English Apples - English Codlin
English Codlin (Common Codlin; Quodling)
Hogg:
Fruit, large, three inches and a quarter wide, and three inches high; ovate
or short conical, wide at the base, generally taller on one side of the eye
than the other, and frequently with a snouted apex terminated in ridges
round the eye. Skin, lemon yellow, marked with patches and broad veins of
russet, especially about the apex and in the cavity of the stalk; sometimes
it has a thin red cheek on the side next the sun. Eye, closed, with long,
pointed segments, set on one side of the axis in a deep, angular, and
furrowed basin. Stamens, basal; tube, conical. Stalk, short, quite within
the deep, uneven cavity. Flesh, firm, brisk, and with a pleasant perfume.
Cells, obovate; abaxile.
A fine old English cooking apple; in use from August to October.
The trees are excellent bearers, but in most orchards they are generally
found unhealthy, being cankered and full of woolly aphis, which Mr. Lindley
attributes to their being grown from suckers and truncheons stuck into the
ground. He says - "Healthy, robust, and substantial trees are only to be
obtained by grafting on stocks of the real Sour Hedge Crab; they then grow
freely, erect, and form very handsome heads, yielding fruit as superior to
those of our old orchards as the old and at present deteriorated Codlin is
to the Crab itself." This circumstance was noticed by Worlidge two hundred
years ago - "You may graft them on stocks as you do other fruit, which will
accelerate and augment their bearing; but you may save that labour and
trouble, if you plant the Cions, Slips, or Cuttings of them in the
spring-time, a little before their budding; by which means they will prosper
very well, and soon become trees; but these are more subject to the canker
than those that are grafted."
This is one of our oldest English apples, and still deserving of wider
cultivation than it at present has. Formerly it was an ingredient in one of
the national dishes of English cookery in the form of "Codlins and cream."
Ray says, "Crudum vix editor ob duritiem et aciditatcm, sed coctum vel cum
cremoro lactis, vel cum aqua rosacea et saccharo comestum inter laudatissima
fercula habetur." The name is derived from coddle, to parboil.
Note from ND - not sure if this is a rare variety ... no-one seems to stock it.
Pictures (click on small images for detail):
Blossom
Fruit
information located by Mel Wilson / Diversity website
