Short Essay #4: History and Production

MN 1711

            The first time I ever tasted a Honeycrisp apple was at my grandparent’s house. It was martini time, 4 0’clock in the Lander house hold, and my grandfather cut up an apple for a snack. He offered me the bowl of slices but my hand stopped short when I saw they were lightly salted. I gave him a very skeptic look and he replied with a “just try it.”  With the first bite, everything I had known about apples was turned upside down. The delicious sweet-tart flavor was brought out by the salt. Apples weren’t supposed to taste this good! Granny Smith’s and Gala’s no longer compared to the crisp and juicy goodness of a Honeycrisp. But where had they been for the years of my life filled with inferior fruit? Turns out the Honeycrisp apple didn’t even exist until 1960.

            The Honeycrisp apple’s origin resides in the University of Minnesota Horticultural Research Center. There it was part of an apple breeding program to produce apple trees that could stand cold winters and still yield high quality fruit. Other apple varieties released by the university had folded under harsh winters, so the search was on for the perfect breed (“Honeycrisp”). After the initial crossing of a Macoun and Honeygold apple, the first Honeycrisp seedling was planted two years later in 1962 (University of Minnesota). Apple trees don’t produce fruit until they have matured, so it is estimated that a Honeycrisp wouldn’t have been sampled until 1967 (“Honeycrisp”). The next stage was selection where trees are rated on things like productivity, disease rating, and picking date. Because the Honeycrisp passed the test, nameless until now, it was assigned the subject number MN 1711. This selection occurred in 1974; it took almost two decades of further examination before the university released the apple as the Honeycrisp in 1991 (“Honeycrisp”).

To understand more about the Honeycrisp apple itself, I researched its parentage. The Macoun is a relatively small apple variety that is dark red in color; its crisp quality makes it a “perfect dessert choice, bursting with sweet aromatic flavor” (“Honeycrisp Heritage”). The Honeygold is a cross itself between a Golden Delicious and Haralson apple, and its sweet but hardy fruit quality lend it to baking (“Honeycrisp Heritage”). Knowing the roots of the Honeycrisp, I wasn’t surprised to find out the characteristic traits it held. The Honeycrisp displays a mottled red and yellow skin and has a crisp sweet-tart flavor. The most surprising trait is holds, however, is that the Honeycrisp can be stored for six months and still retain its firmness and taste (University of Minnesota). This long storage life has to be appealing to farmers and food distributors alike.

Even undergoing the many trials at the university, the Honeycrisp is still a relatively new breed with little information available on it. For the most part, farmers who opt to plant Honeycrisp trees in their orchards have to rely on their knowledge to cope with any problems that surface; apparently Honeycrisp’s are tricky to grow (University of Minnesota). To aid this process, the “Honeycrisp Apple” page found on the University of Minnesota’s apple website hosts a link (titled Production & Postharvest) that leads to a troubleshooting database. On this site, agriculturalists can upload pictures and text that illustrate problems they have run into and tips on how to best avoid them. For example, in solution to bitter pit problems for fruit grown in Maine and New York it is suggested to use calcium sprays during the growing season (“Bitter Pit”).

Since its release, the Honeycrisp has become very popular to consumers and therefore farmers. The Honeycrisp has even gained a following in Europe where it has been dubbed the Honeycruch apple (“Honeycrisp Apple”). Though the Honeycrisp is protected under U.S. Patent, trees can be acquired through licensed nurseries located in the United States, Australia, and Canada (“Licensed Nurseries”).  Farmers in South Canterbury, New Zealand are looking to enter the Honeycrisp market. With a cooler climate that is ideally suited to growing the apples, they hope to capitalize on the exports during the U.S. off-season (“Episode 17: Crunch Time”).

            What started as one seedling in an agricultural experiment has turned into a multi-continental mania. As written in an article on the Minnesota Harvest website, “Whenever we give sample slices of Honeycrisp at the orchard, new converts are won over…one slice, and Honeycrisp is their new favorite” (“Honeycrisp”).  From experience, I can verify this statement; the Honeycrisp is by far my favorite apple. Just last Thanksgiving I was going to bake my first ever apple pie and insisted that my father buy Honeycrisp apples. I never imagined, though, that I was just one more person jumping on the bandwagon.  It amazes me how much this one fruit has altered the apple industry; it also amazes me how good a hybrid apple can taste. I never thought before that my food could be engineered, especially when it comes to “natural” things like fruit and vegetables. It was also surprising how much thought and time goes into selecting one apple tree; I mean the Honeycrisp was around for thirty years before the world knew about it! This research opened my eyes to the fact that something as normal as a Honeycrisp apple can be man-made. It makes me wonder what other foods I eat every day that have been genetically bred for my enjoyment.

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"Episode 17: Crunch Time." Hyundai Country Calendar. TV ONE. New Zealand, 5 June 2011. TVNZ.

Television New Zealand Limited. Web. 07 May 2012. Transcript.

"Honeycrisp." Apples. Minnesota Harvest, 2011. Web. 06 May 2012.

"Honeycrisp Apple." University of Minnesota: Apples. University of Minnesota, 7 Sept. 2008. Web. 07

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“Honeycrisp Heritage.” Honeycrisp. Pepin Heights, All About Apples, and Black Twig Design, 2008. Web.

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"Licensed Nurseries." University of Minnesota: Apples. University of Minnesota, 16 June 2008. Web. 07

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