-firm, juicy, and sweet with an elongated shape and five bumps on bottom.

A good quality ‘Goldens’ are rich, mellow in flavour, with a firm and have smooth, clean tender skin; ranging in colour from light green to pale or creamy yellow. A keen eye will observe an unripe Golden Delicious by its light green complexion and somewhat tart flavour. More mature one, on the other hand, will be sweeter with a clean lovely yellow colour. Moreover, thin-skinned goldens may have a wash of pink colour or blush across the ‘shoulder’, the result of warm sunny days and cool nights.

Peak Freshness late September through June

How to Enjoy One of the finest salad and dessert apples grown. However, it cooks firm, so this apple variety is considered an all-purpose apple great for pies, baked, rich, mellow sauces, and the best choice for cider. Pies and sauces need less sugar. Golden Delicious also freezes well.

Granny Smith

A tart-tangy, crisp flavour that is especially appreciated when baked or sautéed. Good quality granny smith apples will be crisp and firm with smooth and clean skin, deep green with random pink blush of the cheeks. Originally from Australia, this variety was introduced to North America just prior to 1970.

Peak Freshness late October through March

How to Enjoy Great for eating out-of-hand and a very good all-purpose apple. Its talent for retaining flavour makes it a good choice for cooking. Wonderful for apple pie, caramel apples, juicing, eating with cheese platters, and for salads.

Fun Fact There really was a Granny Smith. In 1868, Mrs. Thomas Smith discovered this tart green apple in Australia. North America didn’t get a taste until the 1950s.

Jonagold

Originating in the U.S. just before 1970 as a blend of the Jonathan and Golden Delicious – hence the name Jonagolds. Less firm than most, it is juicy and crisp with a rich, nice balance of tartness and sweetness. Larger than most other apples, with tremendous flavour and its skin has an appealing pink blush over gold.

Peak Freshness Mid October to mid March

How to Enjoy A good choice for salads or baking (making great pies), as well as snacking on its own or with cheeses. It also freezes well.

McIntosh

Canada’s national apple is a soft, juicy variety, blushed green to yellow with red stripes with white flesh, and has a mildly tangy to sweet aroma and taste as ripened. When eaten fresh, their trademark tough skins break against your teeth with a pleasing snap.

Peak Freshness mid August through early June

How to Enjoy The perfect apple for a snack! Nevertheless, it is, also, delicious raw tossed in a salad, as well as pressed for cider.

Although Macs have a very nice flavour in pies, their texture does disintegrate with heat, but making a pie somewhat mushy. Adding a little thickener is a must.  Like pies, everyone has a different opinion on the texture that they like for applesauce:  Macs tend to make a watery sauce.

Fun Fact It was discovered in the 1700s by a Canadian, John McIntosh and is the most popular apple in North America.

Pink Lady

The Pink Lady variety has a uniquely beautiful pink blush over a greenish yellow background and a refreshing and sweet champagne-like taste. This bright, distinctive oblong apple is crisp, firm with a crunchy white flesh that is tart yet sweet to taste. With Australian beginnings in 1973 it was the crowning result of crossing a Golden Delicious and a Lady Williams. Slightly more acidic than Golden Delicious, the Pink Lady is fairly juicy apple and contains a solid texture that bites cleanly.

Peak Freshness late November through mid January – but the very long storage life means they are available almost all year round from northern or southern hemisphere orchards.

How to Enjoy Excellent eaten out-of-hand. Slow to browning, so it is good for salads besides traditional baking, especially scrumptious pies, and applesauce.

Red Delicious

This is the most common variety in the world. A large, uniformly bright red or deep ruby apple with an attractive heart shape that has five distinctive small knobs on the seed end. It is deliciously sweet and juicy, making it a good apple to eat out of the hand. Originating in Iowa, U.S.A., in the 1870s, the grainy cream pulp was developed with a hint of green – the combination is deliciously crisp, sweet, and juicy.

Peak Freshness mid October through to August

How to Enjoy Red Delicious apples’ highly flavoured sweet taste makes them excellent for fresh eating – quite a popular snack item that is also good in salads, but not a good choice for cooking.

Spartan

Being a long-time favourite of apple-lovers, this apple should make every Canadian proud as it originated in British Columbia in the 1920s. This medium, round apple has a snowy-white flesh with skin a darker red colour than its McIntosh parent that was crossed with the Newton apple. A completely different taste experience that is noticeably rich, crisp, juicy, and sweet. Although they soften a bit with age, the refreshing flavour intensifies some. They have a wonderful aroma and the white flesh provides a stunning contrast with the gorgeous crimson red exterior.

Peak Freshness early October through July

How to Enjoy Spartans make excellent all-purpose apples: eaten fresh for snacks and salads, baked in pies, and cooks up soft making it perfect cooled for applesauce.

Sunrise

As a fantastic start to the apple harvesting season, Sunrise is a new apple developed in Summerland, BC. Its heritage is a fine blend of McIntosh and Golden Delicious: A medium to large, uniform oval round (similar to Gala) with an excellent tart yet sweet flavour, as well as a juicy and crisp texture. More good news is that it is not prone to skin russet. Bright red stripes going to blush on the exposed side with about 50% red color makes each apple quite unique. The flesh is white to cream in colour.

Peak Freshness early August

How to Enjoy Its crisp, juicy and sweet flavour makes it wonderful as a dessert or summer salad.

Sunrise apples are at their best when kept refrigerated.

#2 Apples

At Ralph’s Farm Market, our high standards for quality allow you the benefit of value pricing. Any apples that are smaller than average or have small marks are packaged and offered at a lower price.

Peak Freshness Throughout the year

How to Enjoy Excellent for baking traditional dessert treats such as apple crisps or apple pies, and a nutritious feed for horses. Another great idea is to make apple butter and applesauce are simple and delicious ways to use overripe apples.