Golden Delicious apples are popular, medium-sized apples with a crisp firm texture and juicy sweet flavor. These tasty apples have a creamy-white interior and a thin yellow peel with light speckles. This variety is perfect for baking into a scrumptious apple pie or for eating straight off the tree! The Golden Delicious apple was discovered in the early 1900s in West Virginia.
The origin of Golden Delicious apples
Golden Delicious apples are from West Virginia, USA. They were discovered on the Mullins’ family farm in Clay County in the early 1900s. A chance seedling tree was left to grow into a full-size tree that bore huge, yellow apples. The Golden Delicious apple is thought to be descended from the heirloom-favorite Grimes Golden Apple, possibly crossed with a Golden Reinette Apple from a nearby apple orchard.
Stark Brothers Nursery purchased the rights to the cultivar from Anderson Mullins in 1914. The nursery had seen success with their Red Delicious apple and decided to market the new, unrelated yellow apple as a companion variety. To this day, both Golden Delicious and Red Delicious are supermarket staples!
Clay, WV holds a special Golden Delicious Festival each year in celebration of the local discovery, and the variety is also the official state fruit of West Virginia. Golden Delicious is a very popular apple in its own right but is also a parent variety to some other popular cultivars.
“History: It appeared around 1912 on the farm of Anderson Mullins in Clay County, West Virginia. It is speculated to be a seedling of a Grimes Golden tree; the pollination parent is unverified but Golden Reinette trees were growing nearby.”
Apples of North America: Exceptional Varieties for Gardeners, Growers, and Cooks, by Tom Burford
Flavor profile
Golden Delicious apples have a gentle sweet flavor with a hint of spice. The flesh is fine-textured and the peel is thin and easy to bite through. Golden Delicious apples are crisp, but not too crunchy, with a medium softness in comparison to other varieties. The best ones have just enough acidity to balance the sweetness.
Golden Delicious apples are wonderful all-around apples. The crisp and firm texture makes them delicious not only for eating fresh but for baking with and adding to salads or sandwiches. As one of the sweetest varieties of apples, some desserts that use Golden Delicious have reduced amounts of added sugar simply because this variety is so sweet!
Fresh apples from the orchard tend to have a rich, sweet flavor, while imported varieties tend to have a more mellow taste due to premature harvest and flavor decline in storage. If you’re picking Golden Delicious apples and prefer a sweeter taste, look for those that truly are “golden” in color, rather than the unripe green ones. The flavor is best when they ripen on the tree!
“Flavor: Not exactly complex, but darn good in an appley sort of way. Mostly sweet, it is about as tart as apple juice, but there is a touch of intrigue there, a whisper of melony complexity that has been teased out of Golden Delicious’s many illustrious offspring.”
Apples Of Uncommon Character: 123 Heirlooms, Modern Classics, & Little-Known Wonders, by Rowan Jacobsen
Some of the best-tasting apple varieties are descendants of Golden Delicious. The ever-popular Gala and Pink Lady both have Golden Delicious as a parent. Sought-after Ambrosia apples are thought to have Golden Delicious as a parent, while genetic testing of top-tasting Honeycrisp apples indicates Golden Delicious as a likely grandparent.
Growing reginos
Golden Delicious apples are grown all over the world in warmer apple-growing regions. Here are some of the places where Golden Delicious is grown:
- USA (West Virginia, North Carolina, California, Washington)
- Canada (British Columbia, Ontario, Nova Scotia)
- Australia
- New Zealand
- Chile
- South Africa
Harvest season
Harvest season for Golden Delicious apples occurs in September and October in North America. Apples for storage are generally harvested while the peel is still somewhat green. The best Golden Delicious Apples for fresh eating develop their golden yellow peel on the tree rather than in storage.
This variety is generally a reliable producer and good for long-term storage through winter (although the quality does decline). While these apples can be stored for many months, off-season apples are generally imported from Australia, where they ripen in February and March.
Buying Golden Delicious apples
Golden Delicious apples are one of the most popular and easily available types of apples in the world. These beauties can be found everywhere from supermarkets to specialty orchards.
Golden Delicious apples generally cost about $1-$2 per pound. There are about 2 or 3 Golden Delicious apples in a pound. An individual apple may retail for less than a dollar at a grocery store to $1-$2 at a take-out deli or sandwich shop.
