The Winesap and Green Skin Horse apple represent two of the hundreds of antique apple species that are grown at the Southern Heritage Apple Orchard near Pinnacle. (photos by Salem Neff)
Lee Calhoun deflects any comparisons to Johnny Appleseed.Calhoun claims he’s not nearly as eccentric as the American pioneer who introduced apple trees to vast areas of the Midwest, but he is one of only a handful of Southerners who have tried to keep certain varieties of Southern antique apples from becoming extinct.
“Over 1,000 [species of apples] have already died out completely, so we’re trying to catch the last of them before they all die out,” Calhoun, a Pittsboro resident, said. “We’ve found hundreds, but we’ve lost hundreds also.”
Growing apples and preserving the Southern culinary tradition of making apples a part of our everyday diet have been Calhoun’s hobbies since he and his wife moved to Chatham County 35 years ago. Over the past three and half decades, Calhoun has collected nearly 500 different varieties of apples. Like Johnny Appleseed, Calhoun has also shared the wealth with nurseries like the Southern Heritage Apple Orchard at Horne Creek Farm near Pinnacle. Calhoun grafted and donated more than 200 trees of antique and heirloom Southern apples to Horne Creek Farm.
“Two hundred years ago, people had uses for apples we don’t have anymore — apple cider, apple brandy, apple butter, dried apples,” Calhoun said. “Apples were very important to Southern farm families for hundreds of years. Southern farm families ate apples in some way every day of the year. Some apples were good for stewing, some apples good for apple butter — we’ve lost all of that knowledge over the years…. We need to recapture that.”
In years past, Southern families subsisted on a variety of antique apples like the Winesap, Black Twig, Magnum Bonum, Red June, Aunt Rachel and Horse Apple varieties, Calhoun said. In the latest edition of his book, Old Southern Apples, Calhoun gives the history of the Southern antique apple and describes 1,800 species of the delicious fruit.
The ancestral home of the apple is central Asia where the climate is fairly cold and dry, Calhoun explained, but Southerners have grown apples in warmer climes for more than 400 years. So it would be a tragedy if the rich history of the Southern antique apple were somehow lost.
“I’d like to see people expand their apple uses and try to recover some of the things that were done in the past like making their own apple sauce and freezing it or making their own apple butter and canning it. I’d like to see people start frying apples for breakfast, start stewing apples for supper — people did it for hundreds of years. I’d like to see people grow apples that their grandfathers and great-grandfathers grew and recapture some of our apple heritage.”
Margaret Norfleet-Neff strongly agrees with Calhoun. The co-founder of Beta Verde, a farm-to-table project, Norfleet-Neff and her daughter, Salem, grow apples on their property in Winston-Salem. Margaret and Salem often travel to Century Farm near Reidsville to seek out some of the best heirloom apples in the South.
“We try to go for those heirloom strains because the flavor is so unique to each apple,” Margaret said. “We can choose between smooth and light and tart flavor or a liquor flavor. We know if we go with certain apples, we’ll get a certain flavor out of it. If we know we have a slice of pork will come out a little saltier, we will make an apple chutney with a flavor and consistency that complements the meat.”
Most of the apples available in grocery stores are sweet apples, which are not ideal for cooking, Calhoun said.
“If you cook with a sweet apple, it’s just bland,” he said. “You need an apple with more acidity and firmness.”
Calhoun highly recommends the Horse, Virginia Greening, Smokehouse and Sparger apple varieties for cooking. Apples represent a significant chunk of the more than 150 varieties of fruits and vegetables homegrown at Beta Verde.
“Apple season means plentiful varieties and tastes, which leads to apples finding their place in any part of the meal,” Salem said. “We love to pair apples with a savory crust or pork dish or the tallest apple pie you’ve ever seen. If there’s any left at the end of the night, breakfast is going to include them, too.”
The idea of Beta Verde is to expose people to sustainable farming in the city, Margaret said.
“That’s the essence of what we’re doing — to have a place for people to come and enjoy food that is delicious and tantalizing to them and feels like home,” Margaret said.
Margaret and Salem Neff do a lot of canning and pickling as well, and anything that is harvested and not used becomes compost and goes back into the garden.
“We have 16 acres of land supporting itself in sustainable but regenerative way,” she said. “We turn over the land every three years. We use the wood and everything.”
Margaret said she and Salem have learned so much from people like Calhoun, who are passionate about preserving the tradition of Southern food.
“With every food, there’s a million different family stories — that’s what recipes are,” Margaret said. “It’s community and preserving taste — a real taste, not a manufactured taste and that’s really memory.”
Calhoun, Margaret and Salem Neff are doing their part to preserve the legacy of Southern cuisine, which is synonymous with the slow food movement. And apples will undoubtedly remain an integral part of our Southern culinary heritage.
