Apple Review #13: Ashmead’s Kernel

This apple sounds like some Clive Barker shit. Like it’s a forbidden relic — an infernal device you use to enter the Labyrinth of Hell. (It continues its horror pedigree by tasting just a little like you’re kissing a haunted scarecrow, but in a good way? Whatever, more on that in the review.)

As a writer, one of the most compelling things about heirloom apples is their names. Ashmead’s Kernel is a fantastic name. I remarked that when I first started my Heirloom Apple Journey, many of the names sounded either like vampires or hobbits. Lord Lambourne? Vampire. Claygate Pearmain? Hobbit. Calville Blanc d’Hiver? Vampire. Fearn’s Pippin? Hobbit, obviously. Black Gilliflower? Could go either way. Arkansas Black? Clearly a vampire hunter.

Ashmead’s Kernel, again, has a Clive Barker ring to it, to me — as if it were a diabolical, demonic artifact. It is, in reality, named after a man, Dr. Ashmead, which himself sounds like a Clive Barker character — some Faustian doctor and academic trying to logic his way into the pleasures and pains of Hell.

So, know that my very initial interest in these apples had nothing to do with apples, or the taste of apples, but simply because the names were so fucking goofy I had to know what was up with that, and why all these apples were clearly named after creatures of the night and fantasy folk.

Anyway. To the reviewmobile!

My review of an Ashmead’s Kernel apple, Scott Farm (VT), early-Oct:

This small, unassuming little apple sits round and dense in the hand, comfortably nestled in the palm, whispering for you to eat it. I mean, at least that’s what I heard. Perhaps you would not be as fortunate as I was.

I’ve had good ones of these and bad ones of these and the bad ones eat like you’re chewing a parsnip and taste weird, but the good ones are a special kind of sublime — oh, still weird, but a lovely kind of weird.

For instance: the first bite from this thing is giving haunted scarecrow vibes. It has this faintly burlap-sacky cornfield crow-fear taste — it is autumnal in a deeper, more eldritch way than simply “oh dry leaves and cider spice.” That fades quick, and yields more overtly pleasant, if still odd, flavors: gingerbread and graham cracker. Some of this is bound to the skin and is only present when you eat it with the skin on — and here I wonder too if the skin absorbs not only the nutrients from the ground where the apple grew, but the air, too. Gently soaking in the orchard air. Quietly inhaling the dreams of scarecrows.

The flesh of the apple is a dense, chewy thing — not so dense it’s punishing, but you’ll work harder to eat this apple. And it will reward you with big fucking flavors: it’s big tart, big sweet, brings orange and hazelnut vibes to the party — it’s really something else, this apple. It’s also juicy in fits and bursts, as if it chooses when to gush and when to not.

This is a strange apple, perfect for October, fit for Halloween. It’s also small enough but heavy enough to throw at the heads of less the treaters and more the trickers — you get some sneaky little fuckers on Halloween night trying to shit in your pumpkins, well, you could bean them with one of these. Then again, that would be a waste of a wonderfully weird-tasting apple.

Score-wise, I think its weirdness is a virtue but might turn some folks off — as such, an 8.3 feels like a perfectly odd-shaped score.

The eating-it-live review is here, and it gets a bit… kooky.

Ashmead’s Kernel: Big tart, big sweet, tastes like you’re tongue-fucking a haunted scarecrow, but like a cool haunted scarecrow, it’s fine

Reviews so far this year: Honeycrisp, Sweetie, Crimson Crisp, Knobbed Russet, Cortland, Maiden’s Blush, Cox’s Orange Pippin, Reine des Reinettes, Ingrid Marie, Hudson’s Golden Gem, Holstein, Suncrisp