FOOD: Fuji Apples

Just before Christmas, I was shopping at a store and thought I'd look at something other than Golden Delicious to meet my daily apple intake requirement. I've been eating an apple a day since my little bout of not being able to keep meals down (combined with the odd seconds-long bout of not being able to breathe). Green apples seem to help the digestion process. It seems to have helped me.

But the semi-tart GD apples of the fall seemed to get blander and blander as Christmas approached. I grabbed some Granny Smith and I happened upon a stash of Fuji apples in the organic aisle. They weren't cheap, but I grabbed three. Also took home a bag of GD apples, since the plans were to stay in the cave until well into the New Year.

Two nights later, I cut open the first of the Fuji's and immediately felt deflated. The core seemed rotten. Around the actual core was a pallid pale 'secondary' core, the rest of the flesh being a sort of off-white, almost yellowish. I shaved off a slice to test if it was bad.

MY GAWD DID IT TASTE GREAT!!!!!!!

I quickly finished coring and then cut the apple up into slices. As my mother taught me, I tossed the slices with a little salt (doesn't everybody?) and hoovered them up. And then I ate the second of the three apples. I kept the third as a Christmas Day present to myself. It took a lot of self-control. I also phoned Patrick's wife Dawna and suggested she might do herself a great flavour favour by getting Fuji's on her next visit to the grocer. I babbled a lot. She indulged me. I selfishly hope she doesn't get the apples for her brood.

I want them all to myself.

How do the Fuji apples taste? A honeyed McIntosh? Close as I can get. The apples have been chosen to become the sole basis for a drink called Fuji 2.0 that is very popular. These are juicy apples. I eat them without aid of any drink whatsoever. It's just a great dining experience. They are even good snacks. Trust the potato chip king, they are worth switching from Hostess and Lay's Chips!

As long as you don't diminish MY buying horde.