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Good Eats: Apple Family Values
Since the beginning of time, apples have fascinated man like few other fruits. They appear in the Bible (where they play a central role) and occupy the top of the fruit hierarchy. They’re available in thousands of varieties, some good raw, others good cooked, and still others at their best baked. Alton starts with the raw sort, showing how they contribute crisp sweetness to It’s a Wonderful Waldorf salad. After demonstrating a basic salad, Alton shows how to enhance it with complementary flavors. Then he moves on to 10 Minute Apple Sauce, an applesauce that serves as a snake, glaze, or filling equally well. Finally, he demonstrates apple crisps cooked right inside the apple with his recipe Baker Baker.
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Episode Info
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Episode number: 2x3 Production Number: EA1B03 Airdate: Wednesday March 01st, 2000 |
Recap
Alton strolls through an Mercier Orchard in Blue Ridge, Georgia where he extols the virtues of apples. Many food varieties, a record company and a computer have all claimed the apple name. Since man could draw on cave walls, he has held the apple as a kind of “literary fruit fatale” – a dangerous symbol of forbidden knowledge. With the Latin name malus, it’s hard for the apple to be good... even if it is... Good Eats!..Read the full recap
Episode Notes
Cards
- The U.S. leads the world in apple production, growing over 3,000 varieties.
- The same enzyme that makes apples turn brown: polyphenoloxidase, is responsible for the tanning of humans.
- Other great sauce apples include: Rome, Gala, Crispin, McIntosh, Idared.
- Early microwave ovens cost thousands of dollars, weighed hundreds of pounds and required cold running [water] for cooling.
- John Chapman (1774 – 1820) planted apple orchards throughout the American Midwest. School kids know him as “Johnny Appleseed”.
Locations: Mercier Orchards (Blue Ridge, Georgia) and Whole Foods (Atlanta, Georgia).
In 2007, a study conducted at the Linus Pauling Institute concluded that flavinoids are poorly absorbed (bioavailability around five percent) but that their anti-cancer effects may result from the body’s own natural defenses. The body commonly disposes of foreign compounds by excreting them and by metabolizing them in the liver, which can stimulate the liver to produce new enzymes (the liver can produce hundreds of enzymes, many only as needed). These enzymes and other metabolic activity stimulated by the need to remove flavinoids may be the actual source of benefit.
Episode Quotes
Alton: Primal. Protean. Sophisticated. Symbolic. The apple is the king of all fruit, so revered in fact that many non apples: avocadoes, eggplant, pomegranates, pineapples, quinces, tomatoes, computers, defunct record companies and at least one northeastern metropolis have sought to make the apple name their own. Man, on the other hand, ever since he was able to put crayola to cave wall, as cast the apple as a kind of literary fruit fatale, a dangerous symbol of desires gone awry, discord and, well, forbidden knowledge.
Alton: With the Latin name malus it’s hard to be good... even if you are... (Good Eats theme plays)
Alton: Waldorf Salad. A study in minimalism designed in 1893 by Oscar, legendary maitre d’ of Waldorf’s New York hotel.
Alton: The acid in the vinegar will keep the enzymes in the apple from turning it brown. Vitamin C and lemon juice will do the same thing, but they don’t taste very good.
Alton: If you’ve got a carousel, nuke this on high for ten minutes. If you don’t have a carousel, you might consider donating your machine to the local appliance museum. Or at the least find one of those wind-up microwave carousels.
Alton: What gives a good baking apple the backbone to stand up to an oven’s heat? Same stuff that gives us backbone: calcium. Apples high in the mineral: Baldwins, Northern Spy, Romes, Granny Smiths and Braeburns will soften as cooked, but like Weebles, they won’t fall down.
Alton: Since every apple variety is different, it’s impossible to pin a cooking time on the dessert. (Alton gestures with tongs.) You must apply the Charmin squeeze. Now, if you are used to handing nuclear material with your bare hands you can use your fingers for this. Me, I’ll stick with the tongs.
Alton: (giving an apple to a doctor) Hiya, doc. This should keep you away from yourself for at least a day. See ya! (to viewer) And we’ll see you next time on Good Eats.
Episode Goofs
Alton mentions that a “defunct record company” on his list of entities that have tried to make the apple name their own. He is referring to Apple Records, formed by The Beatles in 1968. In addition to distributing Beatles material, Apple signed a number of other artists and is still a going concern as of 2007, so it was hardly “defunct” in 2000 when this episode aired.
Cultural References
mentions computers and “defunct record companies” on his list of apple named entities. The computer, of course, is the Apple Computer, and the record company is Apple Records (see also ‘Goofs’).
When Alton calls the apple a dangerous symbol of discord he may be referring to the golden apple, modern symbol of Eris, Greek goddess of strife and patron of the Discordians.
The apple as a symbol of forbidden knowledge comes from the Bible, where Adam and Eve ate an apple from the Tree of Forbidden Knowledge, upon which God ejected them from the Garden of Eden.
While building Waldorf salad, Alton asks viewers are various points what ingredient they would add next. The way he offers the choices from a card, asks the viewer if he’s sure, suggests the viewer use a lifeline, and the sonorous musical bed all imitate a popular game show of that era, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (US)?
The title of the last segment is “Baker, Baker, 1-9.” It is a pun on “breaker, breaker 1-9” which is a request by a citizen’s band (CB) operator to use channel 19. That particular request appeared in a 1975 popular novelty hit titled “Convoy” (by C.W. McCall) about a collection of truckers communicating over citizen’s band radio as they evaded the “bears” (police) and traveled the country.
Alton compares calcium rich apples to Weebles. First released in 1971 and revived in the early 2000s, Weebles are small toys bearing the pictures of people or animals that are rounded and weighted in such a way that they will always right themselves if pushed or moved. Long running commercials included the slogan “Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down” that Alton uses to characterize the baking properties of calcium rich apples.
Alton recommends the “Charmin squeeze” to test baked apple crisps for doneness. He refers to a series of commercials that featured actor Dick Martin playing grocery store manager Mr. Whipple, who constantly scolded his customers for squeezing Charmin bathroom tissue while hypocritically unable to avoid squeezing himself (and usually getting caught at it). Charmin’s makers sought to suggest that their product was the softest, and therefore the best, bathroom tissue.
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