Description
Red Delicious is an excellent keeper known for the consistency of its texture, bright red color, and conical shape. It is a sweet apple, lightly aromatic with a firm, cream-colored flesh.
Red Delicious grown in New England typically are a little smaller and have a more knobby end than its western cousin. It is a little juicier and sweeter ripening under New England’s long summer days and crisp fall nights. Red Delicious is best eaten fresh, in salads, and in fruit compotes. Picking begins in early October.
Discovered: 1870s, Iowa
Parentage: Unknown
Harvest: Late Season
History
Discovered in Peru, Iowa, in the 1870s, Red Delicious was initially called Hawkeye. The apple was renamed in 1893 after C. M. Stark bit into one and said, “My that’s delicious–and that’s the name for it!”
