[HN Gopher] Apple Rankings
___________________________________________________________________
Apple Rankings
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 974 points
Date : 2022-11-17 14:20 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (applerankings.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (applerankings.com)
| Whitespace wrote:
| I long for the days when the internet was filled with sites like
| these. Every hour spent tying up our only home phone line on my
| 14.4 was an hour well spent.
| bearbin wrote:
| Sadly, in my experience, the apple variety alone doesn't actually
| have that much bearing on quality (although a red delicious will
| always be lacking in the second of it's nominative attributes!).
|
| What I've found is a much better predictor of a good apple is
| freshness. An appple straight off the tree is going to be
| excellent, but a local apple in season will be just as good. Find
| out what the apple seasons are in your location, and just buy the
| fruit that's fresh.
|
| I've never had much luck buying imported apples from New Zealand
| or anywhere in the southern hemisphere, and varieties suitable
| for long storage may look good but won't taste it once they come
| out of the storage bin. So I now only buy apples for about 7
| months of the year, when they're actually good. There are lots of
| other fruit for the rest of the year, and it's such a treat when
| they come back in season again.
| JoshGlazebrook wrote:
| I'm shocked there is something worse than red delicious.
| for1nner wrote:
| For those who need re-assurance:
|
| > Brian Frange is a comedian and writer who has been yelling
| about apples for years. [...] Brian is not in the pocket of big
| apple and all reviews are inarguably accurate and not corrupted
| by corporate influence.
| adamredwoods wrote:
| According to those apple ratings, he has quite the sweet tooth!
| AdamJacobMuller wrote:
| Everyone who is taking this too seriously and disagreeing with
| the rankings is missing the fact that this is some absolutely
| hilarious comedy.
|
| Look at the review for the arkansas black apple, it's hilarious.
|
| > This teeth-shattering oddity, boasting a deep red hue that'll
| make a dark cherry look like a fluorescent glow stick, will
| destroy your helpless mouth with every unfortunate bite. A ten
| out of ten on the Mohs Hardness Scale, this apple would perform
| admirably as a drill tip in a diamond mine. While true the
| hardness marginally decreases if left in your refrigerator for a
| full year, those patient enough to plan lunch into the next
| decade will be sorely disappointed with a thick-skinned carbuncle
| that tastes and feels like an uncooked russet potato. Truly
| despicable.
| gamerDude wrote:
| Even just the subtitles. At the very bottom, the only apple to
| land in "Apple Hell"
|
| Newton Pippin Apples "Long Island's Sand Filled Condom"
| AdamJacobMuller wrote:
| I didn't pick that one because I didn't want to have a
| comment on HN with "Long Island's Sand Filled Condom" :D
|
| It's hilarious.
| [deleted]
| dgudkov wrote:
| The problem with the popular apple breeds is they are too sweet.
| Actually, sweetness is what makes them popular. I couldn't find
| fresh and not too sweet apple breeds in grocery stores in Canada.
| ivanhoe wrote:
| De gustibus non est disputandum... also no Idared and Jonaprince
| wizofaus wrote:
| Are all those varieties reasonably common in the US? A good
| percentage I've never heard of, though as it happens Pink Lady is
| the one in the top category I see regularly in markets here
| (Aus), and indeed my preferred choice for eating fresh (which the
| rankings seem very biased toward - some apples are pretty
| ordinary fresh but great when cooked). Kanzi and Envy are
| moderately common too but I've never been blown away by them.
| I've also had multiple people tell me "Cox's orange pippins" (or
| just Cox apples) are supposedly the king of apple varieties but
| not listed here.
| 323 wrote:
| I'm in EU and from the top 10 I've only seen Pink Lady in
| regular shops (meaning I didn't go out of my way to search for
| apples).
| beefman wrote:
| These are all mass-market cultivars. Get serious!
| chefandy wrote:
| Anybody who'd give the two top slots to _sweet tango_ and
| _honeycrisp_ -- the proprietary, designed-by committee apples
| that prioritize inoffensive, bland appeal over character--
| doesn't deserve an opinion on this topic. It's like ranking a
| bazillion craft beers and giving the #1 slot to Blue Moon and the
| #2 slot to Sam Adams. They're the Applebee's and Olive Garden of
| Apples.
|
| Also, the descriptions show that the majority of what they've
| tasted were probably out of season, not ripe or overripe, and
| likely shipped a long distance. You might as well rank US pizza
| shops but only tasting them at home, delivered... even if they're
| across the country.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if this was a shill either for the people
| who own the honeycrisp patents, or someone who's licensed the
| breed and grows a lot of them.
| wheats wrote:
| OK let's go, give us your top 3 favs.
| tigerlily wrote:
| FWIW Cox Orange, Belle de Boskoop, and Sturmer. Honorable
| mention goes to Southern Snap.
| chefandy wrote:
| From the moment I enrolled in culinary school a decade-and-a-
| half ago, people started asking me to rank all sorts of food
| things, usually with the intent of confirming whatever their
| pet favorite was. I think it's just as ridiculous now as I
| did back then.
|
| Just like any other produce, the best variety depends on
| culinary context, season, setting, and geographic location.
| I've had about a dozen and a half varieties of apples fresh
| off the tree and there's more good/bad variance between
| individual apples than there is between varietals. The only
| ones I consistently dislike are the _delicious_ varieties.
| Pulling a fresh, bright red McIntosh off of the tree in early
| October is an experience that rarely disappoints.
|
| The new proprietary apples are designed to be extremely
| commercially useful-- essentially a replacement for the more
| opinionated and less pleasant red delicious-- and they
| succeeded. They will be "pleasant" and very sweet for more
| than 6 months in refrigeration without atmosphere
| modification, but even right off the tree, they're not really
| different than they are in month 7. Sweet. No real character.
| They're also living material that was initially _patented,_
| which is automatically a black mark in my book. That anybody
| would be sued for patent infringement by putting a seed in
| the ground and growing it is pretty fucked up.
| _vertigo wrote:
| I can't name many more types of apples than "Fuji",
| "McIntosh", "Rome", "Red Delicious", "Gala", "Granny Smith",
| and "Honeycrisp", but I feel like Honeycrisp apples are too
| perfect - too sweet, too crisp, but somehow not as apple-y as
| other varieties.
|
| If you only have one Honeycrisp after years of eating Fujis
| and Galas it will hit you like a ton of bricks with how good
| it is compared to what you've been eating. You might even
| wonder why you would bother to get anything else. But it's
| soo saccharine, so uniformly "good" that it gets old fast
| IMO. Hard to explain, but sometimes I'd rather have something
| that tastes more like a good old fashioned apple and less
| like apple juice in apple form.
| chefandy wrote:
| If you're eating Fuji and Gala Apples that aren't in season
| or weren't picked when they were ripe, sure. However, both
| of those varieties are vastly more interesting than
| Honeycrisp when ripe and in season. Honeycrisp's advantage
| is being "good" for 7 months even if it's never "great."
| Fuji and Gala can be "great," but are usually picked under-
| ripe to ship well and extend shelf life, and they sit
| around far too long; they were picked too soon to be "good"
| and will be sold long after they're less good than that.
| Just about they only thing they're OK for at that point is
| making sweet cider.
|
| Growing up in New England, I always thought Washington's
| much-touted apples were shit until I had one on the west
| coast. They're just as good as ours, but out here we only
| get the ones that were intended for shipping, and they'll
| always be vastly inferior. The reverse is true, also.
| colordrops wrote:
| My favorite are these narrow cylindrical green apples that
| grown in my mom's backyard. They are tart but not as tart as
| granny Smith, very chewy, and have a bit of bitterness and a
| strong tannin flavor. Beats everything else by a mile. No
| idea what they are called though.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Pink Lady, Pink Pearl, Gravenstein. Honorable mention to
| Rhode Island Green and Pippin if you like 'em tart.
| CoffeeOnWrite wrote:
| Just FWIW re your last sentence, per Wikipedia the US patent
| for the Honeycrisp cultivar expired in 2008..
| chefandy wrote:
| Good to know.
| soheil wrote:
| I kinda like the Newtown Pippin Apple.
| 1024core wrote:
| I don't know what this guy is talking about. He lists Arkansas
| Black as a terrible apple; man has no taste! AB's one of the best
| apples I've ever had.
|
| And he doesn't even mention the Gravenstein apple, which made
| Sebastopol, CA famous?!
| ihaveajob wrote:
| Oh man, I liked a Cameo apple so much the other year that I kept
| the seeds to grow something at least remotely similar. Right now
| the tree is standing a good 8ft tall, and I expect it to yield
| some fruit next fall. Only time will tell if it's only a 50/100
| apple, or a great one like I remember.
|
| Actually, looking at the comments
| (https://applerankings.com/cameo-apple-review/), I'm not the only
| one who thinks they're a great pick.
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| FYI, apples don't grow true from seed. The apples you get (if
| any) from your tree will likely be nothing at all like the
| apple they came from.
| samatman wrote:
| All is not lost, however!
|
| The apple tree in question can be grafted with a branch of
| Cameo, or several.
| adamgordonbell wrote:
| Honeycrisp are so good and ruined other apples for me. Now I only
| eat Honeycrisp and its various variants like cosmic crisp,
| Pazazz, SweeTango and so on.
| 1letterunixname wrote:
| Miss apple orchards like this one with fresh cider.
|
| https://www.facebook.com/NobleOrchards/
| PontifexMinimus wrote:
| The annoying thing about this website is I can't find anywhere
| that lists the apples by rank, in any of their 12 categories. A
| ranking website should, y'know, rank things.
| NotAbhay wrote:
| If you click on the "Pick an Apple" menu tab it shows the list
| of apples by rank, https://applerankings.com/pick-an-apple/
| jffry wrote:
| Scroll down, it's hidden below the fullpage background image
| for a single search box
| fckgw wrote:
| This is a comedy website that uses rankings as a method for
| delivering jokes. Hope this helps.
| [deleted]
| grech wrote:
| Clicking on the "Pick an Apple" drop down in the menu bar takes
| you to the rankings page.
| jp0d wrote:
| I absolutely needed this today. Marking it as a favourite!
| flatiron wrote:
| I had to check: https://applerankings.com/red-delicious-apple-
| review/
|
| i have no clue why anyone would buy a red delicious apple. Their
| review is pretty funny.
| adlpz wrote:
| It's easily one of my favorite apples. I love them!
|
| The mealier, the better.
|
| Maybe I'm just weird.
| ashton314 wrote:
| You are just weird. Red "Delicious" is an abomination that
| never should have blemished this planet. ;-)
| [deleted]
| CarVac wrote:
| The best apple I ever had was a Fuji apple... in Japan.
|
| It's never that crisp in the US.
|
| I don't know why they rank Cosmic Crisp so low. I rank it neck
| and neck with SweeTango.
| NKosmatos wrote:
| Came here to say the same thing about Fuji apples. They're
| great from all aspects, juicy, nice taste, crisp/crunchy and
| you can keep them for many days without going bad. I don't know
| about the author or other places, but here in Greece we get
| them produced locally and they're always fresh and delicious.
|
| (Obviously I'm a Fuji apple lover :-) )
| alach11 wrote:
| I have to agree that Cosmic Crisp was unfairly ranked here. I
| did a blind tasting of ten apple varietals with 14 friends and
| Cosmic Crisp was the winner.
| ambrose2 wrote:
| They have really high standards in general for fruit in Japan.
| wizofaus wrote:
| Perhaps, but the prices are far far higher than would be
| justified by any increase in quality. And I'm not just
| talking about $5000 Densuke watermelons. Even a mango can be
| 3 or 4 times the price I'm used to paying in Aus.
| TheCondor wrote:
| I'm also a Fuji fan, it seems they either aren't as consistent
| or don't travel well. In the western US they are a serviceable
| and solid pick..
| trashface wrote:
| Organic Fuji apples in US can be pretty good, I certainly
| wouldn't categorize them as "Horse Food" as the site does. I
| like them better than Honeycrisp (and similar) which are almost
| sickeningly sweet to me.
|
| I also like Gala which this site ranks as "mediocre". It seems
| like the author just likes super sweet, crisp apples.
| LarryMade2 wrote:
| Most other apples give me heartburn, but Fuji are very good.
|
| I think taste may vary so that list is based on that person's
| opinion and taste-buds.
| charlieyu1 wrote:
| I don't even understand why this guy gave Fuji so low, a lot of
| Japanese fruits are another level.
|
| I will have them all day if only they weren't so expensive.
| Blackthorn wrote:
| Probably out of season.
|
| We can get cosmic crisps here year round, but they're usually
| out of season as a result. One of the good things about cosmic
| crisp is they don't really go super bad out of season, just
| almost-good.
| dirtyid wrote:
| Staggering varieties of Apples some of which are delightful. Wish
| there was some sort of clearly labelled Apple sample pack.
|
| Also, not a single green or yellow apple over 80.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| They've ranked Granny Smith as "Not worth eating" so right off
| the bat I can tell you the rating system is junk.
|
| It loses the most points on its "density." Can't say I've ever
| eaten a granny smith and thought "I enjoy this taste, but I sure
| wish I could change the density."
| [deleted]
| gtk40 wrote:
| I love the sourness and the texture. Too many popular apples
| are just "mealy" texture. I've tried some of the other tart or
| sour apples and they are just not as good.
| vehemenz wrote:
| They have Fuji below Gala. I'm surprised you made it that far.
| reducesuffering wrote:
| I was waiting to see this comment. These two are very popular
| in US markets but are world's apart in the opposite
| direction. Gala are straight mush. TBF they do caveat: "You
| MUST buy Gala's that are grown where it is currently
| Autumn... for an off-season Gala may be nothing more than a
| six-month old, previously frozen, grain silo in a fruit
| jacket." Which is 75% of the time...
| balls187 wrote:
| Funny enough I vastly prefer Gala to Fuji.
|
| And my girlfriend swears by Macintosh apples.
| roflyear wrote:
| I think this attempts to rank apples based on how people would
| rank them on average. I think it's good for that. Not a lot of
| people like Granny Smith apples. Maybe I would not say it is
| not worth eating, but I wouldn't suggest it unless you wanted
| something different?
| abruzzi wrote:
| Agreed. Taste is very personal, and to me Granny Smith are
| still my all time favorite apple. Most other apples are too
| sweet for me.
| humanistbot wrote:
| I sure do love me some Granny Smith apples, but probably
| because I grew up with them.
|
| Taste is subjective. Any ranking system for taste is just
| popularity with extra steps.
| dalbasal wrote:
| Matters of taste _are_ subjective, but subjective does not
| mean "all in your mind." There is such a thing as good
| music, good conversation, etc. There are no objective tests,
| but that's not the same as non existent.
|
| Good tastes exists. OP just has bad taste (in apples).
| mike8192 wrote:
| > OP just has bad taste (in apples).
|
| For someone who understands subjectivity, this is an
| awfully objective statement :)
| parkingrift wrote:
| Granny Smith is a trash tier Apple. The skin is inedible and it
| is absurdly sour. It's only edible if you peel the skin, cut it
| up, ...and bake it in something else. Alternatively peel the
| skin, and dip it into something such as peanut butter. By
| itself, it's trash tier.
