The Apple Club Newsletter

Winter 2005

Welcome to the winter issue of our newsletter. And apologies first of all for not getting an Autumn copy to you this year. Between the great apple harvest we had, and putting up a new shed, not to mention making juice, the time just slipped by. It is the first time this has happened in five years, and I am determined not to allow it to happen for at least as long again.
I hope that you find this issue as good as two would usually be, and enjoy reading it when you get a chance over Christmas.

Orchard Removal

 Removing an orchard is an emotional task, especially if you have seen it being planted. In the natural order, trees usually live longer than people, so to uproot a tree that is not so old is not exactly normal. But it must be done. In the past few weeks we have been removing some apple trees that were planted in 1982. The reason for taking them out is that, in a modern orchard of small trees, the best apples are produced before the trees are twenty years old. And the Golden Delicious trees that we have been taking out have been producing smaller fruits (and smaller yields) over the past few years.
Of course, we knew that these trees would have to go, and so, already a few years ago, we planted their replacements in a nearby field, and these are now producing well. And the apples that they are giving are larger, better coloured, and tastier. And as soon as the replacements were
planted, it was only a matter of time before the older ones had to go.
There are a few nice things about removing an orchard. One is to admire the quality of the soil left behind. After twenty or more years of vast quantities of apple leaves falling onto the soil, and being incorporated by earthworms and other soil creatures, the soil in our 1982 orchard is now much darker, and it feels and looks really healthy. And so the next crop that is grown on this field should do really well.
Another useful benefit is the wood that results. After twenty three years, an orchard has also produced quite a lot of timber. Much of this is small branches, which we cut off and pulverise, making a nice soil mulch. But the remainder is solid trunks, which can be used for firewood, once dried, which takes a year or so. Two or three trees give enough wood for a decent fire for an evening, and with many hundreds of trees per acre, there is more than enough wood to see out quite a few winters.
That is one of the fringe benefits of growing apples; knowing that apart from the apples that are being harvested each year, and the habitat that the trees have provided for all sorts of birds, insects and animals, that in the end there will also be a harvest of timber.
And this final harvest saves on coal, oil and gas in the heating of our homes. Apples are surely the ultimate in environmentally-friendly crops.

Vinegar

Taken from an article by Haydn Shaughnessy, in the Irish Times.
Relish the sour taste that real vinegar brings to food.
Before God made man he made vinegar, according to German chemist and Munich patent lawyer, Gunter Wachtershauser.
Acetic acid, vinegar by its scientific name, was there at the origins of life, he says, helping to release energy from sea minerals. It also forms part of the Krebs cycle, the process that produces energy within human cells. This may explain why so many traditional cuisines make ample use of it, notably the noblest of Japanese sushi makers.
Wachtershauser is the theorist of "metabolic theory of evolution". Life on earth, he says, began when acetic acids came into contact with minerals such as iron and created the first acts of metabolism, by which he means the creation or release of energy in a form that fuelled the building of molecules that foreshadowed proteins.
It's easy to see how vinegar played the first blinder. This is the only product that would be naturally hanging around once properly formed. Vinegar is virtually indestructible, and it was there to perform life's miracle kick-start.
There should be dramatic and poetic metaphors for its death-defying power but no classicist anointed it great, apart from Hippocrates who used it for medicine, no romantic extolled its virtues, it never became mangled in Joycean syntax, nobody quite got round to beatifying its presence close to the human soul. Vinegar, we owe you one.
The health and whole food community lays a special claim to its prowess. Vinegar purges, it purifies and it provides amino acids, if you source the right kind. But at the same time we are in danger of underestimating its importance.
It could be the most important chap on the digestive block.
Vinegar has been used over the whole course of human history to purify foods before they are eaten. The use of vinegar in sushi is essential to a dish that contains raw fish. We are foolish enough to chance eating without the protection of such a powerful acid. The same can be said of any dish in which it takes a lead role.
The French, for example, eat salads once they have been doused in vinaigrette, whereas we fool around with south sea island dressing and similar sweet travesties naively believing that dressing is a matter of decoration rather than survival.
The question asked by the few is what type of vinegar is best. True vinegars are non-pasteurised, so we can eliminate most western spirit vinegars from this particular race. Wine vinegars seem to me too variable and uncared for whereas everyday balsamic is a gimmick.
Brown rice vinegar has a pleasingly petillante effect on the tongue. Cider vinegar is wonderfully fulsome.
My tip on the vinegar trip is, above all, avoid leaving it on the shelf. Take any excuse. Use it.

