APPLES… THE “FORBITIN’” FRUIT

by

Karen A. Lech

THE APPLE - This incredible fruit is linked with a deceitful talking serpent, and the downfall of woman, and man! Forbidden fruit! -What sort of connotation is that? Poor, innocent apple! I say we change the apple’s image. Not forbidden, but for biting. It would be easy to understand why this precious jewel of the fruit world would be ‘forbidden’. An apple should portray goodness, for that is what they are - totally good. Unless you get a rotten one. “One bad apple” - a bad apple is totally distasteful; a desecration of all that is pure and, well, good. Apples are used in everyday language, “apple-cheeked” and other terms and clichés that sound like proverbs… “an apple a day keeps the doctor away”. “Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me…”.A line from an old song circa World War II. At this time of year, we could change the lyrics a bit to… Don’t sit under the apple tree…without a helmet. Why? A bombardment of windfalls may knock you nearly senseless, as I found out when apple picking the other day. Yes, it’s that time of year for apple picking!
Just reach up to a branch and pluck. The apple tree’s branches slump like shoulders -.a weary mother laden with the burden of oh-so-many children hanging on her arms. An apple fits perfectly in the palm of your hand. A nice, solid feel, a globe of delight, a treat for every sense. Its skin may be a bit dusty from the elements of wind, rain and sun. You vigorously rub it on your shirt front or the hem of your skirt, and voila! It shines like a coffee table polished with lemon oil. You press it to your lips; its perfume invigorates your nostrils… crisp, the tang of the incredible juices, the sweetness of a season of sunlight and rain, only to be made sweeter perhaps, by a coating of gooey, buttery caramel. The crunch of the skin bursting when bitten to let loose the fragrance and solid fruit and ambrosia -like juice within. Is there anyone who does NOT like an apple?

Under a magnificent skin color, lies the clear white of a McIntosh. The ruby skin of the Jonathan covers its cream-colored flesh. Golden yellow with freckles of bronze - the Golden Delicious. The varieties are almost endless, as well as the possibilities of what can be done with the apples upon returning to your creative room…the kitchen.

Even the word “apple” sounds nice. It has a nice, rounded sound when we speak it. And oh! the triggers of memory that come with it. Apple pie, apple cider, apple dumplings, taffy apples, apple slices layered in a velvety gel spiked with cinnamon and sandwiched between two layers of a melt-in-your-mouth flaky crust, the top crust blanketed in a frosty sugar glaze.

How we take the apple for granted! The merry month of May skips along the happy path of sunshine with laughter and embraces the apple trees with warmth. They respond with glee and burst forth a fragrant floral display, making the trees look like they are holding snowballs of whitish pink. The five-petaled flowers of the apple trees soon drift down to the ground on a Zephyrus day, leaving the heart of the flower to grow for a season. The heart of an apple, its core, is five segmented also, and holds about 5-10 seeds. And the question still remains…….. it is not how many seeds in an apple… but how many apples are in a seed?

Apples are historic - not only from the sense that for want of a better name for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, but all through history. Apples can be found in nearly all parts of the world. The Soviet Union, before its break up was the leading apple producer of the world. Apples are legendary - take the Swiss legend of William Tell, for instance, or our own American legend of Johnny Appleseed - the name given to John Chapman, an early American pioneer, who eventually owned about 1,200 acres of orchards. You can find apples in many poems, songs, and nursery rhymes… “A is for apple…” Archaeologists found charcoal remains of apples when studying the remains of Stone Age villages in Europe. In 300’s B.C., the ancient Greeks were growing several varieties of apples, according to World Book encyclopedia. No wonder we give apples to teachers, but it is apples that teach us so much.
So, go out and have some fun, make some family history. The season for apple picking lasts through October usually. Take a sun-filled Autumn afternoon, hop in your car, park near a row of trees; grab a heavy duty handled paper sack, and survey the rows of trees all waiting for you with their gifts. It does not take long to fill the bag, and each one you pick you are sure is the best. Of course you have to taste so many while you are picking. With your tummy full, your mouth tantalized, your heart overflowing with the just darn good feeling, your mind amazed by abundance, your brain already formulating recipes and future delightful ways to use your treasure, you’ve spent a few hours making some of the best memories you will ever make. When you get home, there will be the fun of peeling and paring to see if you can do the whole apple without breaking the peel. Apples, they are ripe for the picking… The End

