Books Cumbria : Outdoors : Nature : Apples and Orchards of Cumbria Apples and Orchards of Cumbria Andy Gilchrist £9.00 This book is a comprehensive review of Cumbrian apple varieties and of Cumbrian orchards open to the public complied by the Cumbrian orchard groups (SLOG and NCOG). These organisations are voluntary community groups whose objectives are to conserve, maintain and renovate existing fruit orchards and encourage the planting of new orchards in the county recognising the importance of biodiversity and the preservation of old local varieties of fruit. They do this by organising talks and orchard visits, running workshops to teach orchard skills such as pruning, grafting and budding, and attending shows to offer advice to the general public and raise funds by selling fruit trees and publications about fruit. At harvest time they run community fruit pressing days, hire out fruit presses to members and attend Apple Days to identify apples and offer advice. Publisher : Hayloft Publishing Published : November 2013 Pages : 84p Format : Paperback; 210 x 149mm Illustrations : 107 colour images ISBN : 9781904524557 Quantity:  Review Book Review by Steve Matthews of Bookends. The Apples and Orchards of Cumbria by Andy Gilchrist. Hayloft. £9.00 “Flesh soft white, juicy, sharp and fruity”, such is the Carlisle Codlin, and in two years time it will be two hundred years old. The Keswick Codlin is even older. It was first found growing on a rubbish heap at Gleaston castle, near Ulverston, in the eighteenth century. Its flesh is “soft, rather coarse-textured, somewhat dry and acid”. After it was introduced by John Sander, a nurseryman from Keswick, it became one of the most popular of nineteenth century cooking apples. It’s a prolific cropper and it cooks to a juicy cram puree. The Carlisle and Keswick Codlins are just two of the types of apple which originated in the counties which now form Cumbria. There are perhaps nineteen varieties to which we can lay claim. The oddly named Forty Shilling is another double centenarian. Hailing from Thursby, it comes from a vigorous tree, which does well in “high, wet and cold regions”. It’s a dessert apple, best eaten in September and October and has a rich sweet-savoury flavour. Another Keswick cooker is Greenup’s Pippin. It took its name from the town’s shoemaker and was popular throughout the Borders in the nineteenth century. This yellow/green apple with a bright red flush was such a great favourite that it attracted many alternative names, such as Green Rolland, Red Hawthornden, Yorkshire Beauty and, understandably, Cumberland Favourite. Some apples are not so fortunate in their names. A beautiful dark red apple, which tastes as sharp and juicy as it looks, is known as Rankthorn, after the wood in Cartmell Fell, where it was found a hundred years ago. Other names are misleading. Lemon Square is, in fact an apple, and, although not possessing that perfect round apple shape, it is very far from being square. Wheaten Loaves and Churn Lid look and taste just as appley as every other apple. Nelson’s Favourite was named after a local preacher down in Kendal. Cumbria is not famous for its apples. The great commercial orchards are in the south of the country, in Kent and Somerset and Devon, but there has been a long tradition of growing apples. Place names like Appleby and Applethwaite show that apples were grown here many centuries ago. The orchard at Acorn Bank cultivates over a hundred varieties of apple, including many of the Cumbrian varieties, so, it is no wonder, that they celebrate a special apple day every October. The orchard at Brantwood has a smaller number of trees, but its orchard management is based on biodynamic principles: “A descending lunar rhythm is supposed to make sap flow less active, accordingly winter pruning is carried out during such periods.” In Dalemain, many of the house’s thirty different heritage varieties are to be found on the trees, which line the apple walk. The old trees at Hutton in the Forest produce abundant apples, which are stored “in single layers on paper over wooden trays to Christmas provided the mice don’t get them first.” Altogether, Andy Gilchrist describes twenty Cumbrian orchards, large and small, that are open to the public. They are places where pleasure can be derived from the blossom as well as the fruit. This little book is a guide, providing lists of apple varieties and orchards with useful descriptive details. The pictures, mouth-watering photographs of the apples in their burnished skins, or sliced cleanly in half to reveal the fresh flesh, make it a pleasure to read. Andy Gilchrist is a retired agronomist, but he has retained his enthusiasm for the apple and has planted his own orchard of fifty trees. The Apples and Orchards of Cumbria is available from Bookends, 56 Castle Street, Carlisle, and 66 Main Street, Keswick, and from www.bookscumbria.com