Karmine cider vinegar

While on the topic of vinegar, I am pleased to announce that we now have a good supply of cider vinegar coming on stream, which is about time, as we started the fermentation about four years ago. Indeed, we recently had a few interesting customers, who were feeding it to cows to reduce bacterial cell counts in milk. By all accounts it worked, though it is difficult to be sure how. We also had some racehorse trainers who took it to make their horses run faster, but I'm afraid that they turned down my offer of a few tips instead of payment.
As well as pasteurised cider vinegar, we can supply living culture cider vinegar, as recommended in the previous article. There is currently a lot of interest in these living cultures, as they are like the probiotic yoghurt cultures in Actimel, which help to protect your internal system.

Bag-in-box juice

We have recently purchased a system for filling bag-in-box juice, and consequently are now happy to offer you freshly pressed juice in bags. We fill the juice into bags of 5, 10 or 20 litres, and you can get these in a cardboard dispensing box, or loose, to replace into the dispensing box yourself.
Each bag has a one-way tap, so you can fill a glass whenever you like, leaving the bag either in your fridge, or if you prefer, just somewhere in your kitchen.
And because of the one-way tap, the juice will stay fresh in the bag for a month once opened, provided that it is not moved around too much.
 5 litre bags are now available in our farm shop for €12.50, and the dispensing box costs an extra €1.00. 10 litre bags cost €21.00, and the box is again an extra €1.00.
The juice in the 5 and 10 litre bags is identical to that in our bottles, so we feel sure that you will be happy with the quality. At the moment, they are only available from our farm shop.

Celtic Orchards apples

If you visit our website, you will notice a link to Celtic Orchards, and if you saw Nationwide in October, you may also have seen a piece done about this venture, which was filmed in our orchard.
Celtic Orchards is a joint project between a number of growers, who are trying to improve the quality and consistency of apples available to you through the shops. There are a number of growers involved, though only two have supplied apples to the project this year.
So if you don't get your apples from our farm-shop (where, as you know, you always get the best apples at the most reasonable prices), you now have a choice of other locations where you can get Irish apples.
Superquinn outlets nationwide are selling Derek O'Dwyer's apples in trays of six, marked Celtic Orchards. And Super Valu and Centra will shortly also be selling trays of Celtic Orchards apples, this time produced by David Keane in Cappoquin. Keep an eye out for them.

In Your Garden

Apple scab, which causes black scars on the apples, and black spots on the leaves, was quite severe this year. The simplest way to minimise it next year is to rake up all your apple leaves now, and place them in the compost heap, preferably then covering with other leaves or garden or household material. In doing this, you are breaking the life cycle of the scab, which infects new leaves in the spring from infections on old leaves lying under the apple tree.
If you are planning to prune your apple trees, you can do so from now on. There are many manuals and books on pruning, and as it is difficult, it is worth getting one of these, perhaps in the book section of your local garden centre.
As a general guide, if there has been a lot of new growth in the past season (more than 40cm added to each branch), then only a light pruning will suffice, as pruning such trees will stimulate even more growth next year, at the expense of fruiting. On the other hand, if very little growth has occurred in the past season (less than 10cm added to each branch), then the trees need to have more wood removed, to stimulate extra growth and good quality fruit. Remember, when pruning, do not cut a branch half way back. Either remove it fully, cutting back to where it forks or meets the stem, or let it remain.

