How do you like those apples?

[Big Frank]

When I was checking out of the grocery store Sunday one of the cashiers went around giving out free apples. I ate mine a few hours ago. It was a Pazazz apple and it was delicious. It was my first, and it was one of the juiciest apples I've had in my entire life. It's a cross between a Honeycrisp and something else, I don't know what. Honeycrisp apples are already sweet and tart and juicy but Pazazz is better in all those ways. It has more starch and acid. Some of the starch turns into sugar after it's picked making them sweeter and even better a few months after they're picked. One seedling was picked out of 50,000-60,000 as being the best and that's how they got Pazazz.

After that I had some Winter Jack. It's a blend of apple cider liqueur, Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 Tennessee whiskey and spices. Not as good as my apple but it's only 30 proof and goes down smooth.

A week or so ago the same grocery store had a coupon for Kanzi apples but I looked all over and couldn't find any. Kanzi is a cross between a Gala apple and a Braeburn, which are both really good apples themselves. Gala is a cross between two other apples, and Braeburn was a seedling someone just happened to find. They keep cross breeding the crosses and come up with even better apples.

[Rastus]

Sounds good.  You are  making me want to plant a couple of trees 'cause ain't nothin' better than fresh picked.  I have one that's been alive for a couple of years now and it might just make it.

I wish we had a bit more rain here outside of Tulsa.  I have a hard time keeping anything alive because it get's so dry here.  That's especially true because the bare root BS they sell people.  Lots of water is necessary to keep the alive.  Also, bare root trees need to be anchored really well or the wind makes it pretty hard for them to put out viable roots.

[Big Frank]

My friends have an apple tree in their back yard and sometimes when we go camping I get to have homemade apple butter on my toast at breakfast. I'm going to look for Kanzi apples again when I go back to the store. I still have a dollar off coupon for a 2 pound bag of them. I have a 75 cents off coupon for a 2 pound bag of Pazazz apples and will get those too if they're still in stock. I have canned fruit in the fridge but rarely buy fresh fruit. Now I have a reason to get more.