Honeycrisp Surprise

I bought Honeycrisp apples this week instead of my usual Granny Smiths, mostly because (I admit) I like the name. It's cute.

I'm generally wary of produce with names like this, but I decided to take a chance on these (because, you know, the name is cute).


The good:

My first bite was surprising. As I learned from Harold McGee's On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen, the first bite of an apple is always the most satisfying because the rush of air we get from breaking all of those vacuole membranes bombards our olfactory system with the apple scent, enhancing their flavor. Plus there's the accompanying crunch. The apple certainly lived up to the "crisp" part of its name-- the texture reminded me of an Asian pear, which is the ultimate in crunchy deliciousness. After that pleasant surprise about the texture, well, that's when we come to...

The not-so-good (also known as bad):

The apple also lived up to the "Honey" in its name. I enjoy sweetness, and these apples certainly delivered on that, but that was all they delivered. There was not much flavor. It tasted like more like sugar than apple.

Of course; the breeding process used to birth this variety back in 1991 focused on sweetness, color, and shelf-life.

Anecdotally, some attribute the recent increase in apple consumption to Honeycrisp's 1991 debut.
-- Rachel Hutton, Citypages.com

I'm not surprised that sales increased. The Honeycrisp apple I ate tasted like a crunchy sugar-water receptacle. I felt like I was eating candy in fruit form. While the crunch made each bite pleasant enough, I felt dissatisfied.

I didn't think Mmm, apple as I ate it. What is an apple supposed to taste like? It's difficult to explain, but I think of a flavor that would be enhanced by cinnamon. I think of apple skin. (If you've never had apple skin because your mom always peeled and sliced your apples for you as my mom did for my brother for most of his childhood, then... try it.) While I'm not sure how to describe what apples taste like considering there are so very many different varieties, I do know that I want to taste more than sweetness when I bite into one.

I had a hard time detecting the character of my rush-hour snack. I didn't get the "hint of tartness" for which these apples are supposedly known, which was very disappointing because I love tart apples. (Why did I buy Honeycrisp instead of Granny Smith? Cute. Lesson: learned.)

I must withhold complete condemnation of the Honeycrisp as the one I ate came from one of the corporate chain grocery stores; perhaps one I get from a farmers market would redeem the variety for me. Perhaps it was just a case of over-ripeness that made my apple so sweet, though how could I tell when these apples are bred to stay firm for much longer than most apples (I didn't know that before I bought them).

Or perhaps my dissatisfaction with it simply came from my natural inclination for tart fruit. Who knows?

It really did shock me that the texture was so strongly reminscent of an Asian pear.

In conclusion: I love Asian pears.

Aside: I love that they sell Asian pears with that protective styrofoam webbing. They're so dainty (and ...).

Photo courtesy of Kodamakitty.