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| I like my apples sour. But then my favorite fruit is lemon so
| I might be unusual.
| [deleted]
| pivo wrote:
| I don't like them by themselves, but I love them with other
| food. For example, with a nice nutty cheese and maybe some
| fig jam. The sourness can be perfect with a sweet
| counterpart.
| joosters wrote:
| It's just like any kind of snobbery. If you want to be a
| connoisseur, it's practically obligatory to detest all the
| popular options. Because _you_ (i.e. this website) are the
| expert and the commoners must be tasteless and wrong!
| Spivak wrote:
| What do you mean, the most popular options are at the top.
| Honeycrisp, Envy, and Pink Lady are "the good apples you can
| find at major grocery stores."
| mikejarema wrote:
| "The _definitive_ list of good and bad apples. "
|
| Definitive, eh? Qualifiers like this are amusing, as they're
| generally self-proclaimed.
|
| However, having a domain like applerankings.com, as well as a
| comprehensive, in-depth and entertaining library of apple
| reviews, definitely helps make the case.
|
| What other heuristics have you seen out there that help make a
| self-proclaimed "definitive source" become an indisputable one?
|
| Edit: looks like the site came online last year with that same
| claim, so time is not in their corner.
| [deleted]
| MarkusWandel wrote:
| Funny snarky descriptions, but asssuming you buy the ratings on
| this site, how do you list the apples by rating? I'm actually
| curious what he does like!
| favorited wrote:
| If you click the "pick an apple" button (instead of selecting
| from the drop-down), you get the whole index:
| https://applerankings.com/pick-an-apple/
| rsynnott wrote:
| I just can't trust any Apple Authority which claims that there
| exist apples worse than the dreaded Golden Delicious.
| midjji wrote:
| How many klicked thinking it was something related to apple
| dylan604 wrote:
| Everyone? It is about apple(s)
| tobylane wrote:
| Does Granny Smith redeem itself when baked? We have an apple tree
| we vaguely name as cooking apples, and it's nearly finished for
| the season. Stewed apple may be better than the top of this
| ranking. Are there many podcasts that talk about this? There was
| one that liked the cosmic crisp, but moved onto baseball and Icy
| Hot without trying other variants.
| dkarl wrote:
| When my wife makes apple pie, she alternates Granny Smith
| slices with slices of a sweeter apple (I don't remember which.)
| It works well for my taste.
| acchow wrote:
| I would like to try all the apples worse than Red Delicious. I
| find it a bit hard to imagine something worse.
| marricks wrote:
| I don't get why people like honeycrisp so much. It's like a
| sweet, appley, cardboard.
| jihadjihad wrote:
| Amazing site, but I have to disagree on a couple of them! In my
| area, orchards have _excellent_ Jonathan and Winesap apples--I
| would never rank them that low! And I haven 't tried aging
| Arkansas Black apples yet, but I have heard it's worth doing if
| you have the storage.
|
| Totally agree on Pink Lady, just a wonderful apple all around.
| smcg wrote:
| Johnagolds are one of my all time favorites, but relegated to
| the site's dustbin.
| jzawodn wrote:
| Yeah, I grew up a few miles from a big orchard that had amazing
| Jonathon apples every Fall... I still miss them. Best. Apples.
| Ever.
| ab_goat wrote:
| If you like this, I recommend a much more comprehensive apple
| review site:
|
| https://adamapples.blogspot.com/
| hansoolo wrote:
| Kanzi in top three. So well deserved! I new saw one of those
| crisps I german supermarkets yet.
| asciimov wrote:
| I am a fan of the Pink Lady. It is a real treat if you cut them
| into slices add a smear of Peanut Butter and a squeeze of
| Sriracha.
| Smoosh wrote:
| My favourite too, a really great apple, but only eaten plain
| for me.
| ajm-codes wrote:
| Opal being snubbed is a clear sign this person lacks good
| judgement
| hazrmard wrote:
| "Horse food"?! To arms, my fellow Fuji Apple stans! This heresy
| is casus belli.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Yeah that's crazy. Not all fuji apples are good, but a good
| fuji is IMO basically as good as a good honeycrisp, and much
| cheaper.
| aliqot wrote:
| Pink Lady or gtfo my face
| dhruval wrote:
| Ambrosia Apples are top tier. Cant take this list seriously.
| Hakeemmidan wrote:
| I can't be the only that thought this would be Apple products'
| rankings
| teg4n_ wrote:
| Cosmic Crisp is not overhyped. I think it's noticeably better
| than Honey Crisp :\
| AbbeSomething wrote:
| I miss Ingrid Marie, this list strikes me as a summary of common
| industry varieties.
| dsparkman wrote:
| Yeah, these rankings are bogus. Snapdragon is far superior to
| Honeycrisp.
| lowbloodsugar wrote:
| Honey Crisps are just too sweet for me, so this list doesn't work
| for me. Next version: personal recommendations. If you like X,
| then these apples are better on these axes!
| lappet wrote:
| This is good. We need one for mangoes as well.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| https://balconygardenweb.com/different-types-of-mangoes-best...
| 1letterunixname wrote:
| (Gender joke about travel here.)
|
| Unripened ones contain urushiol just as raw cashew nuts, raw
| pistachios, and poison oak do. I can't believe health and
| wellness sites seriously suggest eating raw, unripe mangoes.
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| There are 7,500 cultivars of apples. This list doesn't cover most
| of the varieties in my tiny town in upstate NY. We had a good
| year for Macoun for example. Many apples get a bad rep just
| because they don't ship well, which is bullshit.
| anshumankmr wrote:
| As a non American, first time, I am seeing that Apples have
| brands.
| languagehacker wrote:
| I'm about to hulk out and fight over granny Smith
| srj wrote:
| Laughed at Fuji being "horse food". That's my favorite.
| gnicholas wrote:
| > _the most overhyped apple of all time_
|
| Good to see they've got Cosmic Crisp properly described.
| ionini wrote:
| Do yourself a favor and read the Newtown Pippin Apples' review.
| bitxbitxbitcoin wrote:
| Apparently Opal Apples taste like an unwiped anus... Never seen
| one to have tried myself - can anyone confirm?
| FpUser wrote:
| Honeycrisp are my ever favorite and the site agrees. Their rank
| it as a superb
| egberts1 wrote:
| I could argue that most farmers/food-distributors choose Most of
| the Apple varieties for their ability to stay freshest in a root
| cellar the longest (which was the primary source of food storage
| before refrigeration was invented).
|
| We bought a 1870s farmhouse and found some really good Red
| Delicious left buried about 2 feet deep in the year round
| 56-degree bacteria-less soil in the basement after the 13 years
| of ownership. Quite crispy but mealy too, surprisingly.
| sdfhbdf wrote:
| This is very US-Centric.
|
| Poland is the 3rd most apple producing country in the world
| (behind US and China) [1]. It has probably the highest apple per
| capita count and I cannot even find basic varieties that Poland
| offers in this search engine - Ligol, Antonowka (Antonovka)
| [2][3].
|
| [1]: https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/top-apple-producing-
| coun...
|
| [2]: https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ligol
|
| [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonovka
| heffer wrote:
| US is the default on the internet. So unless explicitly
| mentioned I tend to assume content is geared to a US audience.
|
| But I did not know Poland was big in apples. Interesting. I
| noticed the strong regional variances in Apple availability
| ever since moving to Canada. I have had a very hard time
| finding an apple that works well for baking, as Boskoop Apples
| aren't a thing here.
| sph wrote:
| I think you meant "<My country> is the default on the
| internet. So unless explicitly mentioned I tend to assume
| content is geared to a US audience." Because you are American
| and you tend to visit US-centric sites. No shit.
|
| I am pretty sure 90% of sites visited by Chinese citizens to
| be hosted in, and tailored towards China.
|
| Also it's not just the Internet being US centric. It's
| American people being US centric in general, and thus on the
| Internet make it seem like only US exists. It's more cultural
| than you think it is.
| ImprobableTruth wrote:
| The US has a larger population than the entirety of western
| Europe and it's easily the largest western country. I'm not
| from the US and I'd still consider it the default by sheer
| size.
| sph wrote:
| There is more to the world and the Internet than US and
| western Europe.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number
| _of...
| aardvarkr wrote:
| Wow that got really xenophobic really quick. No need to be
| so hostile.
| sph wrote:
| Where is the xenophobia? Come on, not every single minor
| comment you don't agree with is xenophobia.
|
| You might disagree and think I'm wrong. Fine. But there's
| no need to cry wolf because I said US culture is quite
| insular. Geez.
| heffer wrote:
| I agree with your assessment. I am not US American though.
| I live in America (Canada specifically) but I was born and
| raised in Europe. I'm afraid the cynicism in my original
| comment requires this context to be received.
|
| In my opinion it seems to reflect an expectation in culture
| in general. Most movies filmed in Canada do not actually
| depict Canada. I lived in Toronto for a while where there
| are almost as many NYPD cruisers as there are TPS cruisers
| and as many Yellow Cabs as there are Beck Taxis.
| International YouTubers translating things into Imperial
| Units and US Dollars in videos is another often seen
| accommodation to this.
| airstrike wrote:
| I think my simplest heuristic for agreeing with your
| point is how much content there is in the English
| Wikipedia vs. other languages. I haven't run the numbers,
| but I'm sure it's also much more US centric (take a look
| at the # of articles on the US government (current and
| historical) vs., say, the Brazilian government...)
|
| America just tends to be particularly prolific in
| producing online content. No, I'm not claiming this as a
| statistical fact, but I am claiming that's the impression
| day in an day out so might as well assume as much...
|
| (Dis)claimer: I'm not American
| ausudhz wrote:
| China and India have more internet users than the US.
|
| Unless you specify, I might assume you're Asian.
|
| (most probably they'd speak English too. I'm gonna say
| because I think you'd be concerned)
| heffer wrote:
| Exactly my point.
| acuozzo wrote:
| ARPANET was developed by neither China nor India.
| ausudhz wrote:
| Paper was invented in China
| acuozzo wrote:
| Neat to know!
| MisterSandman wrote:
| What does that have to do with anything?
| acuozzo wrote:
| I was defending the right of the US to be "the default on
| the internet" as stated here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33640903
| gorjusborg wrote:
| Neat.
|
| The country of origin doesn't determine the quantity of
| people using it.
| acuozzo wrote:
| I was defending the right of the US to be "the default on
| the internet" as stated here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33640903
|
| "First!" usually trumps quantity.
| tomtheelder wrote:
| They don't have most of the varieties we grew in our apple
| orchard growing up in the NE US. It's a very limited selection.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| volandovengo wrote:
| God bless the internet!
| gokhan wrote:
| I really like Fuji, but it's very hard to come by in UK for an
| unknown reason.
| JoshuaEddy wrote:
| If you're in New England, you can find the orchards that grow
| your desired apple at https://newenglandapples.org/apples/
| purpleblue wrote:
| Autumn Glory apples are the absolute best apples I've ever had. I
| love it so much more than other apples, but I can't find them
| anywhere this year! The fact that this site ranks them so low
| means I can't trust any rankings from it.
| subsection1h wrote:
| Yeah, I immediately searched for Autumn Glory in their list and
| was shocked. I had them only once (I haven't seen them since)
| and they were the best apples I've ever tasted.
| brianbreslin wrote:
| I am just glad this has nothing to do with Apple inc. I clicked
| thinking it would be some sort of app store thing.
|
| Long live honeycrisp!
| kspacewalk2 wrote:
| Yawn, more of this silly apple snobbery. Yes, honey crisp is a
| good apple, but red delicious is also fine. The difference in
| taste between table/dessert apples is mostly personal preference.
