Fruit Tree

Here at Fruit Tree, this season’s focus is on apple trees.

Apple trees belong to the genus ‘Malus’, species ‘Malus Domestica’. The centre of diversity for this genus is Turkey. Perhaps one of the earliest trees to have been cultivated, the apple tree has been an important part of human diets worldwide for centuries. This is the case particularly for the winter apple, as it is suitable for picking in late autumn and stores well so it can last through the meagre winter months.

Apples are a particularly useful fruit to grow in your garden, allotment or orchard because of their adaptability. For a small crop of fruit, simply eating them fresh off the tree is fantastic and extremely beneficial to your health. The old proverb “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” is not entirely fictional. Apples contain vitamin C, antioxidant compounds, lots of fibre and have been suggested to reduce the risk of colon cancer, prostate cancer, lung cancer, and heart disease. They may also help with weight loss. However, if you have a glut crop, there are an endless number of delicious ways of eating them, preserving them and harvesting their goodness to make it last longer. Apples can be juiced, canned, made into jams and preserves and fermented in various ways to produce cider, ciderkin, vinegar, pectin. They can also be distilled to produce applejack and calvados. You can even make apple wine! Of course there are an endless amount of wonderful recipes that include apples; apple pies, crumbles and cakes, apple sauce, butter and jelly, toffee apples and candies to name but a few.

So, if your appetite for growing these wonderful fruits has been whetted, here are some of our expert’s recommendations. Apple trees are certainly one of the best fruit trees to grow in the UK climate. A highly recommended variety is the Scottish James Grieve variety. It makes a delicious crunchy eating apple but when it eventually over ripens and is a little soft, it a works well in cooking. Another good apple is Tydeman’s Late Orange. It is similar to the Cox apple but it fruits later, meaning that you can keep harvesting a healthy crop until much later in the season. For cooking, the Howgate Wonder is wonderful! It is an extremely large cooking apple from the Isle of Wight and it stores brilliantly.