Shizuka Apples Information and Ordering

Gentle. Sweet, floral and honeyed, with low acid and a long, quiet finish — the flavours are light and attenuated rather than loud. One careful reviewer calls them “generically floral and sweet, with just a bit of liveliness that isn’t quite vinous”.

It is the same family of flavour as Mutsu, which is its full sibling, and as Golden Delicious, which is its parent. If you find those apples mild, you will find this one milder.

Sweet, and distinctly low in acid. This is not a balanced sweet-tart apple in the way Honeycrisp or RubyFrost are — the sweetness is the whole structure, with only a faint liveliness behind it.

Its sibling Mutsu carries noticeably more acid and is the better-balanced of the two. If you want brightness, that is the one to buy.

A lovely one, and it is the best thing about the apple. Whole and unbroken, the fruit has a perfumed floral aroma with a hint of cinnamon — which is unusual and worth noticing, because most apples smell of very little until you cut them.

Put a bowl of them on a table and the room changes slightly. That alone justifies the variety for some people.

Crisp, with a caveat. The crunch is described as “breaking crisp but also a little tender” — so it snaps, but it yields more readily than a genuinely hard apple.

If you want the explosive texture of a Honeycrisp or the 21.9-pound firmness of a WineCrisp, this is not that apple. It is crisp in the gentle, old-fashioned way.

Yes, notably. Juiciness is one of the traits the Aomori programme selected for and it comes through — a ripe Shizuka is genuinely wet.

Combined with the size, that makes it an apple to eat over a plate rather than over a keyboard.

Spring green ripening to yellow, often with crackles of tan russet over the surface and darker green lenticel dots. Some fruit develops a faint pink-orange blush on the sunny side; most does not.

The skin has a satin sheen and a slightly waxy feel. It looks like an heirloom and is not one.

Light yellow rather than white, in a medium-coarse grain. That yellow is the Golden Delicious parent showing plainly.

It is also part of why the fruit looks good sliced — a cream-yellow flesh reads as richer than a stark white one, and it holds its colour unusually well.

Thin and waxy rather than tough, with a satin finish and some tan russet crackling. It is perfectly edible and most people eat it without comment.

On an apple this large, though, many cooks peel it for baking simply because the proportions make the skin more noticeable in a finished dish than it would be on a small fruit.

By the ground colour. A ripe Shizuka has moved from spring green towards yellow. Picked while still distinctly green it will be starchy and dull; left to colour, the floral aroma comes up and the sugar fills in.

It should also feel very heavy for its size — and since these are among the heaviest apples grown, that is saying something.

Recognisably, yes — it is a direct child of it, and it inherited the honeyed low-acid sweetness, the yellow flesh and the floral aroma.

Shizuka is considerably larger, firmer, and better at holding its shape in the oven, and it is slower to brown. Golden Delicious also bruises far more easily. Think of Shizuka as Golden Delicious scaled up and toughened.

A good one rather than a great one, and we would rather be straight about that. It is sweet, aromatic, juicy and enormous, and people who like mild apples love it.

People who want acid and complexity generally prefer its sibling Mutsu, and at least one careful reviewer who has tasted both says exactly that while acknowledging the family resemblance is obvious.

Yes. Early-picked fruit is greener, starchier and duller; fruit left to colour properly is sweeter and far more aromatic. And in storage the acid, already low, falls further — a Shizuka in February is sweeter and blander than one in October.

This is a variety to eat in its first couple of months, when the floral aroma is still doing work.

Russet is corky scar tissue the fruit lays down when its young skin is stressed by cold, damp, wind or friction. On Shizuka it typically shows as fine tan crackling rather than solid patches, and it is characteristic rather than a fault.

It is not disease, not damage and not a sign of poor growing. Its parent Golden Delicious is famously prone to russeting too, so it runs in the family.

No, but they are close relatives and the confusion is reasonable. Orin is another Japanese apple from the same Golden Delicious × Indo direction, and Sweet Orin is a selection of it.

Shizuka, Mutsu and Orin are all part of the same Japanese post-war effort to breed large, sweet, aromatic yellow apples out of Golden Delicious.

No. It is a conventional cross made by hand-pollinating a blossom at a Japanese research station and growing out the seed.

Its triploid chromosome count is a natural occurrence, not an engineered one — triploid apples arise spontaneously and include many old favourites such as Mutsu, Jonagold and Winesap.