| Get over yourselves, you are not better than the many people who
| prefer red delicious, and your palette is not more refined. I've
| met apple farmers who rather like red delicious, surely it's not
| because the poor wretches just don't have access to the other
| kinds, or know nothing about apples.
| Spivak wrote:
| > but red delicious is also fine
|
| I was prepared to agree with you on pretty much any apple
| except red delicious. They are absolutely disgusting and leave
| no room for preference or taste. They're flavorless and mealy.
| I wouldn't give one to my worst enemy.
| 867-5309 wrote:
| >more of this silly apple snobbery
| widerporst wrote:
| Eh, different people like different tastes, sure. I
| wouldn't judge someone for liking the taste of a Red
| Delicious. But there are some practically universally
| disdained qualities, like mealiness. And Red Delicious is
| definitely one of the worst offenders in that regards,
| making it an (almost) objectively bad cultivar.
| Spivak wrote:
| Fine, sure. How bad does something have to taste for it to
| stop being snobbery? Is there any time you can criticize
| any food? Taste is subjective at the margins but Red
| Delicious are famously reviled, and for good reason.
| Whatever measure you pick for "aspects of foods that humans
| like" they will fail.
|
| You're allowed to be that one person that them, I like
| things that nobody else likes too but I'm not stupid enough
| to serve them to others.
| 867-5309 wrote:
| >Is there any time you can criticize any food?
|
| perhaps not during a global food crisis, from a first-
| world (obese) nation, which is seeing some fruits and
| vegetables tripling in price
| Spivak wrote:
| This is the "you should finish your plate, there are
| children starving in __" argument just stated
| differently. Red delicious apples suck and if we dropped
| into a depression where that was my only option that
| isn't going to suddenly make them taste good and I'll
| complain the whole time eating them.
| kspacewalk2 wrote:
| >Red Delicious are famously reviled, and for good reason
|
| Famously reviled by whom? Could this be selection bias at
| play? I personally have never met a real-world person who
| disliked them as singularly as Internet hipsters do.
| Opinions range from "my fav" to "not my fav".
|
| >You're allowed to be that one person that them
|
| Ah, I've got my work cut out for me*, visiting every
| single grocery store and buying up their most abundant
| supply of apples. Surely they cannot be ordering them due
| to popularity.
|
| * (Red delicious is not even my favourite, just a regular
| apple).
| FinnKuhn wrote:
| Disappointed to see my favourite Apple
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belle_de_Boskoop) missing...
| dddw wrote:
| Great apple for pie! but seldom eat it out of my hand.
| dddw wrote:
| Also Elstar is missing, that would be my everyday goto apple
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elstar
| radicaldreamer wrote:
| One reason many European varieties may be missing is because
| the apple market is pretty regionalized (95% of apples sold
| in the US are grown in the US), unlike the bananas market,
| which is hyper-globalized.
| black_puppydog wrote:
| Yes, came here to complain about exactly that one! Outrage! :D
|
| Also James Grieve, and Cox's Orange are great.
|
| Personally I stopped touching any supermarket apples, they're
| all bland. I have a market in front of my house and my parents
| have trees in the garden, and there's nothing better.
|
| Really speaks to what we're losing as a result of
| industrialized agriculture. Not saying it's not worth it in
| order to feed billions, that point can be made, but still...
| yeahdef wrote:
| reminds me a little bit of snackdata.com
| pfist wrote:
| I'm impressed by the level of detail put into this project. There
| is a lot of information here, and his writing is hilarious. I
| guess he's really passionate about apples!
| baxtr wrote:
| Too bad they don't have Topaz. It would obviously rank at the
| top.
| ghostwriter wrote:
| Braeburn has a lower rank than Pink Lady? This ranking system is
| broken.
| ebspelman wrote:
| politely but firmly (with all my soul) disagree.
| ghostwriter wrote:
| It's the level of sweetness and crispness I'm troubled with
| most of the time. Braeburns are crispier and are better
| balanced at sweetness (neiter sour nor too sweet) IMO.
| jackallis wrote:
| boy, this is painful to read regarding red delicious.
|
| "Nowadays, you can find this thick-skinned, flavorless, mealy
| imposter unwashed in a dirty wicker basket on the floor of a
| convenience store. What a sad state of affairs. It's time to hang
| them up old man, your time has passed."
| ddoolin wrote:
| I cried laughing so hard. Other descriptions can't help but
| comment on it as well, such as "belligerently disgusting" in
| the Honeycrisp description.
| anthonybsd wrote:
| Missing my favorite apple, Ginger Gold :(
| smoyer wrote:
| Came to say the same ... Bought a bag today around noon and
| they are half gone!
| anthonybsd wrote:
| You are lucky. Where I am (Northern NJ) Ginger Gold's been
| gone out of stores for a few weeks now. Highly seasonal :(
| Angostura wrote:
| No Cox?
| azepoi wrote:
| Came for that. The list is severely lacking.
| sdze wrote:
| What a bunch of marketing voodoo.
|
| The best apple is the cheapest one. Best is free.
| dekhn wrote:
| To me the source of the apple matters a lot more than the breed
| itself. Put another way: there is a high variance in the quality
| of apples independent of the breed.
|
| The absolute best apples I've ever had were pick-ur-own at a
| well-regarded apple orchard in Connecticut. I believe they are
| McIntosh although it could also be macoun. Every apple is crisp
| (not mealy), sweet and tart, with a thin skin and lots of flesh.
|
| The big disappointment for me was moving to california, in an
| area without pick-your-own. How do I put it? The vast majority of
| apples in supermarkets here are abysmal. The granny smiths were
| often mealy and not tart at all! It wasn't until I went to a
| boutique grocery (Monterey Market in Berkeley) that I finally
| tasted apples in the same category as the ones I grew up with.
|
| Reading the descriptions on this site, I don't really recognize
| their descriptions. Mcintosh has a thick skin? Ummmm.
| zhynn wrote:
| If it has thin skins, it is not macintosh. The thick skin is
| one of the hallmarks of the cultivar. Macoun are my favorite,
| though they don't store for long. My favorite storage apple is
| Empire.
| nckslvrmn wrote:
| +1000, Macouns from Rogers Orchards in Southington CT are the
| BEST apples on the planet
| theobeers wrote:
| I never thought I would see mention of Rogers Orchards on HN.
| Some of my family members live within biking distance of
| there, and I love stopping by for a bag of apples or a pie.
| wrycoder wrote:
| Apples in season at the orchard are not comparable to apples at
| the local big chain market. The latter are picked green and
| ripened with ethylene gas when needed.
|
| The varieties of apples best eaten fresh at the orchard differ
| from the best orchard varieties to save at home, and those are
| in turn different from the varieties used in general commerce,
| which are chosen for survival, not taste.
|
| And, pie apples are not eating apples, nor are they cider
| apples.
|
| The rating listing is laughable.
| marze wrote:
| This is so true. Thinning, tree health, soil health, all make a
| huge difference.
| guyzero wrote:
| Hit Berkeley Bowl or farmers markets which will have much
| fresher apples.
| CoffeeOnWrite wrote:
| Monterey Market is just as good or better than Berkeley Bowl
| for apples.
|
| (Incidentally Monterey Market has quite a better mushroom
| aisle than Berkeley Bowl..)
| dekhn wrote:
| I shop at Monterey Market more since it is closer to my
| house. But yes, BB also has quality produce.
| erisinger wrote:
| This is the truth. A Fuji apple _in Japan_ is life-changing. A
| Fuji apple in Minnesota is flavorless and either hard as a rock
| or mushy and granular. It's all about the source.
| [deleted]
| theonething wrote:
| > he vast majority of apples in supermarkets here are abysmal.
|
| And here I thought I just didn't like apples (California
| resident). Will need to expand my geographic apple boundaries.
| parkersweb wrote:
| if you love apple varieties this account showcases some of the
| more unusual ones: https://www.instagram.com/pomme_queen/
| ckemere wrote:
| Awesome link! Though I think the reviewer has a bias against
| crunch and skin flavor. (I don't understand how the Smitten ranks
| so low.)
| fergie wrote:
| 3 observations:
|
| 1) Granny Smith apples are quite nice.
|
| 2) Generally you should be suspicious of "good" fruits as these
| are the varieties that have been the most intensively
| bred/engineered and grown.
|
| 3) This list is so incomplete- where are all the Scandinavian
| apples?!?
| liminal wrote:
| Opal Apple Review - "A Tasty Unwiped Anus"
| https://applerankings.com/opal-apple-review/
| drumttocs8 wrote:
| Man, this guy had a lot of cheeky fun writing the titles and
| descriptions!
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| It was my understanding from lockdown that the UK had millions of
| apples frozen, and would essentially just cycle through - in
| other words every apple came from farm to freezer to shop.
|
| I may have misunderstood
| Johbii wrote:
| What's wrong with granny smith?????
| cmiller1 wrote:
| Missing my favorite, Northern Spy
| pr0zac wrote:
| Finally a fully objective ranking of apples that is completely
| correct and anyone that disagrees is provably wrong, a fact in no
| way based on my personal feelings agreeing with the rankings
| within.
| [deleted]
| soapboxrocket wrote:
| He's got Granny Smith in the shit category, and this just reminds
| me of a funny story about dogs!
|
| We had two corgis and my wife made all their meals by hand. Part
| of their diet was apples, but we found one of the corgis would
| almost always eat around the apple (usually just a cheap red
| apple) pieces and leave them for the other dog. Then one time
| Granny Smith apples were cheaper at the grocery store so that is
| what we purchased and provided. He ate them up!
|
| Turns out the dog just didn't like the sweeter apples and wanted
| the tart tang of a good Granny Smith.
| KyleBerezin wrote:
| My dog seems to prefer apples based purely on their crispiness.
| josefdlange wrote:
| I have a corgi and that tracks for me. To people who don't have
| corgs, they're sweet kind friendly cute delicate beautiful
| creatures. The those of us who have been blessed with corgs in
| our lives, we know they're really the Frank Reynolds of dogs.
| And I love my corg for it. She's a trash dog, a scrappy little
| scamp, and knows that everyone else she meets will never, ever
| know it.
| jojobas wrote:
| All of their top picks are red, and the two I've tried are too
| sweet and bland at the same time.
|
| I'll pick a Granny Smith any day over any red apple, the
| authors of this "ranking" appear quite arrogant in their
| pretentiousness.
|
| Then again, I eat lemons whole so what do I know.
| reportingsjr wrote:
| I absolutely love sour foods, to the point of drinking
| straight up lemon juice when I was younger. I eat a granny
| smith apple probably every other day, and the more sour the
| better. Yet, my S.O. recoils at the thought of eating granny
| smiths. I wonder why people have such varied responses when
| it comes to sour foods.
| TylerE wrote:
| Their 3rd highest rated apple is incredibly sour.
| jojobas wrote:
| Seems to only be available half a year from now where I am,
| will try to remember.
| jonahx wrote:
| Came here to say that this invalidates the entire list!
|
| Great to see this as the top comment!
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| Red Delicious 25
|
| Granny Smith 53
|
| McIntosh 45
|
| Cortland 24
|
| Either I have never had a good apple or there is something
| off with this list and the reviews. Could it be they are
| using imported or out of season apples?
|
| This list is pretty much the apples I have access to locally
| and they are all perceivably better than some of the
| international variety that are ranked higher on that website.
|
| The comment section for Cortland is savage and honestly I
| agree with a lot of it.
| LilBytes wrote:
| I suspect the author of the website has no time for tart
| apples, seems there's a bias for sweetness.
| cvwright wrote:
| I suspect the author has a sample size of one for some of
| these varietals. Some of these descriptions are... off.
| cvwright wrote:
| That's only because you have terrible taste in apples. :)
|
| Seriously though, who rates Braeburn at 73 and Cortland at
| 24? They're really not that different if you get them
| fresh.
|
| It sounds like they found their test Cortlands in a wet bag
| behind a dumpster.
| Derawk wrote:
| Red Delicious was described as "mealy", which sounds like
| an out of season apple. The science behind long term
| storage of apples made it really common to have edible
| apples all year round but when critiquing you've got to
| take freshness into account.
|
| This site has a comedy bend but with all the interest I'd
| love to see it embrace a rotten tomatoes kind of style (the
| critics vs. the masses).
| batiudrami wrote:
| Every golden and red delicious apple I've ever had I
| would describe as "mealy" though. In Australia we don't
| get many of these varieties but Pink Lady is my favourite
| so I'm tentatively happy to back this list in.
| Blackthorn wrote:
| I've had red deliciouses direct from the farmstand and
| they're mealy. They really are just bad.
| TylerE wrote:
| Nothing says delicious like having to put that in the
| name, right?
|
| Actually powerful people don't go around saying how
| powerful and important they are. They don't need to.
| mark-r wrote:
| I've found that to be a universal truism in marketing. If
| your product is missing some important attribute, put it
| into the name. The power of suggestion overcomes reality.
| The Red Delicious apple is the very product that hammered
| this home for me.
| swasheck wrote:
| apparently the red delicious was selectively bred for
| appearance over taste and texture according to an article
| (which i cannot find) i read a few years ago (and somehow
| retained this information).
|
| now the darlings are, apparently, pink lady and
| honeycrisp, which are both excellent apples.
