Meet the Grapple: A Grape-Infused Apple

The grapple, a grape infused apple, is shown here. Grapple

First, there was the pineberry, the small white strawberry that tastes like a pineapple.  Now, there’s the grapple, an apple that is concentrated with grape flavor.

Grapples are Washington Extra Fancy Gala or Fuji apples that have been soaked in a “relaxing bathing process” of grape concentrate and water.  No additional sugar or calories have been added to the apple and they haven’t been altered genetically.

In an episode of Food Network’s Unwrapped, Marc Summers delves into the making of a grapple.  After the apples are sorted for quality and size, they are tested for sugar content to see which ones are the sweetest.  Once the sweetest apples have been selected, they are dunked several times in the concord grape solution.  Finally, they’re held in cold storage to further infuse.

Eight grapples are sold for $12.95 on the Barret Orchards site.  According to the USDA Agricultural Marketing service, the average cost of Fuji apples is about $1.44 a pound.

Have you tried a grapple?  What do you think?