SEASONS INTRODUCTION LATE SUMMER Late Summer Fruits Late Summer Meat/Fish Late Summer Vegetables Late Summer Recipes

Early Apples
Recipes

• The first apples of the year begin ripening in late summer. Look for Red Delicious, McIntosh (round, red with tinges of green), Gravenstein (red striped), Lodi (yellow-green), Cortland (red with very white flesh), Gala and Royal Gala (orange-red, sometimes with streaks of green), Ginger Gold (smooth and yellow).
• Red Delicious is the most popular apple in America, probably more for its appearance than its taste. In fact, unlike most apples, the Red Delicious looks just great even when it is quite a bit past its prime. Be sure to buy them in season and choose apples that are heavy and firm. These apples are best for eating "out of hand" and do not usually work well for cooking. Red Delicious apples are elongated rather than round, with a sort of high-cheekboned, strong-chinned shape and six distinctive lumps at the bottom. The apple was discovered in the 1870s by an Iowa farmer named Jesse Hiatt. He named them Hawkeyes, but when they won a fruit fair competition in 1893, the name was changed. Apparently, Hiatt's original Red Delicious tree is still alive and well.
• With the exception of the Gala variety, summer apples do not store as well as fall apples, because they have a high water content and tend to become mealy.
• Apples continue to ripen at a rapid rate even after they are plucked from the tree, but refrigeration dramatically slows this process. This is why cold storage is such an effective way of keeping apples available year-round. Once your apples reach a stage of ideal ripeness, put them in the refrigerator if you won't be able to eat them right away.
• The best late summer apples to use for cooking are Gravensteins, Lodis, Cortlands, Galas, and Ginger Golds. Apples go well in both sweet and savory dishes. A favorite European combination is fried apples with pork. Here in America, of course, we have the pie. Look for apples in such summer dishes as fruit salads, cole slaw, chilled soups, and fresh apple tarts.

Early Grapes
Recipes

• Most shoppers think only of green seedless when they look for grapes. But there are many kinds of grapes, and very often the ones with seeds have the best flavor. The late summer is just the beginning of grape season. Look for dark red Cardinals, blue-black Buffalos, golden Thompson Seedless, and the amber Interlaken Seedless.
• There are three different types of grapes. American bunch grapes and muscadine grapes are both native to the North America. European grapes come from the Old World but are widely grown here now, especially in California. The majority of grapes on the market are European varieties, although there are a quite a few American bunch and European hybrids.
• Muscadine grapes are native to the southeastern United States and do not grow well in any other area. In the South, though, they thrive, and people often gather wild muscadines for their desserts. Unlike bunch grapes, which ripen all at once and can be snipped off the branch, muscadines ripen one at a time. They are harvested by shaking the plant so that the grapes fall off into a cloth. Muscadine grapes come in bronze and black cultivated varieties. The most famous of these is the Scuppernong, a bronze grape that was discovered in the early 19th century by a North Carolina naturalist, Dr. Calvin Jones.
• There is some evidence that grape juice, or more specifically, the flavonoid pigment in grape juice, might be of benefit to heart patients, because it appears to prevent blood cells from clumping. Aspirin does something similar and is widely taken by those who have suffered heart attacks. The original beverage studied in this context was wine. It had been noticed that the wine-loving French, despite their high-fat diets and correspondingly higher blood cholesterol, have a lower incidence of heart disease than might be expected. Originally, to the joy of health-conscious drinkers, alcohol was credited with possessing these healthful properties. But on further examination, it was discovered that, fermented or not, grape juice had the same effect.
• The best way to eat table grapes is fresh, either by themselves or in fruit salad. Grapes with lemon and sour cream sauce make for a light, traditional summer dessert. In savory dishes, you will find green seedless grapes in the classic French sauce Veronique (which contains white wine and cream as well as grapes) and red grapes in chicken salad.

Mid-Season Pears
Recipes

• The Bartlett pears of midsummer are followed by the more full-flavored Bosc, Comice, and Seckel varieties, all of European origin.
• The Comice pear, also known as the Doyenne de Comice, was first produced in France in 1849. It is generally regarded as the best of all varieties of pear, because it is particularly juicy and sweet. They are fat, bulbous green pears with a crimson blush. The skin is so delicate that even the tiniest bump can bruise it. Small scratches should not prevent you from buying the fruit, because they will not harm the flavor.
• Boscs are slender, tall pears and have golden skin layered over with brown "russeting." They have a smooth buttery texture but are quite dense and hold their shape when cooked. Their spicy flavor is more assertive than that of other pears, which makes them good for baking.
• Tiny Seckel pears are often used for garnishes, but they are good for eating and cooking too. At little more than two or three inches high, they are olive green tinged with deep red.
• There is no need to buy pears that are already ripe. In fact, the riper the pear is to start out with, the more likely it is to have been bruised during shipping or by another shopper's overzealous squeezing. No matter how hard they seem at the store, pears will achieve delectable ripeness in a few days, if you allow them to sit in a shady spot at room temperature. If a pear is ready to eat, the flesh at the base of the stem will be just soft enough to give when you press it lightly with your thumb. Alternatively, you can pull gently on the stem; if it comes out with little resistance, the pear is ready.
• Bosc and Seckel pears are better for cooking than the Comice, which falls into mush when exposed to heat. Pears go well with anise, maple syrup, stilton and port.