apple: Zestar

[redbird]

We went to the Central Square farmers market today, and one of the vendors had a kind of apple I'd never heard of, so I bought one Zestar (and three Mcintosh, after chatting with the guy behind the counter, who agreed it was early for macs).

This is a nice apple: good though not intense flavor, reasonably crisp and juicy (cattitude says it's a little mealier than he likes, but I am pleased with the texture), and sweet but not too sweet. Similar to a Mcintosh in shape, also with a mix of red and green skin, but the green might be a little yellower than a Mcintosh and the red a little less intense. I'll probably get this again, especially if the Zestars get to the market before the mcintoshes do. Most early season apples strike me as bland; I didn't bother with Vista bella or ginger gold this year.

According to orangepippin.com, Zestar was introduced in 1999, and is a cross between two varieties I haven't tasted, State Fair and MN 1691.

Comments

[moem]

Interesting! Because of the name, I figured they might be related to Elstar, which is my favourite variety (https://www.orangepippin.com/apples/elstar) but they're not.

[sraun]

I thought I recognized that as one of varieties out of the University of MN. Odds are that State Fair was a commonly available apple, and MN 1691 was one of their intermediates - i.e., there was good stuff in MN 1691, but it wasn't for some reason judged to be commercially viable, so they crossed it with State Fair and decided that was a winner.

[redbird]

Not commercially viable, or not named for the retail apple market. One of my favorite apples is NY562, which Cornell sent out into the world under that name decades ago. I met it at the Greenmarket ten or fifteen years ago, brought by an orchard that has other heirloom varieties (Esopus Spitzenberg!) but also still-popular varieties like Mcintosh, and more recently developed ones like Gala.

[sraun]

We've been to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum where a lot of the University of MN apple development happens, and I got to hear about their development process. The MN 1691 matches their naming convention, and from their description, the fact that it's still MN 1691 means that they never released it. It's possible that someone got some grafts of it out of the Arboretum, but it would have been an under-the-counter action.