Apples galore!

Today was the London Apple Festival at Camley Street Natural Park and what a fun-filled apple-fest it was, with apple bobbing, apple tasting, apple pressing, apple peeling and much else apple-related! 

Just a few of the (over 100) apple varieties available to taste:

A very noisy machine pulps the apples.  The pulp is then pressed to make the most delicious apple juice I have ever tasted.

With just a little help my talented five-year-old won a competition to see who could produce the longest single peeling - using an ingenious machine that peels and cores the apple whilst simultaneously carving the flesh into a yummy apple spiral.  His peeling was 139 inches long - more that 3 times his own height!

Some of the longer peelings on display:

The peeling machine in action:

Your chance to name a new apple variety

This autumn the London Orchard Project are launching a new variety of apple, specially developed for London.

What's more they're going to be planting 100 of the new trees in orchards in public spaces, parks and schools across London - including one in our orchard on the Jack Dunning Estate!

Working closely Trees for Life the new variety was carefully nurtured from a single seed and has taken ten years to develop.  It looks like this:

Feeling inspired?  Can you think of a name for this new London apple variety?  Tweet your suggestions to @LondonOrchard and then follow them on Twitter, for the announcement of the winning name.

Not on Twitter? You can email your suggestion to orchard@thelondonorchardproject.org – a chance to make your mark on Britain’s apple history!

Meadow and wildflowers coming soon...

Wild flowers are rapidly disappearing from cities - and that means bees, butterflies and other pollinators are suffering. But just imagine if, instead of grass, wildflowers and meadows were planted in all those redundant green spaces we see everywhere around us.  Step up River of Flowers, an exciting project that's right up our street. 

River of Flowers is a not-for-profit company that supports the creation of wildflower meadows.  They are trying to create a real river of (wild)flowers in our capital.  And guess what?  They want to help us create our own wildflower oasis on the Jack Dunning Estate beneath our orchard trees.

Watch this space for more news...

Picture from here