| fennecfoxy wrote:
| Also Braeburn is mediocre?!?1
| swyx wrote:
| you can listen to him rant about the Granny Smith at the end of
| this interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zohlRKE49wo
| pretty funny
|
| "Granny Smith apple"
|
| "Oh boy... Alright you just made a mistake"
| matwood wrote:
| Dogs are as unique as people :)
|
| All 3 of my dogs love love love bananas. To the point where
| they can be dead asleep and they wake up from the sound of
| peeling the banana. My guess is they all would have preferred
| the sweeter apples over the tart ones.
| jamiek88 wrote:
| I had a dog who loved watermelon. She was a (rescue) pug too
| so you can imagine the mess she made of that.
|
| Even on her deathbed, literal hours before crossing the
| bridge, she still managed a little.
|
| (Wow, I'm 45, it's been nearly 5 years and I suddenly started
| crying after writing that. Goddamn I miss that dog. RIP
| Lucy.)
|
| (I defensively stated rescue as I'm often assailed with 'pugs
| should not exist' replies. I tend to agree. But they do. So
| let's give them the best lives possible and pressure breeders
| not guardians. Guardian instead of owner. I don't want to own
| a sentient being. Semantics maybe but language changes
| attitudes and you all let that 02022 is the year guy do his
| schtick!)
| matwood wrote:
| No explanation needed. We have 3 frenchies - also rescues.
| People get them, realize their vets bills are insane, and
| then dump them off. They are also a big breed in puppy
| mills that get shut down. We have spent an inordinate
| amount of money on frenchies over the years (we've had 5 -
| not at the same time, but 2 died prematurely from health
| issues), but these dogs didn't chose be here, and deserve a
| good life.
| LilBytes wrote:
| You're both doing incredible work. It's heart breaking
| losing a dog, it's raw for me now currently I'm still in
| the crying-almost-daily stage.
|
| Not too dissimilar to me, though I don't often go breed
| specific but age. I've foster failed a few dogs in the
| last 6-7 years. I lost my recent foster fail Buster on
| the 2nd of November and I only got him back from the
| crematorium yesterday.
|
| It's been a rough few weeks, this home has only ever been
| a home with Buster in it and it's been dreadfully empty
| with his passing. I cry every day I see something that
| reminds me of him.
|
| Baby gates that stop him going up and down stairs because
| of his arthritis. His dog beds in each room which he
| would follow us when my partner and I worked from home.
| Food bowls. His blankets to keep him old bones warm.
| Coming home or getting out of bed and him not being there
| to howl at me. It's truly dreadful.
|
| Buster was 14.5 years old when he passed and was 12 yo
| when I adopted him. I didn't believe his age when I
| adopted him. He was a Husky X Boxer so I could only
| imagine what he was like as a puppy considering his
| appetite for movement at 12 yo when he was effectively
| 100+ in human years.
|
| Some pictures of Buster:
| https://imgur.com/gallery/WtLy4ZN/comment/2279131045
|
| I want to wait a while before fostering or adopting again
| but... I'm getting warn down by all the dogs that are
| needing a home from the groups I volunteer and donate to.
| I'm doom scrolling dogs in need daily.
| matwood wrote:
| I'm so sorry. I feel for you and don't have any advice to
| give. Reading your post and looking at the pictures of
| Buster have me tearing up.
|
| I've often wondered what makes our bonds with dogs so
| tight. I often joke with my partner that I wish she
| looked at me like one of our dogs does.
|
| It's a reminder to show the people and animals around you
| how much you care about them everyday.
|
| When you're ready, the next dog that finds you will be
| lucky find a person who cares so much.
| jamiek88 wrote:
| Oh lilbytes,
|
| My heart goes out to you.
|
| I know exactly how you feel my only advice is to do your
| best to let those feelings come. Wallow a little. Feel
| and experience your grief.
|
| Locking it away doesn't work and the tears will become
| fond smiles in time.
|
| Wishing you peace.
| e40 wrote:
| McIntosh are my favorite and in the shit category. So, you peel
| it, no big deal.
|
| Honestly, I don't think I can trust anything else on the site
| because of this review, unless it's completely meant to be some
| sort of joke...
| Xcelerate wrote:
| Totally disagree with SugarBee being so low. My understanding is
| that it was engineered to be an improved version of Honeycrisp.
| My wife and I did a head-to-head comparison of SugarBee and
| Honeycrisp, and the SugarBee won no contest. We got our apples
| from Sigona's; maybe the list creator got a bad batch somewhere?
| harveywi wrote:
| So you are essentially saying it was not an apples to apples
| comparison?
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Now _this_ is the kind of important tech /nerd info that I come
| to HN for! 10/10
|
| Notes:
|
| I'm only familiar with several of the varieties on this page, but
| I definitely agree with the rankings. We used to buy Gala, Fuji
| or Juici, since there were the cheapest at the store and we
| didn't know better, but once we tried Honeycrisp we never went
| back. (Cosmic Crisp also ok but not as good. I'd also rank Envy a
| bit lower.)
|
| Also, best cider I've had is from Honeycrisp apples.
|
| Red/Golden Delicious are tasteless garbage. Granny Smith is ok
| for particular dishes so I'd probably rank it a bit higher.
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| I am actually now interested in trying one of these "Arkansas
| Black", "Cortland", or "Newtown Pippin" apples just to see if
| an apple can really be worse than a Red Delicious.
|
| I hadn't thought such a thing was possible till now.
| jefftk wrote:
| Cortlands get mushy and flavorless quickly, even if
| refrigerated, and so are bad supermarket apples. But I'd
| rather have one straight off the tree than any of their top
| rated apples.
| infotropy wrote:
| I'll come to the defense of Arkansas Blacks. They are
| definitely better than Red Delicious. They're just really
| hard and quite tart with a faint green flesh. Red Delicious
| are mealy and tasteless.
|
| I love the Arkansas Blacks, but they wouldn't be everyone's
| cup of tea.
| 1024core wrote:
| I love Arkansas Blacks! They have a hint of cardamom
| aftertaste, which makes them unique!
| dmm10 wrote:
| I took up the Arkansas Black cause from my grandmother
| who was born in the 1800's. They are unarguably hard.
| That contributes to them being amazing baking apples.
| Unfortunately whoever created this list of apples seems
| to have never considered eating apples that were baked in
| foods. Not even a mention of baking apples vs. eating
| apples appears on the site. Some varieties are good for
| baking and eating. Then there are those worthless for
| either (ie. red delicious.)
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Pippins are in season here and they seem to be exceptionally
| high in tannins and not too prone to turning mealy. They're
| not great for snacking but I bet they'd go really well in a
| pie.
| spike021 wrote:
| I think Golden Delicious can be delicious but they have to be
| just right. Red are the absolute worst, though.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Agree. I think they underrate Cartland and Jonagold but maybe
| it's because I am a New Yorker. I think Honeycrips is OK but
| not stellar.
| [deleted]
| hahamrfunnyguy wrote:
| As other commenters have said, apples can be pretty variable in
| flavor. Many are not keepers or go flavorless fast. The last
| couple of bags of Gala's I've bought have been very good. The
| flavor doesn't keep for long and the become pretty bland.
|
| I don't care for Honeycrisp at all, fresh or not. Too high of a
| sugar to acid balance. I prefer my apples with a bit of a tang.
| Cosmic crisp can be great. For the more common apples, I really
| like Empire and Pink Lady (Cripp's Pink) as well.
|
| I don't agree with any of this guy's ratings at all, he seems
| to only like the really sweet apples.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| To be fair, there is a huge difference in how some of these
| apples taste coming straight off the tree at the right moment,
| and in the supermarket.
| swalsh wrote:
| If you can find a Kanzi, you need to try them. By far the best
| Apple available.
| molsongolden wrote:
| I've actually had very good red/golden delicious when picking
| them myself at a local orchard. Not sure if they degrade so
| quickly that freshness was the difference or if the local farm
| was growing a slightly different varietal less designed for
| transport and storage.
| eyelidlessness wrote:
| Whatever truth there is to the rapid degradation, for at
| least red delicious there's a long time for degradation
| because they're staples in mass markets which don't otherwise
| stock fresh fruit (eg schools, convenience stores). Who knows
| how long those apples have traveled or rested waiting to be
| consumed.
| gammarator wrote:
| This appears to be one person's subjective nonsense--I personally
| think SweetTango apples taste cloying artificial, for instance.
|
| I like the website
| https://www.orangepippin.com/varieties/apples/ambrosia instead.
| sonofaragorn wrote:
| Surprised this domain was available
| tambourine_man wrote:
| h5 subheader "The definitive list of good and bad apples" is
| overlayed by the title on large screens
|
| Check Elementor's page builder responsiveness
|
| https://imgur.com/6v04O7y
| spuiszis wrote:
| This is simply fantastic - learned plenty of stuff about apples
| while genuinely laughing until my face hurt.
| ezekg wrote:
| There's not a lot that's better than a red delicious apple with
| some good peanut butter. All these sweet apples be damned.
| sovnade wrote:
| Absolutely appalled there are apples below Red Delicious on this
| list.
| Fiahil wrote:
| So sad that it's missing so many niche varieties and their
| translation... Am I to assume it's always the case with American
| authors?
| rehash3 wrote:
| Ah... the internet is still alive in bits and pieces! I know
| where I will be spending some time this weekend.
|
| PS: I hate the internet being monetization of cattle vs discovery
| of wild and unclassified species in the woods.
| [deleted]
| Snowbird3999 wrote:
| I used to be a fan, but these days I feel like there is little to
| no innovation in the top ranked apples anymore. Not to mention,
| does SweeTango even have USB-C?!
| johndhi wrote:
| Honey crisp massively overrated.
| csa wrote:
| This list reeks of middle-brow hipster ignorance:
|
| 1. If you're judging an apple by its year round availability (as
| the site creator does), then you've basically admitted that
| you're only randomly running into apples that are at their best.
| Some apples are amazing at their peak, but very mediocre when not
| at their peak.
|
| 2. As others have mentioned, there are many variables that
| influence the texture, taste, and appearance of an apple. If you
| live far away from where the apples are grown, you will mostly
| see either the negative side of these variables or the downsides
| introduced by breeding that allow these apples to get to your
| market. We don't even know the geographic base(s) of the author.
|
| I really appreciate the author's effort, but the execution and/or
| presentation needs a lot of work.
|
| I'm sure that a tour of orchards that are far from where the
| author lives would have him rethinking many of his rankings.
| braingenious wrote:
| >This list reeks of middle-brow hipster ignorance
|
| I agree! For example, a lot of their complaint about Cosmic
| Crisp is the marketing campaign around it. Like, buddy, that
| apple tree didn't design stickers or write press releases. It
| makes no sense to penalize the apple itself for that.
| rtev wrote:
| This is an entertainment site maintained by a comedian
| braingenious wrote:
| And I'm quite entertained by criticizing it!
| tristanc wrote:
| An entire thread about apple rankings and no mention of Adam's
| apples?
|
| https://adamapples.blogspot.com/
| stephencoyner wrote:
| They are severely underrating cosmic crisp imo. It's got all the
| flavor of the best honey crisp you've ever had with an
| unbelievably slow browning rate. You can cut one up and leave it
| out for hours and it's still not brown.
|
| My only beef with them is that they are too big. One cosmic is
| practically 2 meals.
| alach11 wrote:
| I have to agree that Cosmic Crisp was unfairly ranked here. I
| did a blind tasting of ten apple varietals with 14 friends and
| Cosmic Crisp was the winner. Now there are factors (the
| perfectly unbrowned flesh and small bites) that may have given
| it a slightly unfair advantage. But middle of the pack seems
| far too low.
| taftster wrote:
| I was excited for the Cosmic Crisp to broadly hit the market. I
| have been a Honey Crisp fan for a long time, but was looking
| forward to seeing if the CC could beat it.
|
| Turned out, I just don't like the CC at all. It's too sweet?
| And the sweetness is syrupy almost. And I miss the tartness of
| the HC, I guess.
|
| Cool looking apple, with all the stars on it and all, but I
| actually think the ranking places it just right. e.g. in "The
| Most Overhyped Apple of All Time" category.
| hughes wrote:
| Perfect for sharing :)
| SergeAx wrote:
| I beleive this is very US-centric. Living in Europe I never heard
| of most varieties from top-10.
|
| By the way, are description there GPT-generated?
| cocacola1 wrote:
| The Newtown Pippin:
|
| > This sand-filled condom from Long Island was choked down in the
| 1750s by the likes of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello, George
| Washington at Mount Vernon, and Benjamin Franklin as he declared
| it his favorite apple. Perhaps the Newtown Pippin was once a
| great apple whose quality has degraded over the centuries like
| the crumbling democracy the Founding Fathers established. Or
| perhaps, after decades of eating pigeon pie and squirrel meat,
| these wooden-toothed slave owners' tastebuds are not to be
| trusted. Either way, in today's world, aside from being excellent
| for apple cider production, the Newtown Pippin is a tasteless
| hunk of malformed donkey shit that should've been abolished
| during the reign of King George III
| [deleted]
| ropable wrote:
| What, no Bravo? Needs the ability to submit guest reviews.
| xivzgrev wrote:
| "BEST USES: Compost"
|
| couldn't agree more for red delicious. tastes like styrofoam.
| elil17 wrote:
| This list entirely ignores many of the highest rated apples.
