Free Republic

There's never been a better time to eat — and cook with — American apple varieties.One day in 2004, Brooke Hazen noticed something unusual about one of his Golden Delicious apple trees. “Some people are lucky enough in their career to have their own bud mutation variety that they get to name,” says Hazen. “Out of the thousands of trees I have, one branch on one tree decided to do its own thing.” What it did was yield an apple with the typical green-yellow skin but an unusual pink patch where it faced the sun and a sweetness and fragrance...

Cheese lovers rejoice: Recently discovered 40-year-old cheddar to be sold When Edward Zahn decided in May to close his cheese shop in Oconto, he made a discovery that is going to drive cheese lovers more bonkers than the 15-year-old cheddar released by Hook's Cheese in Mineral Point in 2009. In the back of his walk-in cooler, Zahn, 73, found several wooden boxes of cheddar cheese from the now-closed County Line Cheese in Oconto that over the years had repeatedly been buried by incoming cheese products. The result is 40-year-old cheddar that makes up part of what is likely the oldest...