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Apple Rankings

applerankings.com

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Re: Apple Rankings

#431

Post by TylerE »

Blackthorn wrote: post #407
Dudical wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

I've had red deliciouses direct from the farmstand and they're mealy. They really are just bad.

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.

Re: Apple Rankings

#432

Post by inferiorhuman »

wheats wrote: post #404
chefandy wrote: post #345

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 majorit…

OK let's go, give us your top 3 favs.

Pink Lady, Pink Pearl, Gravenstein. Honorable mention to Rhode Island Green and Pippin if you like 'em tart.

Re: Apple Rankings

#433

Post by TylerE »

jojobas wrote: post #427
soapboxrocket wrote: post #145

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 w…

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.

Their 3rd highest rated apple is incredibly sour.

Re: Apple Rankings

#434

Post by TylerE »

m463 wrote: post #160
tylervigen wrote: post #57

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 adv…

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 quick…

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.

Re: Apple Rankings

#435

Post by TheCondor »

CarVac wrote: post #28

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.

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..

Re: Apple Rankings

#436

Post by chefandy »

wheats wrote: post #404
chefandy wrote: post #345

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 majorit…

OK let's go, give us your top 3 favs.

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.

Re: Apple Rankings

#437

Post by chefandy »

CoffeeOnWrite wrote: post #379
chefandy wrote: post #345

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 majorit…

Just FWIW re your last sentence, per Wikipedia the US patent for the Honeycrisp cultivar expired in 2008..

Good to know.

Re: Apple Rankings

#438

Post by Whitespace »

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.

Re: Apple Rankings

#439

Post by jojobas »

TylerE wrote: post #433
jojobas wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Their 3rd highest rated apple is incredibly sour.

Seems to only be available half a year from now where I am, will try to remember.

Re: Apple Rankings

#440

Post by LarryMade2 »

CarVac wrote: post #28

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.

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.

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