Perhaps the most famous variety from the English county of Yorkshire, Ribston Pippin is a strong-tasting 'aromatic' apple, very popular in Victorian times. One of our favorite fresh eating, here are Luke’s taste notes from 2023 Ribston harvest in Missoula: “Honey flavor with hints of grape. Dense apple with interesting woody texture that makes you continually want more. Decent acidity and good sweetness. Medium thickness in terms of the skin.”

Used for culinary purposes and for a sweet/sharp hard or soft cider, the flavor is at its best a month or so after picking. Most likely the parent of the world-renowned Cox's Orange Pippin, Ribston Pippin is a yellow, flushed orange, and streaked red with russet at the base and apex.

In terms of hardiness, Ribston is fairly hardy but certainly not as hardy as a lot of the stuff we grow. It’s limit is probably -40F so it probably wouldn’t work for most parts of Eastern Montana. But given that it is on the super hardy Bud 118 rootstock, it could be worth a shot so long as it doesn’t get too below -40F.

These trees are 5-7 tall bare root and grafted onto the large semi-dwarf Bud118. We also have one year older grafted onto M116.

Image Courtesy of Markus Hagenlocher under CC3.0