| Adam's Apples, a long time apple reviewer, has six top ranked
| apples ("three stars, exceptional apple worth a quest"), all of
| which are exceptionally hard to find.
|
| https://adamapples.blogspot.com/p/apple-ratings-explained.ht...
| zhynn wrote:
| In-season macoun remains my favorite and is relatively easy to
| find out here in east-central vt. Cox's orange pippin
| however.... that's my favorite and it is so hard to find.
| czam wrote:
| Thanks, it has my recommendation Topaz as a "two-star" :)
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaz_(apple) as
| frozenbit wrote:
| A lot of terrible eating apples are great for baking, Granny
| Smith for example.
|
| Also, red delicious _used_ to be, well, delicious. But selective
| breeding made them taste terrible:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Delicious
|
| Wonder if the same will happen to other popular varieties, or if
| apple growers know better now.
| unmole wrote:
| > A lot of terrible eating apples are great for baking, Granny
| Smith for example.
|
| There's no accounting for taste. Grany Smith is my favourite
| eating apple.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| Granny Smith falls apart when baked; I prefer something that
| retains some toothy-ness like a Rome.
| r00fus wrote:
| I dunno - honeycrisp is not bad in a pie either. Depends on
| your preferred consistency at the end game.
|
| Preference for consistency is also very subjective - gala
| apples while "mediocre" were preferred by my kids as they're
| "softer" when slightly overripe, better for smaller younger
| mouths.
| jcims wrote:
| I distinctly remember picking red delicious as easily my
| favorite apple in the 80's. It's unrecognizable now.
| WFHRenaissance wrote:
| Red Delicious hate is is one of the corniest high-status opinions
| I see currently in rotation.
|
| Red Delicious apples are regarded as some of the best apples on
| the planet by most people, the SV and NYC types hate on them
| because poor people like them.
| arecurrence wrote:
| I'm surprised Ambrosia scored so poorly. Ambrosia was a taste
| explosion and remains a fond memory even now years later. Perhaps
| it has a narrow optimal for eating period.
|
| Honey Crisp is similar and generally my consolation buy as it's
| far more common to find.
| medell wrote:
| Agree, ambrosia is my #1. The fact that it is 55 and the
| mealier, less tart, less sweet Gala apples are 70 tells me we
| have very different tastes. It is closer to a Honeycrisp, which
| they have as 91 and I grab when Ambrosias are unavailable.
| tomcam wrote:
| I'll save everyone some time.
|
| Fuji.
| guyzero wrote:
| Per other commenters, Granny Smith gets downranked for being a
| mediocre apple for eating plain in-hand, but it's great for using
| in salads. We have a Granny Smith apple tree and we dry all the
| apples in a dehydrator and it makes the best apple chips.
| [deleted]
| dylan604 wrote:
| Granny Smiths are also good for baking in general. They have a
| twang to them that offsets some of the sweet, as well as being
| a crunchy apple that doesn't turn to mush during the cook.
| [deleted]
| jefftk wrote:
| This ranking seems pretty plausible to me if you're buying your
| apples at the supermarket. It gives good marks to varieties which
| maintain their texture through weeks (or months!) of
| refrigeration.
|
| On the other hand, if you're at an apple orchard and deciding
| what to pick to eat right now, this is not the list for you. A
| Cortland, McIntosh, or Macoun right off the tree easily beats a
| Honey/Cosmic/etc crisp.
| Blackthorn wrote:
| I wish it was easier to tell when just touching them.
|
| I love fresh Empire apples, but give them two weeks and they go
| from highly crisp to mealy. It's always a gamble even at the
| farmstand which one I'm going to get.
| Grazester wrote:
| I came here to say this about the Cortland Apple. Right off the
| tee it is so good. In the supermarket, not so much.
| mcphage wrote:
| Agreed. Yeah, Cortlands turn to mealy mush quickly, I admit
| that. But when they're fresh and crisp, they're absolutely
| amazing. This site does them dirty.
| Finnucane wrote:
| Yep. I live in New England, and in the fall it is easy to get
| fresh Macs and Cortlands, and always so much better than what
| is in the supermarkets most of the time. Honeycrisps are just
| too sweet (don't get me started about sweet corn!).
| mmanfrin wrote:
| This blatant Fuji disrespect has not gone unnoticed. Honeycrisp
| is ranked second and Fuji is down at the bottom despite HC being
| a slightly crispier but way more expensive Fuji?!
|
| How DARE you.
| deeblering4 wrote:
| Fuji rated far below Granny Smith? Horse food?? O H P L E A S E
| [deleted]
| twoWhlsGud wrote:
| Indeed! I blame the popularity of HC's on folks applying the
| same super-saturated attention spans they derived from spending
| too much time on Instagram to food preferences. Fuji's are
| yummy - HC's are over-sweet parodies of a proper apples.
|
| Hrmph! : )
|
| Though it's fun to read his reviews even where they're wrong,
| so there's that.
| gffrd wrote:
| Honeycrisp as #2? Nahhhh ...
| dalbasal wrote:
| Finally! An _objective_ ranking of apples. I for one am fed up
| with apples-to-oranges comparisons.
| [deleted]
| horsawlarway wrote:
| Honestly - I think this list prioritizes basically just
| "sweetness" and "crispness" (despite his claimed categories)
| which is fine - those are generally appealing things for eating.
| That said - many of the apples in the "shit" category are fucking
| delicious.
|
| There are days when I want a sweet, crisp apple, and there are
| days I have a _serious_ hankering for a good ol ' granny smith.
|
| Even the classic Red Delicious - which gets a really tarnished
| name in current pop culture is actually a damn good apple...
| soft, slightly chewy, sweet - but not too sweet, a little hint of
| bitter in the skin - it's just a different experience than the
| super sweet, juicy apples that start to just taste like apple
| juice.
|
| Then again - I really like apples, and I'm vaguely suspicious
| that the site maker just likes sugar water.
| jacobr1 wrote:
| > Even the classic Red Delicious
|
| You are right about the flavor profile - but Red Delicious gets
| its bad rap from being mealy.
|
| Now that might be due to historical transport and storage
| practices during the era when Red Delicious reigned supreme, in
| which case it is indeed a bad rap. But for me crispness is king
| and I remember eating mealy red delicious apples at school
| lunch and hating them. I had no problems with the apples my
| mother bought which were all sorts of non-Red-Delicious
| varities.
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| I used to like red delicious as a kid and my perception is
| that they got worse over time. I still like the other apples
| I ate as a kid. So I don't know if this is all in my mind or
| not.
| telchior wrote:
| You're probably right, not sure how old you are but growers
| kept selectively breeding solely for appearance up to (I
| think) the 2010s.
| nine_k wrote:
| Appearance _and_ shelf life. That 's how an apple
| attracts a buyer on a store shelf.
|
| Once you've bought grocery in a store, you're not going
| to return it if it's so-so but not outright dangerously
| rotten. And your choice of large stores nearby is
| limited, so you're not going to stop going to that store.
| ishjoh wrote:
| I love Golden Delicious apples. To me they are the standard of
| what a green apple should taste like. Crisp and tart, truly an
| amazing apple. Rating on this site was a 33. I suspect you're
| right that sweet was the highest priority.
|
| I also really like HoneyCrisp but I would rate it in the 70s,
| not the 90s.
| droopyEyelids wrote:
| A golden delicious is neither crisp (mealy) nor tart (bland,
| watery)- are you thinking of Granny Smith?
| nine_k wrote:
| It very much depends on when and where you buy them.
|
| Fresh, these are superb. After a week on a shelf, they get
| soft and a bit bland.
| nl wrote:
| > I love Golden Delicious apples. To me they are the
| standard of what a green apple should taste like.
|
| Nor are Golden Delicious' green, so I guess they do mean
| Granny Smith
| mpol wrote:
| Down here in the Netherlands most Golden Delicious are
| green, only seldom are they yellow. Mealy is when they
| are not saved well, more often they have a bit of bite.
| And juicy they are. It might differ per region.
| derac wrote:
| I've had some spectacular Golden Delicious apples. I
| hypothesize that these otherwise mealy apples in the right
| condition have a soft pearish texture rather than a crisp
| cucumber-like one, but it is a fragile structure that
| degrades more rapidly.
| BoorishBears wrote:
| The second to the top apple is listed for tartness isn't it?
| nl wrote:
| I love apples - even blogged about them once.
|
| I agree with the assessment of Red Delicious - it's just
| garbage. Being fed them as a kid put me off apples for years. I
| don't mind the taste of them when cooked or something, but the
| floury nature of them when eaten fresh is just horrible.
|
| I'd be interested in what you think of Jazz apples? To me they
| are somewhat similar to Red Delicious in taste but the
| crispness (is there a more crisp apple? I don't think so) makes
| them a much better experience.
| horsawlarway wrote:
| Eh - I think the Red Delicious is a complicated apple. It's
| also hard to accurately judge because for a long time - it
| was one of the _most_ propagated apples out there, and sadly
| - time matters a lot for this one. So unless you know they
| 're coming from somewhere very close to you, it's probably
| too old for hand eating (although I still do it - I don't
| hate the texture).
|
| It doesn't go _bad_ quickly, but it certainly loses a lot of
| its luster very quickly off the tree. It gets progressively
| more mealy the longer it 's been stored.
|
| Which... is the second point - older Red Delicious don't make
| great hand eating apples because they've lost the texture
| appeal, but they make a really important part of things like
| apple tarts or pies. I certainly wouldn't recommend _only_ a
| red delicious pie - since you basically end up with mush, but
| they really help hold together a pie when mixed in with other
| apples. I personally love a pie with 1 red delicious, 1
| granny smith, and then 4 filler apples (honey crisp is easy
| to find and tasty - but I actually prefer Rome, since they
| 're not as sweet).
|
| Cut the Red Delicious and Granny Smith up more finely than
| the other 4, so they mix in well. A lot of recipes say things
| like "no mushy pies!" but that's not really right - what they
| mean is that the whole pie shouldn't just be mush, but having
| a little mush in there is critical - otherwise you end up
| with apple bricks between layers of pie crust, and it's just
| really lackluster. That Red Delicious in there is going to
| help soak up some of the water coming out of the other
| apples, and give a nice contrast to the firmness/tartness
| from the granny smith. Then the filler apples are there for
| sweetness/apple flavor.
|
| Long story short - I've talked myself into making another
| apple pie this weekend...
| throwaway675309 wrote:
| Even assuming the flavor of red delicious was at all palatable
| in any sense of the word, it's impossible to get past the fact
| that they have the tepid texture of water soaked pile of
| corrugated cardboard. I think you may be an outlier.
| shirleyquirk wrote:
| They are, I was shocked to discover, delicious and crisp, but
| you have 30 seconds to eat them after picking before they
| turn into the horror you describe so eloquently.
| NBJack wrote:
| This is most certainly the real culprit. There are
| undoubtedly markets where the Red Delicious lives up to its
| name. The rest of us end up with whatever freshness
| roulette is played by the local supplier; while I too have
| occasionally eaten a 'good' one, the number of times I end
| up with an abomination in my taste buds far outweighs it.
| Blackthorn wrote:
| Yeah, I even bought one from a local farmstand to see if
| they really were better fresh. Nope.
| olyjohn wrote:
| First apple I looked up was Red Delicious, just to see if
| they're ranked as badly as I think they are. "Coffee Grinds
| in a Leather Glove" is the tagline for that apple!
| skyyler wrote:
| You might find this breakdown of popular american supermarket
| apples (in the context of pie):
|
| https://www.seriouseats.com/the-food-lab-what-are-the-best-a...
| appleflaxen wrote:
| That list is incomplete without honey crisp being listed
| johnbcoughlin wrote:
| Without having tried it... honeycrisp would be very likely
| to make a terrible apple pie due to too much water and
| sweetness.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| A waste of money, too. They're 3-4x as expensive as the
| other apples here.
| seabriez wrote:
| Not a fan of HoneyCrisp. HC are too acidic. Tangos are pretty
| good.
| syntaxing wrote:
| Hah, "You've been eating trash"
| oezi wrote:
| Ranking apples seems ridiculous as it would be to rank wines and
| just promotes monocultures where we should strive to have the
| widest range of heritage apples with their unique tastes.
| Reduction to a few global breeds just leads us to a situation as
| with bananas where a single fungus can threaten the global banana
| supply.
| athenot wrote:
| One aspect that comes into play is shelf life / freshness of the
| apple. I normally find Golden Delicious apples to be completely
| devoid of taste. But they keep a long time so chances are the
| ones I come across are months old.
|
| I was at an apple orchard a few years ago and encountered an
| awesome apple, enquired as to what was planted on that row and it
| was Golden Delicious. I triple-checked because it was a
| completely different taste than I expected.
|
| It would seem that taste doesn't keep once the apple is picked
| and it becomes bland over time.
| martibravo wrote:
| Am I the only one that thought it was a ranking on different
| Apple Inc.products?
| simonsarris wrote:
| Just this week I ordered for my orchard of weird little apples:
|
| Almata, Arkansas Black, Hudson's Golden Gem, Keepsake, Northern
| Spy, Pipsqueak, Ribston Pippin, Roxbury Russet, St. Edmund's
| Russet, Trailman, Wickson
|
| The only one this site had was Arkansas Black, which is very mild
| right off the tree but sweetens in storage. They hated it. I
| wonder if they ate it off the tree.
| KyleBerezin wrote:
| Northern Spy is a fantastic apple. I can't remember what they
| taste like whole, but they make great cider, and they mature
| super late so you can have fresh cider right up into winter.
