An Overrated Flavor

The other day we celebrated a birthday at the office. The birthday boy had indicated to his friends that he really was a huge fan of cherry pie–so that ended up being the birthday treat, rather than cake. I happily joined in the singing of “Happy Birthday,” but I passed on the pie. I typically like fruit pies, especially apple and blueberry, I’ve never cared for cherry pie, or for that matter cherry anything. I think cherry is the most overrated, and therefore overused, flavor agent in Flavortown.

Pretty much everything comes in cherry flavor. In addition to cherry pie, you’ve got cherry-themed ice cream, chocolate-covered cherries, cherry suckers, cherry popsicles, cherries jubilee, cherry soft drinks, cherry licorice, cherry jawbreakers–the list goes on and on. In fact, cherry flavor is so ubiquitous that they even use it to make cough syrup and other patent medications more palatable. Instead of a spoonful of sugar, it’s cherry flavor that helps the medicine go down.

That overabundance of cherry items hasn’t done the cherry flavor any favors. And have you noticed that the cherry flavor in products is never subtle? Instead, it’s as if they different products are trying to out-cherry each other. The cherry flavoring in often so overpowering it has become cloying and mouth-puckering–almost as bad as grape flavor. Product manufacturers, dessert creators, and confectioners would do us all a favor by dialing back on cherry concoctions, but also on the amount of cherry flavor being infused in the product.

I think the cherry should aspire to be more like the humble apple. The apple has avoided the overexposure that has made cherry flavor so commonplace and over the top. You’ll find apple in a pie or applesauce, and maybe some sour apple gum, and of course a nice, crisp apple a day helps to keep the doctor away, but you’re not going to order an apple Coke or find apple-flavored cough drops at the drug store. Apple has stayed in its lane, and has profited from that exercise of good judgment.

On The Apple Trail

Ohio produces some of the best apples in the world, thanks to the legendary efforts of Johnny Appleseed and generations of apple growers, and early autumn is prime apple harvesting time in Ohio. That means that anyone who is driving through the Ohio countryside should keep their eyes peeled for roadside apple stands where they can pick up a sack of a dozen freshly picked apples. I remember buying a paper bag of apples on a whim from a farmstand years ago and taking them to an offsite meeting. They were some of the best apples I’ve ever tasted and earned rave reviews from the other attendees.

There are lots of different varieties of apples, and the choices can seem overwhelming. I ran across this helpful chart recently that puts apple varieties in order, from most tart to most sweet. There’s an ongoing debate about which kind of apple is the best in an apple pie–everyone agrees you want a firm apple that will hold up during the baking process, with the dispute being which variety presents the truest apple pie taste like Grandma used to make–but I know, for eating by hand, that I prefer apples on the tart end of the spectrum.

Give me a fresh, crisp McIntosh on a bracing fall day, let me bite through the skin and experience that rush of tart juice and the happy crunch of the fruit, and watch me carefully nibble around the core and the stem to get every last bite. It’s a classic “autumn in Ohio” experience.

Edited to add: After I posted this, a Facebook friend called my attention to the message in the middle of the chart, which I hadn’t noticed because I looked only at the top and bottom. Pay no attention to that, but the rest of the chart is pretty useful. I found the true chart on-line and it appears below.

Smashed Apple Season

In the spring, everyone loves apple trees. Their delicate blossoms scent the warming breezes, and their pretty bright flowers foretell the growing season to come.

But in the fall, no one is very excited to have apple trees around. Once, perhaps, people actually tended the trees and carefully harvested the apples for consumption, but those days are long since past. Nobody picks the fruit anymore. Instead, the overripe apples fall to the ground, rot on the pavement, and eventually are smashed and ground into the asphalt by passing pickups and pedestrians who want to indulge their destructive impulses. And when the apples get obliterated, they coat the roadway with slime and emit an overpowering, cloying smell like applesauce gone bad, on steroids.

It’s not pleasant.

We’ve got a few of the smashed apple zones in Stonington that I pass on my morning walks. As bad as the smell is for a passerby, at least the unpleasantness is fleeting. Imagine living within one of the zones and smelling that smell constantly. It’s something for everyone to keep in mind the next time they are tempted to play Johnny Appleseed.