That ’s a keeper!

Properly preserving your pick and keeping apples fresh will ensure you can enjoy them well into the winter.

Apples don’t ever need to go to waste. While varieties that flourish in August and September are best eaten or cooked with immediately, most late-cropping varieties (Bramleys, Russets, Howgate Wonder and Lane’s Prince Albert, for example) keep well. The key to keeping the fruit fresh, however, starts with the pick: if an apple has dropped from the tree of its own accord or if the skin is bruised or even slightly damaged, it isn’t a keeper. Choose firm fruit with unblemished flesh and bear in mind that a ripe apple will not need to be tugged off the branch (it should come away easily). And don’t think that apples will continue to ripen in storage – unlike a banana, an under-ripe apple cannot reach maturity once picked.

For successful storage, apples need a cool, well-ventilated draught- and frost-free environment – a sturdy shed, cellar or unconverted attic is ideal. However, kitchens and spare bedrooms should be avoided as fluctuating ambient temperatures can cause chaos. Wrapping each apple in newspaper helps prevent the spread of rot, damp or infestation, as does giving it room to breathe; so single-layer storage is ideal. It’s also crucial to check your harvest at least once a week; it’s true that one bad apple can spoil a whole crop. Given the right conditions, apples can keep for a long, long time – up to a year isn’t unusual, and some folk claim to have successfully stored cooking apples for twice as long as that. But aim to still be enjoying October’s apples until early summer of the following year.

But storage isn’t the only way to make the most of the apple harvest. Whole, unpeeled apples can be spread out on a tray and frozen before being transferred into freezer bags. But peeling, coring and chopping before briefly dipping them in a lemon-juice-and-water solution (to stop the fruit from browning) and freezing in airtight boxes is more space-efficient. Be warned, though: freezing from ‘raw’ doesn’t always do the flavour any favours; a better idea is to make sauce or purée to freeze, or make apple pies and freeze them before the baking stage.

Drying apples works well, too: bake slices of apples (that have been dipped in lemon juice) in a hot oven for about 1 hour – once cooled, the flakes taste great on cereals or yogurt, or as a snack-on-the-go.

Meanwhile, apple-based chutneys bring a whole new dimension to the delights of an apple glut: once sealed in sterilised jars, you can look forward to the fruits of your labours for many months to come.