| Most of our cider producers switch to spy in late autumn and
| that is when the cider tastes the best.
| kenjackson wrote:
| I did a taste test some years ago and Fuji won by a good margin.
| And this was in the US even -- I've heard they're better in
| Japan, but I was really pleased with their quality here. BTW, all
| my testing was with organic apples, if that makes a difference.
| nsxwolf wrote:
| Gosh I'm already eating Honeycrisp apples and they're just like,
| pretty good I guess. Doesn't look like there's a lot of headroom.
| Maybe I just like the idea of apples more than apples themselves.
| tencentshill wrote:
| samdafi wrote:
| What?
|
| Low rated Cripps Pink and high rated Pink Lady? Isn't it the same
| cultivar, just Pink Lady is trademarked?
| Ancalagon wrote:
| Hard disagree about cosmic crisps. IMHO they panned out as good
| as advertised and I like them more than honeycrisps.
|
| Otherwise I love this and makes me really want to try a
| SweeTango!!
| jeffkeen wrote:
| Really missed an opportunity not naming this site "How do you
| like them apples?"
| bitcurious wrote:
| It's not on the list, but if you haven't had Ananas Reinette
| apples you're in for a treat. Look for them!
| medell wrote:
| Most of the apples in grocery stores have been in storage for
| months since most are harvested in fall and have been sprayed
| with diphenylamine (DPA), an antioxidant that slows the
| development of black patches on the skin. DPA is banned in the EU
| because a byproduct of it when it breaks down, nitrosamine, is a
| carcinogen.
|
| I love apples, but since finding this out, I try to avoid eating
| them out of season.
|
| This article fails to mention DPA, but is interesting
| nonetheless!
| https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/11/26/668256349/th...
| willhinsa wrote:
| I fucking love science!!
|
| Sorry, I just hate the world we've built. I would so much
| rather live in a world where my apples are not poison but only
| are around during the fall.
|
| But, capital return requirements and the remorseless scythe of
| competition exist, so instead we get poison apples available
| year round.
| KoftaBob wrote:
| Would washing the apple thoroughly not remove the nitrosamine
| byproduct? Genuinely curious.
| indymike wrote:
| I entered II and ][, got an error. Then I realized it was for
| fruit.
| m463 wrote:
| what about for baking (and other uses)?
|
| baking an apple pie the apples need different characteristics
| than apples that taste sweet when you eat them.
|
| Also, I was at a farmer's market and they had other
| characteristics like "baking, snacking, salads, freezes well" and
| more I can't remember.
| RektBoy wrote:
| Is this an American thing to know types of apples from top of
| your head? I'm from EU and apples are just apples, of course we
| have multiple types of apples at store, some are better than
| others, but really can't remember their names.
| ekianjo wrote:
| Rankings based on what ? Personal taste? And it's not like every
| batch of apple is going to be the exact same from one week to
| another... You need to be a lot more specific than that.
| wilg wrote:
| I wish the website would recommend similar apples to ones I know
| about. One of you clowns surely knows ML or something, help this
| guy out!
| asah wrote:
| LOL! Example:
|
| https://applerankings.com/arkansas-black-apple-review/
|
| Arkansas Black Apple
|
| This teeth-shattering oddity, boasting a deep red hue that'll
| make a dark cherry look like a fluorescent glow stick, will
| destroy your helpless mouth with every unfortunate bite. A ten
| out of ten on the Mohs Hardness Scale, this apple would perform
| admirably as a drill tip in a diamond mine. While true the
| hardness marginally decreases if left in your refrigerator for a
| full year, those patient enough to plan lunch into the next
| decade will be sorely disappointed with a thick-skinned carbuncle
| that tastes and feels like an uncooked russet potato. Truly
| despicable.
| conartist wrote:
| Absolutely offended by the ranking of my go to apple the humble
| Granny Smith
| yalogin wrote:
| Without going into the contents of the article, I was surprised
| to learn recently the number of varieties of apple available.
| Then I learned apple sweetness and tartness rankings is a thing.
| I don't understand why so many exist and need to exist. Why
| didn't the whole market just coalesce on a few(2/3) varieties? Do
| people actively seek a specific variety and all these are in
| vogue?
| boomerango wrote:
| It's doubly strange when you realize there's basically a single
| species of banana that we all eat.
| wizofaus wrote:
| Fairly sure all cultivars are the same species. And I dunno
| about you but I regular see Lady Fingers and Plantains and
| not occasionally Red bananas at markets here along with the
| ubiquitous Cavendish, so they obviously are eaten (I've had
| cooked Plantain in south American dishes a fair bit, but not
| recently). But it's probably true that most fruits are more
| heavily dominated by a single cultivar than apples, and
| there's rarely more than 2 or 3 alternatives readily
| available. Esp. berries - can't think of when I saw multiple
| options for blueberries or blackberries and even for
| strawberries it's rare to have much choice.
| StillBored wrote:
| ? Thats the way it was just a few decades ago. Red delicious,
| and Granny smith.
|
| Now we have more choices, which is good because apples are a
| species that produce offspring that is frequently quite
| different than the parents. Meaning every single one of those
| supermarket apples is the product of a long dead tree being
| propagated.
| hedora wrote:
| The comments column table will help:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_apple_cultivars
|
| There used to be more than the current 7500 cultivars. Many
| went extinct. There are groups that scour abandoned homesteads
| looking for surviving trees of lost varieties.
|
| One reason there are so many is that apple trees are readily
| planted, but each new tree produces a completely different
| variety of fruit. Rule of thumb is that 1% of trees produce
| something edible, 0.1% something good, and 0.01% something
| commercializable.
|
| For this reason, almost all apples you eat come from clones.
| (As they have been for 100's-1000's of years.)
| civilized wrote:
| Everyone in my family loves Granny Smiths, even the 4 year old.
| Her apple consumption greatly increases every time they're in
| season.
|
| The top varieties listed here are indeed good but I quickly come
| to find their sweetness cloying. Meanwhile I'll eat a 5 lb bag of
| good Granny Smiths in a week.
|
| Which brings us to another important point about apples. They
| have to be in season. If you get off-season Grannies from Chile,
| you're in for a leathery/papery-skinned, mealy disappointment.
|
| Peak Granny season in the US is early/mid-fall, aka right now.
| empiricus wrote:
| I always peel granny smiths, so much better imo.
| dom96 wrote:
| I wish this listed which countries each can be bought in. Anyone
| know which of the best ones are available in the UK?
| jschveibinz wrote:
| Opal apples are at the top of the list when fresh: sweet, tangy,
| intense apple flavor, crisp, and reminiscent of trips to the
| apple orchard growing up in northeast Ohio.
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| You rank Jazz apples a 65? What?
|
| Clearly flawed site is clearly flawed.
| chaostheory wrote:
| This list is garbage. Honey crisps are mediocre while Fujis are
| great.
| tuatoru wrote:
| Disappointing site - it doesn't even mention the two main
| categories of apple breeds. Apples were traditionally bred either
| for cooking or for dessert. There should be a selector and
| separate ratings for intended use.
|
| With the advent of the shipping container, of course, they are
| now bred primarily for toughness (low bruising), visual appeal,
| tolerance of long storage without losing visual appeal, and a
| short picking season. Taste and texture are minor attributes.
| Visual appeal means a waxy tough skin and size, mainly. The
| Granny Smith and Red Delicious being the archetypes.
|
| When I was growing up, in autumn we used to get (by rail, from
| the grower, 200 miles away) a case of Cox's Orange Pippin[1] for
| eating, and another two of another apple the name of which I
| can't remember for cooking. The Envy, Smitten, and Sweetango come
| closest to the Cox's Orange as I remember it, although that had a
| hint of a winy taste to it.
|
| If you have room for an apple tree or two, there are many
| heirloom varieties out there that were bred for taste and
| texture, not for shipping, storage, and display.
|
| ETA: The ratings are pure opinion, based on what is available at
| the author's location, the author's preferences, and undefined
| attributes. What does "skin" mean as a quantitative measure? And
| why is "branding" a factor at all?
|
| 1. https://www.epicgardening.com/heirloom-apples/
| deskamess wrote:
| Went apple picking a few weeks ago. It was end of season but they
| had one I never tasted called Eden. Wow. My new favorite.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| McIntosh: " A Seal-Skinned Canadian Letdown." 45, horse food.
|
| So it's war then.
| pivo wrote:
| I've never had a McIntosh that wasn't grainy and bland. Where
| do you find good tasting ones?
| biotinker wrote:
| At an orchard, or in the months of September and October.
|
| McIntosh are very difficult to keep properly, with age they
| will become mealy and bland. Same with many of its
| descendants, like Cortland.
|
| If you get to them within two weeks of being picked, they're
| delicious.
| dekhn wrote:
| picked right off the tree!
| dalbasal wrote:
| No need for war. This list is objective, so it can't apply the
| standard canadian handicap, as is traditional for most ranking
| lists.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| We demand that our handicap be applied at all times.
| asciimov wrote:
| I've only once had a good McIntosh. I must have nailed the
| exact day you want to have one, it was crisp and beautiful.
| Every other one I have ever had was a mealy let down, even when
| cold.
| Ensorceled wrote:
| This is weird site run by someone who clearly isn't an apple fan.
| My personal favourite apple, the Cortland, is rated "24
| Despicable" because:
|
| > "The general public usually doesn't have access to an apple
| fresh off the tree in a cold orchard. My rankings must reflect
| what is available to regular folks."
|
| In Ontario, this apple is only available for a few weeks in the
| fall because it ages and travels poorly. At least they have the
| proper opinion about the Granny Smith ...
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| As someone from Quebec, I share your surprise. The general
| public absolutely has access to this apple, either from picking
| at the orchard directly (very popular social event) or from the
| local growers that sell at the grocery store.
| Melatonic wrote:
| Personally I only like sour apples so this list is totally wrong
| for me.
| zooweemama wrote:
| I didn't know Snapdragon was a kind of apple! Did Qualcomm name
| their SoC Snapdragon hoping to sell it to Apple? :D
| Alex3917 wrote:
| It's a new-ish Cornell cultivar that they are only licensing to
| growers within New York state. Probably the best commercial
| apple on the market today.
| lo_zamoyski wrote:
| He ranks McIntosh poorly (the mind boggles, though I will admit
| that sometimes the skin can be a little tough) while ranking some
| of the most vile, cloying varieties rather highly. A palette
| spoiled by high fructose corn syrup? That would be one charitable
| guess for some of these rankings. Also, different apples have
| different culinary uses.
|
| I am also sad to see the limited number of cultivars. The world
| doesn't begin and end with North America. Have a Papirovka/White
| Transparent or an Antonovka some time.
| nicolas_t wrote:
| Yup, clicked and saw Honeycrisp at number 2 and no Boskoop or
| Reine de reinette... A good apple should have some sourness to
| counterbalance the sweetness.
| [deleted]
| nateburke wrote:
| Macoun NOT LISTED.
|
| Makes me suspicious of the author. A fresh macoun will make you
| question everything you know about apples.
| tylervigen wrote:
| I once spent a month blind taste-testing apples with my wife to
| compare the apples in our supermarket. We learned 4 things:
|
| 1) Most of the Honeycrisp varietals that make it to market are
| good (Wild Twist and Cosmic Crisp being our favorites), but...
|
| 2) The time of year makes a HUGE difference. It seems obvious
| when I say it, but different varietals from different farms are
| best in different weeks. Honeycrisp has an advantage here because
| it has so many growers that someone is keeping a batch in good
| condition for practically every week of the year.
|
| 3) You have to go by the apples in your local market. Lists like
| these are hard to use because there are many more apples on it
| than you have available to choose from - most grocery stores only
| stock 3-10 varieties depending on time of year
|
| 4) Your use case is critical. Obviously baking a pie requires a
| different apples from eating, but even if you are just eating the
| apples raw there are differences. Some apples beat others in
| texture when cut up, but have the wrong density to eat by biting
| down on the apple
|
| After all our testing, we mostly went back to Honeycrisp because
| it's so reliable.
| trip-zip wrote:
| Point #4 is totally on point!
|
| I slice lots of apples to share with my kid and there is such
| an unexpected difference depending on the variety we buy. Some
| apples really benefit from being cut into wedges!
| ortusdux wrote:
| I agree as well, rating apples without considering the use
| case is a critical oversight! Kenji set the apple rating bar
| pretty high:
|
| https://www.seriouseats.com/the-food-lab-what-are-the-
| best-a...
| jacobr1 wrote:
| I love our local farmers market during peak apple season. There
| are maybe 20 varieties to try across the different farms, more
| if you consider each farm's variant it own thing. Sadly we
| still have covid restrictions preventing food-tasting.
| Aleksdev wrote:
| You spent a whole month? You must be a big fan of apples.
| thomasahle wrote:
| > 2) The time of year makes a HUGE difference. It seems obvious
| when I say it, but different varietals from different farms are
| best in different weeks.
|
| Exactly. Don't expect to get a good apple in March. Eat
| something else instead.
| mike_d wrote:
| I grew up in the apple producing capital of the world.
|
| There is no such thing as a fresh apple in retail. They are
| all picked just before they are ripe and stored in massive
| cold storage rooms with all the oxygen pumped out. Apples can
| spend up to two year in storage, and the best tasting
| sweetest apples are often the ones that have been stored the
| longest because they form more sugars.
