Tuesday 14 September 2010

she'll be apples


Not a lot to report at the moment, except, you know, just everyday juggling.
I am so wanting things to rev up but I am also so wanting a long sleep in and afternoon naps.

So to fill in while I think of something interesting to write about here's a visit to the Huonville Apple Museum. It's in an old coolshed, it's cute and dinky and kind of homemade and there are some real treasures in there. I grew up opposite a coolstore in an area that had once been apple orchards, I remember that chilled sweet smell of that dark shed. 
The Museum has shelves running down the centre. Stapled to each shelf is a line of handwritten labels above which sits an example of that apple, starting to shrivel but still beautiful, or rather beautiful because of their slight decay.



The heritage orchard at Huonville grows 500 varieties of apple, barely 10% of those apples types grown in Britain, think of that- 6,000+ apples with 6,000+ uses. 
Supermarkets are Satan.
And the names are sheer poetry.

Antonowka Polomtorafoundwdia
Baldwin
Beauty of Bath
Black Winesap
Blue Pearmain
Belle Cacheuse
Belle Pont Dechaisse
Blanche
Bonne Hotture
Brabant Belle Fleur
Calville Flageolet
Carolina
Catshead
Courtpendu Rouge
Cranberry Pippin
Crow Egg
Cremiere
Delicious Strakrimson
Devonshire Quarrendon
Eldon's Pippin
Finson's Orange
Geeveston Fanny Red
Gravenstein Gnarl Free
Gravenstein Red 
Grimes Golden
.
.
.
.
.

I could quite happily list them all, they sing of blossom on bare branches in Spring and ripening globes and turning leaves of Autumn.






1 comment:

  1. Do you remember Aumann's?

    I went there recently.

    It's gone boutique. Phillipa's bread and pasta with fancy packaging and ridiculous prices.

    Distressing...

    ReplyDelete

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