Sidebars:

Some facts dietary and otherwise about Apples:

Apples consist of about 85% water. They contain the vitamins A, and C, potassium, pectin and fiber. From the Website www.bestapples .com, 1 medium apple has about 80 calories; 22 grams total carbohydrate, 0 total fat and 0 cholesterol and trace iron.

Three varieties of apples - Delicious, Golden Delicious and Granny Smith make up about two-thirds of the apples grown in the United States. Two other varieties- McIntosh and Rome Beauty also rank among the leading apples grown in the U.S. McIntosh and Delicious apples are the chief varieties that are grown in Canada.

The apple is a pome - (no wonder I like poems) A fruit that has a fleshy outer layer and a paper-like core. Pears are also pomes.

Apple trees belong to the rose family!

Apple trees can bear fruit as long as 100 years, though most grown in orchards are replaced every 12-20 years.

Leading apple growing countries:
Soviet Union Approx 301,700,000 bushels produced annually
United States - 235,000,000 bushels produced annually
China - 225,600,000 bushels produced annually
France - 126,000,000 bushels produced annually
Iran - 57,200,000 bushels produced annually

Some local apple picking locations:

Harvest Time - Oriole Springs Orchard
35032 128th Street
Twin Lakes, Wisconsin.
Open daily - (with fresh doughnuts that put Krispy Kreme to shame)

Woodstock Country Orchard
17015 Garden Valley Road
Woodstock, Illinois

APPLES… THE “FORBITIN’” FRUIT

by

Karen A. Lech

THE APPLE - This incredible fruit is linked with a deceitful talking serpent, and the downfall of woman, and man! Forbidden fruit! -What sort of connotation is that? Poor, innocent apple! I say we change the apple’s image. Not forbidden, but for biting. It would be easy to understand why this precious jewel of the fruit world would be ‘forbidden’. An apple should portray goodness, for that is what they are - totally good. Unless you get a rotten one. “One bad apple” - a bad apple is totally distasteful; a desecration of all that is pure and, well, good. Apples are used in everyday language, “apple-cheeked” and other terms and clichés that sound like proverbs… “an apple a day keeps the doctor away”. “Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me…”.A line from an old song circa World War II. At this time of year, we could change the lyrics a bit to… Don’t sit under the apple tree…without a helmet. Why? A bombardment of windfalls may knock you nearly senseless, as I found out when apple picking the other day. Yes, it’s that time of year for apple picking!
Just reach up to a branch and pluck. The apple tree’s branches slump like shoulders -.a weary mother laden with the burden of oh-so-many children hanging on her arms. An apple fits perfectly in the palm of your hand. A nice, solid feel, a globe of delight, a treat for every sense. Its skin may be a bit dusty from the elements of wind, rain and sun. You vigorously rub it on your shirt front or the hem of your skirt, and voila! It shines like a coffee table polished with lemon oil. You press it to your lips; its perfume invigorates your nostrils… crisp, the tang of the incredible juices, the sweetness of a season of sunlight and rain, only to be made sweeter perhaps, by a coating of gooey, buttery caramel. The crunch of the skin bursting when bitten to let loose the fragrance and solid fruit and ambrosia -like juice within. Is there anyone who does NOT like an apple?

Under a magnificent skin color, lies the clear white of a McIntosh. The ruby skin of the Jonathan covers its cream-colored flesh. Golden yellow with freckles of bronze - the Golden Delicious. The varieties are almost endless, as well as the possibilities of what can be done with the apples upon returning to your creative room…the kitchen.