|
| Your entire concept of when an apple is good or not boils
| down to the time between when the ethylene is pumped into the
| room to start ripening to when you put it in your mouth.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| As with everything it depends. The heirloom varieties that
| make it to grocery stores (at least in the Bay Area) have a
| short enough window each year that they're definitely not
| being kept in cold storage for too long. The window of
| availability for something like Gravensteins and Pink
| Pearls out here is about a month.
|
| The sweetest apples you're talking about are probably the
| mealy ones folks are complaining about (although some
| varieties are more prone to becoming mealy than others).
| mike_d wrote:
| > The window of availability for something like
| Gravensteins and Pink Pearls out here is about a month.
|
| The window for pretty much all apples is a few weeks.
| That is exactly why they all go to cold storage. If the
| growers don't pack them directly into storage the brokers
| and wholesalers will. Apples are worth more in the off
| season.
|
| Unless you are shopping at a farmers market or a roadside
| stand, they have spent some time in a CA room.
|
| > The sweetest apples you're talking about are probably
| the mealy ones folks are complaining about
|
| Mealy apples are caused by the cell walls breaking down.
| The most common cause is refrigeration after they have
| been chemically ripened. Either spending too much time in
| the refrigerated grocery logistics chain or in your
| refrigerator at home.
| inferiorhuman wrote:
| Right. And out here the heirlooms I'm talking about are
| _only_ in stores for a couple weeks (a month at
| longest)... because they 're not likely being kept in
| cold storage.
| jader201 wrote:
| > _The most common cause is refrigeration after they have
| been chemically ripened._
|
| We often experiment between organic and nonorganic
| apples, and in my experience, it seems like the organic
| apples are way more prone to being mealy, suggesting that
| it's not (in this case) what you're describing.
| m463 wrote:
| I remember going to one of the local markets and asked the guy
| putting out the apples if the organic apples were really worth
| it.
|
| He immediately pulled out an organic apple (fuji if I recall
| correctly) and the same type, but non-organic. He cut out a
| slice of each apple and let me taste it.
|
| The organic apple had _significantly_ better flavor.
|
| He explained that the drawback was that the organic apples
| would go bad quickly so you should only buy what you need, and
| eat them promptly.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| > The organic apple had significantly better flavor.
|
| What are you concluding from that? You can get the same apple
| 1 week apart and have a significantly different experience.
|
| Or you could get the same apple at the same time from
| different batches and have a significant difference.
|
| Or you could get two apples from the same batch at the same
| time and they could vary a lot.
| m463 wrote:
| Well, I suspect at a minimum that the organic apples were
| turned over quicker, and possibly were picked recently.
| RussianCow wrote:
| Anecdotally, I find this to be the case with many fruits,
| especially citrus. I always figured that a lemon is a lemon
| and a lime is a lime, but after getting into cocktails and
| mixology, I realized that there is a night-and-day difference
| between high-quality fruit and the cheap stuff at your
| discount grocery store. This doesn't mean organic fruit is
| always strictly better, but I have found it to be a pretty
| reliable proxy for quality.
| yojo wrote:
| Fruit at the discount grocery store is usually old/nearing
| end of life. Citrus, and limes in particular, get
| noticeably more bitter as they age and oxidize.
|
| This actually leads to a schism in European/American
| bartending. Europe juices their citrus a la minute, so the
| juice has no time to oxidize, making the acid component
| punchier. American bars pre-juice before service, and it
| has time to mellow out a little.
|
| Someone (Dave Arnold maybe) ran a blind taste test with
| bartenders from Europe and America and found that the their
| preferences lined up with the customs in their country.
|
| Personally I follow the Europeans. Not because I like it
| better, but because I don't have the kind of foresight to
| juice hours before I'm making drinks :-)
| MivLives wrote:
| And god forbid you have premade line juice. Roses is the
| absolute worst (and people keep bringing it to make
| daquaris), but the extra effort for fresh juiced is worth
| it.
| tetraca wrote:
| Rose's is barely juice, probably only really suitable for
| gimlets. You can get straight lemon/lime juice in glass
| bottles. I find that works as a mostly fine alternative
| if I don't feel like squeezing.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| You might want to reconsider that, at least for homemade
| pre-made juice:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RA3AaCO7A8
| MivLives wrote:
| Thank you for the link. I hadn't heard of this, and I'm
| going to give it a try now!
| nerdkid93 wrote:
| I love Super Juice! If I'm going to have friends over for
| a get together or party, I'll make a batch (or multiple
| if I want more than 1 fruit) a few days ahead of time to
| increase the speed in which drinks can be made. The
| downside is that garnishes still generally tend to need
| peels, so I still need to have a couple real fruits
| hanging around.
| RussianCow wrote:
| For garnishes, unless expressing the oil of a citrus peel
| is essential to the aroma of your cocktail (like in a
| Negroni), my "hack" has been to dehydrate citrus wheels
| as garnish. You can get ~2-3 wheels out of the middle of
| every citrus fruit and use the rest for super juice.
| Plus, they look really cool.
| gleb wrote:
| That's because conventional store apples are coated with wax
| and organic ones are not. Wax often has bad, usually bitter,
| taste and unpleasant texture.
|
| Organic apples are not coated with wax, so they taste better,
| but will dry up faster.
| ravedave5 wrote:
| We got organic bananas because the regular bananas were all
| green. They were SO GOOD. Bananas are so damn cheap overall
| we just always get the organic ones and they do seem overall
| better.
| TylerE wrote:
| I've long held a notion that organic produce is better mostly
| because it's fresher - it has to be since it doesn't have an
| unnaturally long shelf life.
| fastaguy88 wrote:
| Apple rankings are much less about varieties and much more about
| freshness/locality. If you do not live in an apple growing (and
| distributing) state, these rankings might make sense. But as
| someone who can get orchard fresh apples in Virginia, the lowest-
| ranked variety of Virginia apple in season will beat the highest-
| ranked Washington/Oregon apple hands down.
|
| For fresh fruit, there is nothing better than shopping local.
| rkagerer wrote:
| _The SweeTango apple was developed by the University of Minnesota
| (UM), which also developed its parents, the Honeycrisp and
| Zestar! apples. Accordingly, SweeTango is intellectual property
| owned by UM and licensed to our farmer cooperative of 47 growers
| that sell the fruit throughout the United States and Canada. In
| fact, our growers lease the trees._
|
| https://sweetango.com/find-faqs/
| skue wrote:
| You omitted the link that has a lot more detail about why they
| chose to license it this way:
|
| http://sweetango.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/ruralcoopera...
|
| > _44 apple growers... are members of "Next Big Thing, A
| Growers' Cooperative" (NBT)... across the United States and
| Canada. Their ranks include both small and large producers..._
|
| > _NBT was the brainchild of Minnesota apple grower Dennis
| Courtier, owner of Pepin Heights Orchards Inc. While Minnesota
| is a small player in the U.S. apple industry, ranked 20 out of
| 29 commercially producing states in 2014, Courtier is well
| known in the industry for new variety innovation. He was one of
| the first commercial producers to grow and market Honeycrisp
| apples in the 1990s. Honeycrisp -- a "fruit phenomenon"
| produced by the University of Minnesota's (UMN) apple-breeding
| program -- has turned the apple category on its head. By 2014,
| it had rocketed to become the No. 6 apple variety in the United
| States, based on production._
|
| > _Honeycrisp saved [Courtier's] orchards, but soon it was
| being grown in geography it wasn't suited to, and, arguably,
| being overgrown. The university had released it as an "open
| variety" -- meaning that after paying a small royalty to a
| variety's developer, any grower can buy Honeycrisp trees and
| sell the fruit as they wish._
|
| > _If apple growers were to be financially healthy in the long
| term, Courtier felt that apple production and marketing would
| have to change._
|
| There is also this description about one of the co-op members
| (which may explain why other commenters have different opinions
| about Red Delicious)...
|
| > _The Clarks watched the decline of the Red Delicious (Reds)
| variety from a front-row seat. Chelan was historically known
| for producing prime-quality Reds. Then the variety was "bred to
| grow red" in parts of the state that weren't good "terroir" (or
| growing territory) for it. That fruit didn't taste as good or
| store as well._
|
| > _The variety's popularity with consumers fell far and
| fast..._
|
| > _"As consumers ourselves, we know that if we consumers don't
| get a good apple, we don't come back for a while," says Bill
| Clark. "NBT is managing who grows an apple, where it grows,
| what the eating experience is. That's paramount to the
| variety's sustainability_
|
| Edit: formatting
| mike_d wrote:
| > SweeTango is intellectual property owned by UM and licensed
| to our farmer cooperative
|
| That is some Monsanto bullshit wrapped up in a quirky "small
| growers" story.
|
| Nobody "owns" living organisms.
| poulsbohemian wrote:
| I immediately went to look up the Cosmic Crisp, which was a
| research endeavor from Washington State University. It is an
| excellent apple for eating. I'm at a loss to understand these
| rankings, as the reviewer claims that the Cosmic Crisp has a thin
| skin and less-than-average flavor. This is completely the
| opposite of my experience - the Cosmic blows away every other
| eating apple on the market, including the Gala. It stays crisp,
| has a firm but not chewy skin (I'm looking at you, Red Delicious,
| or whatever they heck they did to you), and while not over-the-
| top sugary it is certainly a sweet treat. #GoCougs.
| Blackthorn wrote:
| Where do you live? The Cosmic Crisps that make it here to New
| York (almost certainly out of season), end up having not much
| flavor. They're still edible though (waaaaaay better than
| garbage like red delicious), one great thing about the Cosmic
| Crisp is that they actually store well.
| poulsbohemian wrote:
| Eastern Washington - so it's very local crop. As you well
| know, you have lots of Apple production in New York and if I
| were there, I'd presumably look for local varieties too. Good
| to know they don't ship well, appreciate the insight
| Blackthorn wrote:
| Yeah, when they're fresh I basically get whatever I can
| here. In the late winter / spring though, well, it's
| whatever stores best :-)
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| As someone who enjoys eating a lemon, so sourness is no issue,
| Granny Smiths are pretty good IMO. I always got a sense they were
| harder to digest after eating them, it does feel like roughage
| ... and the site agrees by saying they are the hardest to digest
| apple, but good for gut flora as a result.
|
| Also I like the mild clickbait. By making apple the first word, I
| assumed they meant Apple Inc.
| ianai wrote:
| I once had access (local grocer) to apples that were green on the
| outside and red fleshed on the inside. I forget the name and
| haven't seen them in years. Wish I could find them again as they
| were perfect for this time of year.
| drdo wrote:
| Wrong, granny smith is number one.
| itisit wrote:
| For baking an apple pie, not for eating directly.
| cosentiyes wrote:
| Wrong, #1 in all categories.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| It's missing my favorite Apple for making juice, the "Cox's
| Orange Pippin"!
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cox%27s_Orange_Pippin
| _whiteCaps_ wrote:
| Roald Dahl's favourite apple! Mine too.
| tigerlily wrote:
| > Apple Rankings by The Appleist Brian Frange
|
| Well Brian, if you're reading this, then know that at this
| present juncture I fear your taste is quite awful. You are
| contributing to the infantilisation of flavour preferences by
| ranking such sweet varieties so highly. I bid you humble yourself
| by exploring some real vintage apples for a year, and report back
| advocating for those. Then book a trip to Wales and work in the
| cider and perry orchards. Then climb a high mountain. Then you
| must go to Kazakhstan and try all the OG varieties there, eating
| them from the ground like the bears that did so since time
| immemorial. Then when you are forty seven years old, you must
| sell all your possessions and buy a big field to be in for a
| while before planting there an orchard and rearing young bears.
| Then you must retail those apples from a roadside packing shed
| for forty years. Only after you have done at least one of these
| things may you write about apples on the internet.
| thomasfl wrote:
| Thank you Tiger Lily for your insight into the world of apples.
| nilespotter wrote:
| I'm all about that Honeycrisp life but I like to weave in Granny
| Smith & Fuji, I don't know what this guy is smoking.
| bcaulfield wrote:
| Granny Smith, Red Delicious are both, rightly, trashed. Good.
| iMark wrote:
| I wonder how many fewer clicks the article would have received
| had the title been "Ranking apples"
| mandeepj wrote:
| > had the title been "Ranking apples"
|
| That gives a totally different meaning though
| iMark wrote:
| Well, yes.
| docandrew wrote:
| Granny Smith is severely underrated here. This site is like
| hipster-tier ratings of vinyl with a bunch of obscure stuff
| nobody ever heard of to try and appear more sophisticated.
| [deleted]
| sangnoir wrote:
| I wanted to say the same thing: the Granny Smith slander is
| uncalled for.
| treesrule wrote:
| You don't understand Nevermind wasn't actually all that good
| Bandwagonesque BY Teenage Fanclub was actually better and more
| instrumental into turning the early 90s into an audio
| experience.
| 98codes wrote:
| I can tell that the person doing the rankings doesn't try to bake
| with these apples, or do anything but eat them out of hand; this
| is basically Hot or Not but for apples.
| favorited wrote:
| They said they consider factors such as use in baking as
| secondary:
|
| "After the initial one hundred point evaluation is calculated
| several additional factors are considered which may add or
| subtract points. These include: Lineage, History,
| Sustainability, Uniqueness, Longevity, and Alternative Uses
| (cider, applesauce, baking)."