It was bred rather than discovered, which is a real distinction. It came out of a deliberate cross at the Aomori Apple Experiment Station at Kuroishi, and was introduced by Tsuneo Murakami in 1986.

Compare Ludacrisp, which was genuinely found — a chance seedling noticed by a grower walking his own rows in Ohio.

Proportionally, no — and that is one of the quiet benefits of a very large apple. The core is close to normal size while the flesh around it is not, so you waste less of what you paid for.

It is the exact inverse of a Lady apple, where a normal-sized core sits inside a golf-ball of fruit.

Some Japanese varieties are prized for watercore — the translucent, honey-sweet zones that form near the core in very ripe fruit — and Fuji is the famous example. We have not seen watercore documented as characteristic of Shizuka.

If you find translucent flesh in one, it is not a defect. It is intensely sweet, and in Japan it would raise the price rather than lower it.

Close to ideal. It is one of the lowest-acid apples we grow, and the sweetness is gentle rather than sugary.

Other good choices in that direction: CandyCrisp, Fuji and Golden Delicious. Avoid GoldRush, Granny Smith and RubyFrost.

Very big. Commonly 300 to 500 grams — roughly two-thirds of a pound to well over a pound apiece — and specimens above a pound are not unusual.

That makes it one of the largest apples grown anywhere, in the same class as its sibling Mutsu, which is also famous for size.

About five or six, because a single large Shizuka can weigh a pound on its own. That catches people out, since apples are sold by weight and every other variety gives you far more fruit.

The same five-pound box holds ten to fifteen ordinary apples, or forty Lady apples. Check the count before you order for a specific number of people.

Three or four for a standard 9-inch double-crust pie, since a pie wants two and a half to three pounds of fruit.

Fewer apples to peel and core than any other variety we grow. If you dislike prep work, this is the apple that solves it.

Because it was bred that way, deliberately. Its pollen parent Indo is a large sweet Japanese apple, and large fruit has long been prized in the Japanese market in a way it has not always been in the West — apples there are frequently sold individually, often as gifts.

Its sibling Mutsu inherited the same trait from the same cross. Size is the family signature.

Often, yes, and that is worth planning for. A 400-gram apple is two to three times a normal serving, and a half is a reasonable portion.

It cuts and keeps well for that — the slow browning means half an apple in the refrigerator is still perfectly presentable at the next meal.

It is close to the ideal apple for it, and this is one use where the size is a pure advantage rather than an awkwardness. A cored Shizuka gives you a genuinely generous cavity for a sweet or savoury filling, and one apple is a whole serving.

Sausage and sage, or butter, brown sugar and walnuts. Rome holds its walls slightly better; Shizuka tastes better.

Substantially, and in the opposite direction from most apples. A generic “medium apple” panel is based on roughly 180 to 200 grams; a Shizuka can be twice that.

So a standard panel understates a large Shizuka by about half. Our nutrition section below gives figures scaled to this variety’s actual weight instead.

There is a real horticultural principle behind the suspicion — a heavily cropping tree with unthinned fruit produces bigger, blander apples, and sugar gets diluted across more flesh.

But Shizuka is genetically large rather than accidentally large, and a properly thinned, properly ripened one is sweet. What is true is that this is a mild apple by nature, and its mildness is inherited from Golden Delicious rather than caused by its size.

A bushel runs about 40 to 42 pounds, which at one to one and a half apples per pound works out to roughly 45 to 60 Shizukas — far fewer individual fruit than any other variety in the same box.

For comparison, the same bushel holds 80 to 125 ordinary apples, or 250 to 400 Lady apples.

Yes, and more than most. A large-fruited variety on a vigorous tree will overcrop and give you a lot of merely big, watery apples if left alone.

Thin to one fruit per cluster four to six weeks after bloom. On a variety this size that is also a practical matter of branch loading — a cluster of half-pound apples is a lot of weight on one spur.

By weight, like every apple, which is what trips people up with a variety this size. A pound is often a single fruit.

If you are buying for a specific number of people or pies, work out the count first and then convert. One apple per pound is a safe planning figure.

Among the biggest commonly grown, alongside its sibling Mutsu. Record-breaking individual apples of various varieties have gone far larger, but as a consistent characteristic this is near the top.

What makes it unusual is that the size is genetic and reliable rather than the product of extreme thinning on one show tree.

Yes, and it is the sensible way to eat one. Wrap the cut face tightly and refrigerate; the slow-browning trait means it is still presentable at the next meal.

