Apple day is a celebration of all things about this well known fruit. This last Sunday I attended the Bradford Apple Day held at Bowling Park Community Orchard here in Bradford, Yorkshire.
I saw some old, I think table mats with pictures of various varieties of apple on them including the one in the picture above.
I have always believed that we should preserve and indeed use the many and varied varieties of the apple. There are here in the UK a large number of identifiable varieties of the humble apple and even so there are many old varieties that have been forgotten. The trees live on in gardens and old orchards but the people who planted and looked after them are long gone.
I you look at the apples in most supermarkets, they will be selling only a very few common varieties often with them being grown in France and other much further afield countries. I remember getting an apple some time back and getting people to guess where it grew. No one ever guessed, it was from Chile in South America.
I used to live in Kent in the South East of England and the is one of the traditional places where there used to be many orchards. Today here in the UK the orchard is no longer as common as they were in my childhood.
I think the Apple Day held in Bradford is not the last of those to be held this year there are still a few yet to come over the next few weeks in other places.
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It's the same deal over here. Only a few varieties to choose from, and many of those are imported.
ReplyDeleteThe same thing appears to be happening in Austraia too, although not with apples. Oranges from California? Bananas from some country overseas? Why? QLD is banana territory, apples are grown widely in Tassie and here in Victoria - why the need to import them?
ReplyDeleteAnd you make a good point about older varieties being forgotten and living on in people's gardens. Snow apples - one of my favourites of childhood, have long since gone. A house I was living in in the 80's had a very old apricot tree - well, it was next door - and the fruit used to hang over our fence. They were the best apricots I've ever eaten, much bigger than the "normal" ones, more the size of a peach and the taste was better. An older Italian chap who had a fruit shop, said he remembers them, and he thought they may have been a NZ apricot. We never did find out though.
Thans for visiting my blog btw. Next time I'm in the city, I'll see if I can get some pics of the Athenaeum.
Cheers.