This rare apple is a fine American apple originated in New York about 1848, and was introduced by Gillet to California in 1890. Attractive pale yellow often almost entirely overspread with bright pink-red, dotted and streaked with purplish-carmine and striped with bright red. Flesh is yellowish-white, fine, crisp, tender, juicy, somewhat sprightly aromatic, subacid, very good quality. Many esteem this to be one of the best dessert apples of the season. The fruit tastes like a mix of apples and strawberries, apples and raspberries or apples and grapes depending on your taste buds. Its one of our favorites! Ripens in September to December. It is a hardy, healthy, long lived and a regular cropper, yielding moderate to heavy crops biennially or nearly annually. This variety was chosen by the Slow Food Ark of Taste in 2014 to be honored and saved for posterity.

The grandmother trees are located in Forest City and Humbug. Forest, in Sierra County, CA was a very productive gold mining camp beginning in 1852. The remaining town is full of antique pears, apples and cherries that are highly protected and valued by the people who live there. Apples are particularly productive and long lived at this 4500’ site. The other mother tree is located in Humbug, the famous mining camp now known as Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park, at 3250’ on the San Juan Ridge of Nevada County. While it is difficult to estimate the age, they are planted next to a house from the late 1800s.