Even the word “apple” sounds nice. It has a nice, rounded sound when we speak it. And oh! the triggers of memory that come with it. Apple pie, apple cider, apple dumplings, taffy apples, apple slices layered in a velvety gel spiked with cinnamon and sandwiched between two layers of a melt-in-your-mouth flaky crust, the top crust blanketed in a frosty sugar glaze.

How we take the apple for granted! The merry month of May skips along the happy path of sunshine with laughter and embraces the apple trees with warmth. They respond with glee and burst forth a fragrant floral display, making the trees look like they are holding snowballs of whitish pink. The five-petaled flowers of the apple trees soon drift down to the ground on a Zephyrus day, leaving the heart of the flower to grow for a season. The heart of an apple, its core, is five segmented also, and holds about 5-10 seeds. And the question still remains…….. it is not how many seeds in an apple… but how many apples are in a seed?

Apples are historic - not only from the sense that for want of a better name for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, but all through history. Apples can be found in nearly all parts of the world. The Soviet Union, before its break up was the leading apple producer of the world. Apples are legendary - take the Swiss legend of William Tell, for instance, or our own American legend of Johnny Appleseed - the name given to John Chapman, an early American pioneer, who eventually owned about 1,200 acres of orchards. You can find apples in many poems, songs, and nursery rhymes… “A is for apple…” Archaeologists found charcoal remains of apples when studying the remains of Stone Age villages in Europe. In 300’s B.C., the ancient Greeks were growing several varieties of apples, according to World Book encyclopedia. No wonder we give apples to teachers, but it is apples that teach us so much.
So, go out and have some fun, make some family history. The season for apple picking lasts through October usually. Take a sun-filled Autumn afternoon, hop in your car, park near a row of trees; grab a heavy duty handled paper sack, and survey the rows of trees all waiting for you with their gifts. It does not take long to fill the bag, and each one you pick you are sure is the best. Of course you have to taste so many while you are picking. With your tummy full, your mouth tantalized, your heart overflowing with the just darn good feeling, your mind amazed by abundance, your brain already formulating recipes and future delightful ways to use your treasure, you’ve spent a few hours making some of the best memories you will ever make. When you get home, there will be the fun of peeling and paring to see if you can do the whole apple without breaking the peel. Apples, they are ripe for the picking… The End

Sidebars:

Some facts dietary and otherwise about Apples:

Apples consist of about 85% water. They contain the vitamins A, and C, potassium, pectin and fiber. From the Website www.bestapples .com, 1 medium apple has about 80 calories; 22 grams total carbohydrate, 0 total fat and 0 cholesterol and trace iron.

Three varieties of apples - Delicious, Golden Delicious and Granny Smith make up about two-thirds of the apples grown in the United States. Two other varieties- McIntosh and Rome Beauty also rank among the leading apples grown in the U.S. McIntosh and Delicious apples are the chief varieties that are grown in Canada.

The apple is a pome - (no wonder I like poems) A fruit that has a fleshy outer layer and a paper-like core. Pears are also pomes.

Apple trees belong to the rose family!

Apple trees can bear fruit as long as 100 years, though most grown in orchards are replaced every 12-20 years.

Leading apple growing countries:
Soviet Union Approx 301,700,000 bushels produced annually
United States - 235,000,000 bushels produced annually
China - 225,600,000 bushels produced annually
France - 126,000,000 bushels produced annually
Iran - 57,200,000 bushels produced annually

Some local apple picking locations:

Harvest Time - Oriole Springs Orchard
35032 128th Street
Twin Lakes, Wisconsin.
Open daily - (with fresh doughnuts that put Krispy Kreme to shame)

Woodstock Country Orchard
17015 Garden Valley Road
Woodstock, Illinois

I am a published author of a children’s book, 51 POEMS FOR CHILDREN, numerous articles, poetry, and in the process of releasing my new book of short stories FOUR TOLD I have won numerous awards for short stories and have studied writing at five colleges. Also a winner of an Outstanding Achievement in Poetry, I live in Richmond, Illinois.

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