Product
Pink Lady Apples
Country of Origin
Western Australia
WA’s Home of Crunchy Apples Pink Lady: now tagged with a DiMuto QR code to ensure blockchain traceability and transparency of their farm to fork journey, from Manjimup to your fridge crisper!
Newton Orchards is also the home of WA’s best tasting natural apple juice, Cloudy South, and the On the Shoulders of Giants range of craft apple ciders and apple spirits.
For stockists and stories from the farm, follow us @newtonorchards on Instagram & Facebook.
Our Farm to Fork story:
Perfectly sweet-tart, crunchy and juicy premium fruit from Newton Orchards, the Home of Crunchy Apples. Located around WA’s pristine, clean and isolated Southern Forests region with the town of Manjimup at its heart, these are the orchards where the world-famous Pink Lady was first commercially developed and exported.
A cross between Golden Delicious and Lady William, the Cripps Pink variety was developed by West Australian apple breeder John Cripps in the 1970s and 80s. After 200 days on the trees ripening slowly in our perfect climate, fed by pure rainfall and meticulous care to the world’s best standards of food safety, only the best apples go on to bear the Pink Lady brand. Distinctive for their stunning pink skin, more-ish sweet yet tart and clean flavour, crunchy and juicy texture and rich in antioxidants, West Australian-grown Pink Lady is one of the most popular apples in the world.
Farm to Fork Process Story
A Newton Orchards Pink Lady apple begins its journey to your plate each September as the swelling buds on the trees begin to burst into blossom. Our orchard team takes great care at during the spring to provide the trees with the right nutrient balance at this critical growth period. As the blossoms fall and little applets form, the crop is covered with netting to protect from bird, hail and sun damage.
Thinning occurs in late spring and early summer, which is the process of leaving only the amount of apples that each tree is capable of growing to the market’s size and quality requirements; all the excess fruit must be removed. Over summer the nutrition programme continues but due to WA’s hot dry January and February, most important is regular irrigation from our large catchment and storage freshwater dams.
Approaching 200 days of ripening, we test the crop to ensure the correct harvest specifications of brix sugar levels, balanced natural fruit acids, starch and pressure for the crunch factor that every delicious apple needs! Harvest of successive varieties is all completed by hand from Royal Gala in February through to Pink Lady and Sundowner in May and June. A period of controlled atmosphere storage where natural gas levels are manipulated to arrest the ripening process, essentially putting the apple to sleep, the flavour profile of our Pinks is better integrated as some of the natural acid composition changes, making them sweeter.
At packing time they are washed, presized and graded to ensure top quality and sufficient pink colour to meet the Pink Lady specification. Our fruit does not have extra wax applied, just a natural shine from gently buffing the skin as the apples roll across the packline brushes before being handpacked, handstacked and dispatched to their final destination.
Every Pink Lady apple has been tagged with the DiMuto QR code to ensure traceability and transparency of their farm to fork journey – to bring a taste that’s closer to nature to you.
Product Origins
Where It's Grown
Farm Location: Manjimup, Southern Forests region, Western Australia
Farm: Newton Orchards
Family owned and operated for 90 years and across three generations, Newton Orchards is “Proudly West Australian and the Home of Crunchy Apples.” Growing premium quality apples, pears, cherries and avocados, our fruit is sourced from several select sites located around WA’s pristine, clean and isolated Southern Forests region, 300km south of Perth with the town of Manjimup at its heart. The Southern Forests are famous for the huge tracts of magnificent karri eucalypts, towering 70m from rich red karri loam soils.
Newton Orchards takes great care to go above and beyond world’s best practice in accredited food safety, quality and ethical employment standards. Apples are our key crop harvested from February to June and available year-round thanks to the latest storage technology. Our main varieties are Pink Lady, exciting new brands Bravo and Kanzi, plus Granny Smith, Royal Gala, Fuji, Red Delicious and Sundowner – a crunchy and juicy Newton Orchards apple for every month of the year.
Meet Your Farmer
Farmer Name: Harvey Giblett
The current owner-manager of Newton Orchards, Harvey Giblett has lived and worked on the orchard for more than 50 years under two guiding principles: “If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing well”, and “Find a job you’re passionate about and you’ll never work a day in your life”. Harvey works alongside his daughter Nicole and son Michael in running Newton Orchards, with the goals of growing world’s best quality fruit and ensuring ethical employment for around 80 locals and over 100 seasonal workers.
Harvey is well known in the Australian apple industry for his knowledge and expertise, his willingness to share valuable information with everyone, and his open-door policy. He was one of the first commercial Pink Lady growers in the late 1980s, and has since been an early adopter of other licensed varieties including Kanzi® and Bravo®.
In 2019 Harvey’s contributions to apple industry were recognized with the ultimate accolade – Apple Pear Australia Ltd’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Product Certificates
Newton Orchards is Global G.A.P Certified for Good Agricultural Practices, meeting the global standards for safe, sustainable agriculture.
Recipes
In 2014 Southern Forests orchardists are celebrating 40 years since the first Cripps Pink tree was grown right here in WA, producing the world’s most famous apple, the beautiful Pink LadyTM. Take a look overleaf for this specially created 40 Years of Pink recipe from one of our region’s greatest produce advocates, Foragers’ Sophie Zalokar.
Like your Genuinely Southern Forests Pinks crunchy?
– KEEP THEM IN THE FRIDGE! –
PINK LADY APPLE AUTUMN SALAD
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
2 medium fresh beetroot, peeled
3 tbsp + extra macadamia oil
1⁄2 cup hazelnuts
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp grainy mustard
1⁄2 tsp sugar
salt flakes & freshly cracked black pepper
2 sml parsnips, peeled
2 handfuls baby kale
1 handful watercress
1 witlof, leaves separated
1 sml fennel bulb, thinly sliced 4 radishes, thinly sliced
1 Genuinely Southern Forests Pink Lady apple, quartered, cored & sliced
200 g goats cheese, thickly sliced
METHOD
Preheat oven to 180 ̊C. Slice the beetroot thinly, lie evenly on a baking tray and drizzle over a little macadamia oil. Roast in the oven for 10 – 15 minutes until crispy around the edges. Toast the hazelnuts on a separate baking tray in the oven for 10 minutes until golden. Rub the skins off and roughly chop. Whisk the 3 tbsp macadamia oil, apple cider vinegar, mustard and sugar together in a small bowl with salt and pepper. Using a vegetable peeler cut the parsnips into ribbons. Toss together with the remaining ingredients except the apple slices, goats cheese and a little of the hazelnuts in a large bowl with half the dressing. Layer the salad mixture with the roasted beetroot slices, Pink Lady apple slices and goats cheese and garnish with the remaining dressing and toasted hazelnuts. Serve with freshly cracked black pepper.
© Sophie Zalokar. Photo: Craig Kinder@f22photography