Jonny McCambridge: How the little tree proved me wrong 961 times over

‘Hmmm, a tree,’ I remarked, striving to adopt a tone of voice which suggested I was taking an interest, but not enough so that I would be given a job.

I watched through the blinds as my wife dug a hole in the front garden and planted the sapling. It was less than four feet tall with a few patchy leaves. After a while my concentration returned to the TV (in my defence I had recently discovered the original animated He-Man series on Netflix).

While my lack of attention was motivated partly by my natural sloth, there was also an element of self-preservation. I didn’t want my interest to be pricked by a process which I strongly suspected would disappoint. Like everything else I had ever been involved with planting in the ground, I feared that the plant, like any expectations I had, would wither away and die.

For a couple of years my initial cautiousness seemed to be well-judged. The tree grew no larger and it remained barren of fruit. While it had not regressed, there was no signal of improvement, no apparent sign of promise.

Everything began to change in the spring of 2017. Around May I noticed little flowers on the branches. The blooms gave way to be replaced by small bulbs which grew into little crab apples in the autumn. The fruit was a fiery deep crimson, similar in colour to cherries and only slightly larger. The tree now looked vaguely festive with its happy red baubles.

Which presented me with a new problem. What to do with the fruit? I counted 80 crab apples on the tree, which seemed like an impressive haul, and I thought it wasteful to allow them to rot on the branch.

Crab apples are particularly bitter, which ensures that the hungry crows leave them untouched. They are also not available in shops, possibly due to their tartness. There didn’t seem much that could be done with them.

So, in an unlikely turn, I decided to teach myself how to make jam and jelly. I learnt a number of things. I learnt of the patience needed to use a straining bag. I learnt that the setting point for jam is 105 degrees Celsius. I learnt not to put too much produce and water into the pot when boiling. I learnt that when the pot overflows like lava then the best thing to do is run like blazes.

That December I gave jars of my home-made crab apple jelly as Christmas presents. They were gratefully received and I felt a greater sense of achievement than in previous years when I bought everyone socks and drawers out of Primark.

In 2018 the tree did even better, producing almost 150 apples. Last year this had grown to around 240. Considering the tree was still not much taller than the height of my young son, I thought this was mightily impressive.

At one point a neighbour called at my door and asked me to explain my secret. He said he had been trying to grow apples for years with limited success. I blushed as I confessed that I could take no credit. The truth was that since it had been planted the tree had flourished without any interference, there had been no feeding, pruning, watering, caressing or encouragement.

I continued with my adventures in making jam and jelly, but also branched out into making crab apple flavoured liqueurs such a gin and vodka (a truly selfless gesture in that I don’t drink alcohol). I also had mixed success in baking with the fruit. Somewhere in my head there may have been he beginning of an idea of putting together a Christmas hamper made entirely of crab apple products.

Perhaps it was the unusual weather that resulted in the Great Leap Forward of 2020. The sun baked the ground dry in April and May before incessant rain turned the grass a deep shade of green in July and August. Being naturally unobservant I was only vaguely aware that something was different, although the occasional visitor would comment on how well the tree was looking.

October is usually harvest month, but I was stirred into action several weeks early this year when the fruit began to fall and the weight on the branches left them stooping towards the ground.

So I started to pluck the apples. I was startled when my largest pot, which had in previous years been capacious enough to contain the full crop, was filled to overflowing before I had emptied the first branch. I went on picking apples in my front garden, sporadically having to retreat to my kitchen to find yet another vessel to fill. I began to feel like I was in the middle of a Roald Dahl story as I plucked the seemingly endless orbs with aching arms from Jonny’s Amazing Apple Tree.

As I stood there in the garden I thought of a day more than six years ago when I watched on the other side of the glass while my wife first planted the little sapling. How I had been unwilling to get involved because I was sure that it would not work out. How my initial instinct had been not to try at all in case of later disappointment. How foolish I had been.

By the time I finished I had pulled 961 apples off the tree.

Now, I am no gardener, but 961 apples from our little tree seemed to verge on the miraculous. I got so excited that I started to send text messages to people I know declaring simply ‘961 apples!’, leading to some puzzled responses.

As I write this I am in the middle of boiling apples for yet another batch of jelly. The kitchen is filled with a pungent, acidic aroma which is forming into little droplets and settling on the insides of the window.

The pots overflowed again and my wife will tell me off when she comes home for spilling some of the sticky mixture on the floor.

I have also made another batch of my crab apple gin and baked a crab apple loaf - and I still have a few hundred apples left over.

Anyone who is hoping for socks and drawers from me this Christmas is going to be disappointed.

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