Recipe: Apple Clafoutis

Clafoutis is usually made using cherries, but many other fruits like peaches, plums and rhubarb can also be used. It can be made in individual dishes, but here we use one large 20-23cm (8-9") earthenware dish.

Ingredients: (serves 6)
4 or 5 Bramley apples
5g (1oz) caster sugar icing sugar for dusting butter for greasing
For batter:
100ml (3 fl. Oz) milk pinch of salt
100g (4 oz) caster sugar 3 eggs
25g (1 oz) plain flour
150ml ( pint) whipping cream
2 or 3 tablespoons of brandy (optional)

Method:
Preheat the oven to 190oC (375oF, Gas 5)
To make the batter, whisk the ingredients to a smooth consistency, using a mixer or by hand. Then leave the batter to relax while preparing the apples.
Peel, core and quarter the apples, then cut these to medium thick slices and sprinkle with caster sugar.
Butter the dish, stir the batter and cover the bottom of the dish with some batter, spoon in the apple slices, and cover with remaining batter Bake in a preheated oven for 25-40 minutes, so that the batter is not too soft. The pudding will rise more around the edges than in the centre, which just sits.
Remove from the oven and leave to rest. The batter will collapse from its souffl look, and this is normal. Serve while still hot, after dusting lightly with icing sugar.

War and Peace,   By Willem Traas

Last year at Christmas, I wrote about Christmas celebrations in Holland. This time I will write about war and peace (Tolstoy wrote a book with this title).
It is war when people disagree with each other so much that they begin to fight and even try to kill each other.
It is peace when people get on with each other and live and let live. In the bible, the first war took place between two brother called Cain and Able, sons of Adam and Eve. Cain killed Abel because he was jealous of him. You can read this in the first book of the bible, called Genesis. Since that time there has been war and peace throughout history. You know that from school. It just never stopped. From small wars with stones and fists to the atom bombs which were dropped in Japan, first on Hiroshima and then on Nagasaki.
Here in Ireland it was the same; from Brian Bor to the civil war. All wars are the same. They are about power and dominance, like you see between animals. Except that animals rarely kill one another.
The first World War was from 1914 to 1918. It was called the Great War. What was great about it? Only the scale. Millions of soldiers were killed in the trenches of Belgium. Killed by bombs, bullets, bayonets and gas. Plenty of Irish people from around here died or were wounded in that war. Many were 17 or 18 years old, and the youngest soldier killed in that war was from Waterford, only 14 years old.
When the first World War was over people wanted peace badly. Still, only twenty years later, the whole World was at war again. From Germany to England to America, Japan, Russia and France. Think if that happened now. Yes Germany started that war. And it was not a war as wars were before. It was a total war.
And the biggest evil was thought out by a man named Hitler. He really had an incredible power over people. Millions of people greeted him with Hail Hitler, as if he was God. Hitler not only made war, but told people that the German race was better than any other. They were perfect and others were inferior. Especially the Jews were inferior to him and his Nazi party.
If you read what happened to the Jews and to others you would not believe it. But some people filmed what happened at the time, and these films prove it, and that is important now that few survivors are still alive. A book I recommend is the diary of Anna Frank. She was a Dutch Jewish girl living in Amsterdam, and kept a diary of what happened to her. She died, and six million more, in the concentration camps.
We need to remember what happened, again and again. War is lunacy; is madness. War is not about bravery and medals.
I was in the Dutch army when I was young, and I began to see that it was for the Generals and power-mad people.
And now it is almost Christmas. I think Christmas is the best feast of the year. It is about a child born who wanted to bring peace to the World. Peace between different people.
Peace is not just the absence of war, I hope. I think it should mean respect and love between each other.
Christmas is such a wonderful feast because people try not to be greedy but generous. We give presents to each other and wish each other peace and happiness. And if we wish that to each other, it is bound to happen. It gives us courage to start a new year.
I wish you peace and happiness, and I hope to have it myself.


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