With most apples half a fruit looks unappealing within the hour. This is one of the few where saving half genuinely works.

Japan — specifically the Aomori Apple Experiment Station at Kuroishi, in Aomori Prefecture at the northern tip of Honshu. Aomori is Japan’s apple country, producing the majority of the national crop.

The same station produced Mutsu, which is Shizuka’s full sibling, and a long line of other varieties.

It was introduced by Tsuneo Murakami of the Aomori research station at Kuroishi, in 1986.

That is a late introduction for a variety from this cross — its sibling Mutsu was released in 1949, nearly forty years earlier, from the same parental combination.

In Japanese, shizuka (静か) means quiet, calm, still, peaceful, serene. It is also a personal name.

It is an unusually apt name for this particular apple. Shizuka is not a loud fruit: the flavours are gentle and attenuated, the aroma is soft and floral, and nothing about it shouts. Very few apple names describe the eating experience this well.

1986, in Japan. It reached North American nurseries and specialist orchards afterwards and has never become a mainstream commercial variety here.

You will find it at heritage orchards, farm stands, specialist growers and here — not in a supermarket.

Because it is where most Japanese apples come from. The prefecture at the northern end of Honshu has the cold winters and long autumns apples want, and its experiment station at Kuroishi has been breeding fruit for over a century.

Mutsu — the old provincial name for the region — is named after it. Shizuka came from the same station.

Because the market rewards it. Apples in Japan are frequently sold individually rather than by weight, often carefully wrapped, and very often given as gifts — a context in which a single spectacular fruit is worth far more than several ordinary ones.

Growers there also thin hard and sometimes hand-pollinate, both of which push size up. Shizuka and Mutsu are products of that culture.

Not at scale. It is planted by heritage and direct-market orchards, and by growers who want something unusual for a farm stand — which is how most Japanese varieties other than Fuji have fared here.

Fuji is the exception that proves the rule: it became a global commercial apple. Shizuka did not, and was never really positioned to.

Only distantly, through Golden Delicious — and not by parentage. Fuji is Ralls Janet × Red Delicious, from the Tohoku research station at Morioka, released in 1962.

They are both Japanese, both very sweet, both low in acid and both excellent keepers. That is convergence in a breeding culture rather than family.

Mutsu (1949), sold in Britain and elsewhere as Crispin, is by far the best known. Orin is another Golden Delicious-derived Japanese variety in the same tradition. Shizuka joined the list in 1986.

Together they represent a coherent programme: take the honeyed sweetness of Golden Delicious, cross it with large sweet Japanese apples, and select for size, sugar and keeping.

Not in the United States, so far as we can find. It is a 1986 Japanese introduction, and any Japanese protection would long since have lapsed.

Where our WineCrisp and RubyFrost pages quote numbers from a sworn federal filing, this page cannot, and says so.

Roughly shee-ZOO-kah, with all three syllables given about equal weight and a light stress on the middle — Japanese does not use heavy stress the way English does.

Not “shy-ZOO-ka”, which is the common English mangling.

Modern — 1986 — though it looks and eats like something older. The green-yellow skin, the tan russet crackling and the gentle low-acid flavour all read as heirloom.

It is younger than Honeycrisp genetics and older than almost every apple in a modern supermarket.

No. Crispin is the name Mutsu is sold under in Britain and some other markets — the same apple, renamed for export.

Shizuka is a separate variety from the same cross, released 37 years later. If a shop labels a huge green-yellow apple Crispin, it is Mutsu.

As a category they tend toward large size, high sugar, low acid, thin skin and careful handling — because they are grown for a market that sells apples individually, often as gifts, and pays accordingly.

Fuji, Mutsu and Shizuka all fit that description. The American commercial tradition optimised instead for shipping, storage and uniform grading.

It is a well-established practice there, along with very hard thinning, bagging fruit on the tree, and in some orchards rotating reflective sheeting to colour the fruit evenly.

That labour is why Japanese apples look the way they do. It is also why the same variety grown in New York produces a slightly different fruit — the genetics travel, the horticulture does not always.

Golden Delicious × Indo — a West Virginia chance seedling crossed with a large sweet Japanese apple, at the Aomori station.

That is the same parental combination that produced Mutsu, which makes Shizuka and Mutsu full siblings from the same cross — different seeds from the same two parents, like brothers rather than clones.