| sh1mmer wrote:
| Less trash talking but more varieties
| https://www.orangepippin.com/
|
| Also, America is missing out on Cox's Orange Pippins. I miss them
| so much.
| kentt wrote:
| Missing my favourite apple: Aurora. This is the best apple by
| far. Last long, taste is amazing (though maybe a bit too sweet
| after a while). I can't rarely find them. Does anyone know how to
| track down where apples are grown?
| fanatic2pope wrote:
| Assuming you mean the Aurora Golden Gala, this is also my
| favourite with Honeycrisp a close second. The only place I have
| ever found them for sale is in Vancouver. I discovered them at
| the UBC Botanical Garden Apple festival
| (https://botanicalgarden.ubc.ca/apple-festival-2022-recap/)
| gammarator wrote:
| Berkeley Bowl used to regularly sell them--not sure if they
| still do.
| codpiece wrote:
| Oh! We had Aurora apples in upstate NY recently, they were
| wonderful. We were in Apple Valley right around Syracuse/Finger
| lakes region.
|
| Can't seem to find anywhere to order them shipped though.
| sedatk wrote:
| Apparently, Aurora is a cross between Golden Delicious (33/100
| - horse food) and Royal Gala (70/100 - mediocre).
| dsmmcken wrote:
| I know the site is partly in jest, but I cross-checked against
| my local bareroot orchard that sells ~75 varieties of Apples
| and this site had only about 5% of them. I would say it's
| missing quite a few of the best apples.
| js2 wrote:
| I don't know what's with the hate on Granny Smith. I love Granny
| Smith apples. They are especially good for making Waldorf salad.
| They are also my favorite to eat with honey at new years. They
| have a nice crispy texture and are delightfully tangy.
| fideloper wrote:
| I eat a granny smith every day. They don't deserve this
| ranking, and this is absolutely a hill I will...uh... lie down
| on. Not die on.
|
| I pair it with some cheddar cheese.
|
| Another good pairing with cheddar cheese is Mcintosh. When
| they're in season, they're great.
|
| Lately I haven't been able to find mcintosh apples in the store
| (or if I did, they're mushy and gross). I suspect that's the
| case with a lot of these apples. The Mcintosh apples I got in
| Connecticut were great, but here in Texas they are trash.
| innocentoldguy wrote:
| Mmm. I like Granny Smith apples with cheddar cheese too.
| Especially in toasted-cheese form.
| efa wrote:
| Me too. And they last forever and are still good and crisp.
| taftster wrote:
| Purely as a standalone apple, the Granny Smith does NOT (in
| most opinions, it seems) hold its own against other apples. A
| 1v1 challenge against some of the more popular apples seemingly
| places the GS as the loser.
|
| However, you mentioned the pairing and combinational use of the
| GS, which is where it shines. Granny Smith is meant to be
| dipped, diced, baked, smothered, cheesed, etc. The GS goes way
| up in rankings, when you pair it with other foods.
|
| I think that's why GS is low on the rankings. It's probably
| getting a bit harsh of a review on that site, I grant you, but
| again I don't think it holds up as a standalone apple quite the
| same as others.
| js2 wrote:
| I don't really eat any apple by itself. I don't find it to be
| a very good fruit on its own regardless of variety.
| lettergram wrote:
| As someone who has 20 off apple trees, while these ratings are
| fine. There are some reasons to have apples not listed. For
| instance, I have Arkansas Black apple trees. They are hardier
| than trees like honey crisp and their apples last 6 months in a
| chilled environment. Compare that with honey crisp and you're
| only talking a handful of weeks.
| loeg wrote:
| Wow, they like Pink Ladies better than Cosmic Crisp? Bizarre.
| ngalaiko wrote:
| a system that ranks Jazz apples as mediocre is obviously flawed
| technologia wrote:
| It's not the site we wanted but the one we needed but never knew.
| irrational wrote:
| Pink Lady not being ranked higher is a crime.
|
| Though, there should be different rankings for what use the Apple
| is being put to. You want different varieties depending if you
| are using it to make applesauce, eating it plain, making a pie,
| etc.
|
| Except for red delicious. It is the absolute worst and has no
| uses. Such a mealy Apple.
| earksiinni wrote:
| Arkansas Black as one of the _bad_ apples?
|
| Is this a joke?
|
| I had one for the first time from our local co-op. It was
| definitely firmer than any other apple I've had but I wouldn't
| call it "teeth-shattering" by any means.
|
| Oh, but the flavor. Exquisite. Floral, fragrant. Tasted half like
| a really good apple, half like a perfectly ripe Bosc pear.
|
| Do yourself a favor and find a ripe Arkansas Black apple. Best
| apple I ever had.
| db1234 wrote:
| Before clicking on the link, I thought Apple launched a web
| search service.
| themagician wrote:
| I was a big Honeycrisp fan for a long time, but they have gotten
| too sweet for me now. They also seem to grow them the size of
| grapefruits these days.
| plgonzalezrx8 wrote:
| 100% disagree with these rankings.
|
| But then, all the top ones he selected are reds, so yeah...
| sharkweek wrote:
| _Scrolls to bottom_
|
| Red delicious in the bottom 10.
|
| Perfect.
|
| This also reminds me of a side project blog I built years ago
| where I'd review and rank chips (potato/tortilla/other).
|
| Was a fun creative outlet for a while but life got too busy. I
| hope to pick it back up some day.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Red Delicious is the sort of apple that a kid finds at their
| grandparents place, takes one bite and returns it to the fruit
| bowl.
| aaronbrethorst wrote:
| The flavorless, hard apple you'd find in a school lunch. I
| remember chucking these into the trash in elementary school
| in the late 80s and early 90s, where it would land alongside
| dozens of other "thick-skinned, flavorless, mealy imposters."
| schnevets wrote:
| Years ago, my friend and I had a tumblr called Loo York City
| where we reviewed bar bathrooms in NYC. We had some fun nights
| drinking at bars and writing up grandiose assessments about
| life based on where you go pee. The page received no traction
| whatsoever and we eventually took it down, but I still have
| local copies of the reviews and reread them more often than I
| care to admit. The writing is more entertaining and memory-
| triggering than any free-form journal I ever attempted.
|
| Nowadays, I write beer (and sometimes wine) reviews in a
| similar matter. I would never post them on untappd or elsewhere
| because the thought of someone who brewed the beer actually
| stumbling across something so self-indulgent makes me uneasy,
| but I have found it to be a fun, low-stakes creative outlet
| (even if my wife dislikes me writing notes while we're out)
| gaoshan wrote:
| Are they trying to measure cooking apples by the eating apple
| metric? Because they dunked on some cooking apples that would be
| a million times better in a pie than any of the highest rated
| ones.
| perfectstorm wrote:
| They gave Honeycrisp 5 stars for sweetness but only gave 2 stars
| to Fuji. that doesn't make sense to me. Fuji is one of the
| sweetest tasting apples and Honeycrisp is a mix of sweetness and
| tartness.
| minitoar wrote:
| Yeah I was really surprised by the low Fuji ranking.
| xivzgrev wrote:
| agreed. Fuji is my go-to when it's on sale at Costco.
| lm28469 wrote:
| It's a list made by a comedian, I wouldn't take it too
| seriously, reading the descriptions it's a pretty clear that
| it's at least partially, if not majoritarly, a joke website
| jeremyjh wrote:
| But it says 100% accurate!
| SMAAART wrote:
| "Long Island's Sand-Filled Condom"
|
| (Newtown Pippin Apple Review)
|
| https://applerankings.com/newtown-pippin-apple-review/
| blowski wrote:
| What, no Russets?! And Pink Lady are all sugar and no flavour.
| janj wrote:
| I tried them [Russets] once years ago and was blown away,
| haven't seen them since but I've been looking.
| blowski wrote:
| They're pretty common in the SE of England, where I live.
| ISL wrote:
| Are there Russet apples? I associate the term with potatoes.
|
| TIL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russet_apple
| pensievelogsfir wrote:
| vehemenz wrote:
| The ratings aren't serious, but I like the idea of having a "go
| to" site that simply provides a rating, brief description, and
| that's it.
|
| It would be great to have something like this for movies, since
| IMDB and RT are not serious ratings (MetaCritic is a bit closer,
| I suppose).
| wanderingmoose wrote:
| My favorite description of a Red Delicious apple was from Mitsuwa
| (japanese grocery store in the US): "Looks nice, flavorless. Ok
| in salads"
|
| Growing up, I really liked Winesaps from a local orchard, but
| those were rated "Horse Food" on this list. To each their own, I
| guess.
| kernal wrote:
| Savage
|
| >Oh how the mighty have fallen! Believe it or not, the coffee
| grinds in a leather glove known as "The Red Delicious Apple" was
| once a robust firebrand credited with reinventing the apple from
| mere cider-fruit into a full-fledged lunch-worthy sidepiece. It
| even won the Stark Brothers apple contest in 1894. Likely your
| great-grandma's favorite apple, this once flavorful Prometheus
| has been mass-produced into desolation.
|
| > Nowadays, you can find this thick-skinned, flavorless, mealy
| imposter unwashed in a dirty wicker basket on the floor of a
| convenience store. What a sad state of affairs. It's time to hang
| them up old man, your time has passed.
| ckastner wrote:
| It seems to have inspired an even better review, of the Golden
| Delicious:
|
| > _[...] with our collective distaste for the Red Delicious
| fully realized, this ill-fated adopted brother may as well be
| called the "Golden Bin Laden."_
| whyenot wrote:
| I have a golden delicious tree in my yard, and the apple are
| amazingly good. I wonder if there isn't a bias against apples
| like red delicious, yellow delicious and Granny Smith that
| store very well and may be getting stale at the time of
| purchase. For example, mealiness is usually an indication
| that an apple is getting stale.
| ovao wrote:
| Weirdly, this isn't the first bias I've seen against the
| golden delicious -- which is still one of my favorites --
| and excessive fawning over the honeycrisp.
|
| I suppose I don't disagree with a lot of elements in the
| general order ranking, but listing the honeycrisp as a
| 90-point apple and the GD at 33 seems...extreme.
|
| (And I fully realize the absurdity in calling an online
| ranking of apples "extreme")
| silisili wrote:
| Anyone who puts Pink Lady at 80 deserves no audience at all.
| Blasphemy.
| adenner wrote:
| Personally I am a fan of Tolman Sweet apples, but they are rather
| hard to come by.
| EGreg wrote:
| was I the only one who thought until I scrolled down that this
| was an independent ranking of Apple iOS apps?
| borner791 wrote:
| No Macoun, tragic.
| lcuff wrote:
| Others mention how pies call for different apples. In the same
| vein, my father's cousin, a farmer and now sadly no longer with
| us, had a strong opinion about apples that were best for
| applesauce. Sadly, I don't remember which variety. He lived in
| rural Ontario, Canada, and knew the only farm in the area that
| grew that variety, so that's where we'd go to buy apples when it
| was time to make applesauce.
| innocentoldguy wrote:
| I like Ruby Red apples for applesauce because there's no work
| involved. They come out of the skin as a sloppy puree.
| fellowniusmonk wrote:
| Yeah, I wish there was an index organized by "baking",
| "eating", "sauce".
|
| About 20 years ago I was visiting a friend in south eastern
| Indian. While buying groceries at a local chain there was a
| chatty old lady in the apple section who exclaimed that some
| breed of apple was available and that you didn't see them
| often any more and they made the best apple sauce.
|
| Intrigued I bought some even though I had no plan to make
| apple sauce and threw them in a pot like she instructed, they
| turned into a perfectly sweet and flavorful sauce with no
| intervention at all.
|
| It was almost a shame to add cinnamon they were so good.
|
| I tried an uncooked slice and it was the mealiest garbage
| I've ever tried but as a sauce it was the platonic ideal of
| an applesauce. I wish I could remember the variety.
| drstewart wrote:
| Honeycrisps are overrated. Too sweet. It's a meme apple at this
| point. Cosmic Crisps beat them all day long imo.
| azalemeth wrote:
| There is a local business in Oxford, run by a retired railway
| engineer and countertenor, called Tiddly Pommes. They (well, he)
| produces hyper-local apple juice, often from a single tree or
| small collection of trees in someone's garden, harvested by hand,
| pressed, and pasteurised. It's amazingly, amazingly delicious. I
| really didn't expect it to be quite as delicious as it is; all
| store bought juice is somehow forever disappointing in
| comparison. He runs grading systems and seeks out more obscure
| varieties from old Victorian trees, many of which might be sourer
| but somehow crisp and refreshingly delicious juiced.
| ge96 wrote:
| horse food wtf I'm offended
|
| Pink Lady's are great
| morepork wrote:
| Doesn't have my go to, the Eve apple, I guess it's a US centric
| list?
|
| https://specialtyproduce.com/produce/Eve_Apples_12823.php
| leogout wrote:
| Go read the worst ranked apples it is absolutely worth it. I've
| waken up my wife laughing out loud...
| janandonly wrote:
| Perfect ranking is possible. Also, Kanzi apples are indeed the
| best kind.
| Cockbrand wrote:
| Where's Elstar? Or Gravenstein? Both are excellent apples in both
| flavor and texture.
| vehemenz wrote:
| Cultivars are highly regional.
|
| About half of the apples on this list are ones I recognize as
| being generally available in the US, depending on the time of
| year, but I'm not sure how the others were chosen.
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