Misplaced Nostalgia?

I grew up on the East Coast eating McIntosh, Cortland, Jonathan, and Rome Beauty apples. Family and friends are in the orchard business. My maternal grandfather co-owned an apple orchard. When we visited Seattle in the 1990’s, the apple selection was limited to Red and Golden Delicious, Granny Smith, and one or two other varieties. Luckily, the selection has widened in the years since our first visit.

The other day I bought a locally-grown, new crop, McIntosh apple at the fruit stand. Julian doesn’t like them, so I usually don’t purchase that variety. I took it to lunch yesterday. One bite and I thought to myself: “DAMN! Is this a Red Delicious in disguise?” The apple had no snap to its flesh. It was as if it had been in cold storage for six months. The potential explanations are as follows:

• It was a Red Delicious in disguise
• Terroir (similar to wine grapes) is at work. If you grow grapes in a particular location, the resulting wine may be an entirely different animal from wine made from the same variety grown elsewhere. Soil and climate may affect apple varieties the same way. Apples from the same tree may have different characteristics from year to year depending on temperature and precipitation. Perhaps McIntosh apple trees don’t do as well when planted on the Eastern slopes of the Cascades as opposed to the Snow Belt of New York.

Maybe I should stick to West Coast apples on the West Coast–except for applesauce.