Road Apples

We have been making this selling trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for five years.  We spend a week on the road circling the west half of the peninsula.  After we cross the Mackinac Bridge we turn left and keep going.  One of the most peaceful places we drive through is called the Garden peninsula.  It's a piece of land that juts out into Green Bay separating Big Bay De Noc from Little Bay De Noc.  It's peaceful and beautiful and I noticed the first year there are orphaned apple trees all over the place.  

I've asked a few people where they came from and I was told they were planted by the birds dropping seeds in their droppings.   I don't accept that.  These trees are too evenly spaced, too close to the roads, they outline fields so I'm thinking early settlers of the area.  The first sawmill was built in the early 1800's so there were enough people living there then to NEED a sawmill. And apples.  These trees are scattered everywhere and  of many, many different varieties.

These are the size of a dime.  A gumball.  A nut. 

In the past I've picked one or two to try and always managed to pick one that was really, really sour.  This year I brought a big bag along and we stopped whenever I saw one that seemed to be easily accessible.  I climbed down road ditches, climbed up road ditches, walked through fields and tromped through tall grasses and pulled branches down to reach the fruit.   I wasn't the only one picking.  The grasses around the trees were sometimes tromped down, you could tell the deer are loving these apples.

There are all different varieties and sizes.  I picked what was in good shape, not buggy, sometimes one sometimes five or six. 

Sometimes I was Eve, taking a bite out of an apple and left it hanging. I nursed that bag of apples in the car all week, checking for bruising causing spoiling, bugs I overlooked, softness.  I really, really wanted to get these home.  I wish I could have gotten more but sometimes what looked accessible from the road wasn't once I got there.

Yesterday I peeled some for a pie.  I took a bite (read: a slice) out of each one to see what I was getting.  Some were soft and sweet like a Macintosh, an apple I don't like at all because they are soft.  I like an apple that's cracking crisp.   Some were SO sour, some were surprisingly sweet and crisp.  They were all very different and that would be a good experimental pie.

What didn't go into the pie went into the pot for applesauce.

So. I made a pie.  Now, first a disclaimer.  I will never order an apple pie in a restaurant or bakery.  They are too cloyingly sweet and when I see one with a streusel topping drizzled in caramel, well, it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.  The only apple pie I eat is the one I make.  My grandma used Northern Spy apples so I do too.  Sour, firm, they aren't sweet.  I use little sugar and my grandma even spritzed a lemon in hers.  I will make and eat that pie because it isn't sweet.  So the pie I made with these found apples was a test for today.

We had my brother and sister and spouses over for dinner and they were my test case for a pie that can never be duplicated.  I'll never have these apples, this combination of apples again so it was a one time deal.   I also made home made cinnamon ice cream just for insurance.

Well, it's too bad this is a one time pie because it was wonderful.  Absolutely the best.  It wasn't sweet but once in awhile you hit a sweet bite.  It wasn't mushy, or oozy or overly anything.  It was delicious.  This happens a lot when I cook.  I open the refrigerator or cupboard and toss in whatever looks or sounds good and don't write things down and can't duplicate it again.  But if you happen to be here for dinner, well...