Are Golden Delicious apples GMO?
Golden Delicious apples are not genetically modified (they are not GMO). This variety was a result of the natural cross-pollination of different varieties that just happened to create a wonderful offspring apple. New Golden Delicious trees are made by grafting sticks from existing trees onto separate rootstocks (humans have been grafting trees for thousands of years).
In the USA, it is possible (but rare) to buy Golden Delicious apples that have been genetically engineered (GMO). These GE apples are called Arctic Apples and are sold as pre-packaged sliced apples in select US cities (mainly in the Midwest).
How to grow Golden Delicious apples
Golden Delicious apples are easy to grow in comparison to many other varieties of apple trees. They have a short growing season, wide climate tolerance, and high production reliability. The trees are also easy to find from specialty tree nurseries (and most are grafted onto semi-dwarf rootstocks, making them perfect for backyard growing).
Golden Delicious apple trees can be grown in USDA Zones 4-9, meaning they can be grown in all but the hottest and coldest regions. They don’t bloom too early, making them a good choice for areas with unpredictable late-spring frosts. They are also somewhat self-pollinating, although they will set more fruit if a suitable pollinator partner is nearby. Good pollinator trees for Golden Delicious include Jonagold, Gala, Granny Smith, and Red Delicious.
“While bees will travel 2-3 km (1.2-1.9 miles) to seek the nectar from fruit trees, there is a greater success with cross-pollination if the trees are planted close together.”
Growing Urban Orchards: How to Care for Fruit Trees in the City and Beyond, by Susan Poizner
Plant your tree in an area with at least 6 hours of direct sunlight per day. Choose an area with well-drained soil if possible. Dig a wide planting hole that is only as deep as the soil in the plant pot of the tree. Place the tree in the hole and backfill with the existing soil. Water the tree deeply after planting and place a thin layer of compost on the soil all around the tree (taking care not to push the compost up against the actual tree bark).
The young fruit tree will need consistent watering for the first few years as it becomes established. Backyard apple trees are generally best pruned in early spring, just before they come out of winter dormancy. Most backyard trees are pruned to have a single “central leader” vertical branch that goes straight up the middle, like a Christmas tree. Competing vertical branches are shortened. Also remove any branches that are dead, dying, diseased, or damaged (the 4 D’s).
Long-term storage
Storage of Golden Delicious apples is relatively easy and reliable. These apples can keep for 3-4 months in the crisper drawer of the refrigerator. In commercial cold storage, Golden Delicious apples can be kept for up to 8 months! The characteristics of this variety make them a good variety for long-term storage. Always look for undamaged fruits without bruising when choosing apples to store.
What to make with Golden Delicious apples
Golden Delicious apples can be used to make fresh appetizer plates, homemade applesauce, or classic apple pies. These apples are excellent for cooking, baking, and eating raw straight off the tree!
Golden Delicious apple recipes
Here are some recipes for Golden Delicious apples:
- Perfect Apple Pie
- Old-Fashioned Easy Apple Crisp
- Homemade Applesauce
- Baked Cinnamon Apples
- Golden Delicious Coffee Cake
Baking with Golden Delicious apples
Golden Delicious apples are excellent for baking. They have a balanced, sweet flavor and tend to hold their shape when cooked. Baking with Golden Delicious apples is quite common for all kinds of cooked recipes, especially for those who want to use only one type of apple rather than create a blend of different varieties.
Substitutes for Golden Delicious apples
There are several good substitutes for Golden Delicious apples. For fresh eating, the best similar options are Pink Lady, Ambrosia, and Honeycrisp. For apple pies, try Braeburn, Gala, Jonagold, or a blend of Granny Smith with McIntosh.
Several of these similar apples are offspring varieties of Golden Delicious. Golden Delicious is the parent apple variety of many famous apples. The following apples are direct descendants of Golden Delicious:
- Gala (‘Kidds Orange’ × ‘Golden Delicious’)
- Cripps Pink/Pink Lady (‘Golden Delicious’ × ‘Lady Williams’)
- Ambrosia (believed to be ‘Starking Delicious’ × ‘Golden Delicious’)
- Jonagold (‘Golden Delicious’ × ‘Jonathan‘)