No, though it is very closely related. Mutsu — sold in Britain and elsewhere as Crispin — is a separate variety released in 1949 from the same Golden Delicious × Indo cross.

They are full siblings and the family resemblance is obvious to anyone who tastes both. Mutsu is the better balanced and carries more acid; Shizuka is sweeter, gentler and more floral.

A large, sweet, low-acid Japanese apple and the pollen parent of both Shizuka and Mutsu. It is where the size and a good deal of the sweetness come from.

It is little grown outside Japan and you are unlikely to meet one. Its main significance now is as an ancestor — the large sweet Japanese apples you can buy are largely descended from it.

The honeyed low-acid sweetness, the yellow flesh, the floral aroma and the tendency to russet. Golden Delicious is one of the most used parents in apple breeding precisely because it passes on a sweet, versatile, agreeable fruit.

It is also the parent of Jonagold, Gala, Pink Lady, AutumnCrisp and a very long list of others. Shizuka has a great many half-siblings.

Because siblings are not clones. Every seed from a cross is a fresh shuffle of the two parents’ genes, so two seedlings from the same pair can differ as much as two human siblings do.

This is exactly why apple breeding requires growing out hundreds or thousands of seedlings from a single cross. The RubyFrost patent records 1,017 seedlings from one cross, of which one was selected.

Yes, and this is the single most important practical fact about growing it. Like its sibling Mutsu, Shizuka is a triploid — it carries three sets of chromosomes instead of two, and its pollen is sterile.

That means it cannot pollinate anything, and it needs two diploid pollinators nearby rather than one. See the growing section below.

Not that we can find published. Golden Delicious × Indo is the recorded parentage from the Aomori station and it is consistent with everything about the fruit.

We flag it because recorded apple parentages have been overturned by marker work more than once — Honeycrisp’s own was. We have no reason to doubt this one; we simply have not seen it verified.

Closely, in the same Japanese Golden Delicious line. Orin is another Japanese variety from the same breeding direction and the same era of effort, and Sweet Orin is a selection of it.

Shizuka, Mutsu and Orin together are the product of one sustained programme: take Golden Delicious, cross it with large sweet Japanese apples, and select for size, sugar and aroma.

Half of it. Golden Delicious is a chance seedling found on a West Virginia farm around 1891 — one of the most consequential apples ever discovered and entirely American.

So Shizuka is a Japanese apple with an Appalachian parent, bred in Aomori and now grown in New York. Apple breeding has been globalised far longer than most industries.

If you want balance and a bit of sharpness, Mutsu. If you want gentle sweetness, a strong floral aroma, and the largest apple in the box, Shizuka.

Both are triploids, both are enormous, both cook well, and both are much better from a farm than from a shop. Buy one of each and decide for yourself — that is what we did.

As half-siblings, through Golden Delicious, which is a parent of all three. Gala is Kidd’s Orange Red × Golden Delicious; Pink Lady is Golden Delicious × Lady Williams.

Golden Delicious is in so many modern apples that half the fruit aisle is related. The family resemblance in this case is the honeyed sweetness.

Chromosome count. Most apples are diploid, carrying two sets of chromosomes. A triploid carries three, which usually happens when an unreduced gamete meets a normal one.

Triploids are often larger and more vigorous than their diploid relatives — which is part of why Shizuka and Mutsu are so big — and their pollen is sterile, which is the price.

Slowly — noticeably more slowly than most apples. That is one of the variety’s quiet advantages and it is not widely advertised.

“Slow” is the honest word rather than “never”. Left out for hours it will eventually discolour; over the span of a meal or a platter, it stays pale.

Browning is an enzyme reaction — polyphenol oxidase meeting oxygen and the phenolic compounds in the flesh — and varieties differ a great deal in how much of each they carry. Shizuka sits at the low end.

It was not engineered for it. The cross predates any ability to select for the trait deliberately, and low acid tends to correlate with gentler browning.

We would not claim so. AutumnCrisp, SnowSweet and RubyFrost are marketed specifically on the trait and are conspicuously slower than an ordinary apple.

Shizuka is slower than average without being in that class. Nobody has published a side-by-side measurement, so we will not rank them.

No — they are unrelated. Browning is a surface enzyme reaction on cut flesh; storage life is about respiration rate and firmness loss.

Shizuka happens to be reasonably good at both, but one does not cause the other. AutumnCrisp is the proof: one of the slowest browners we grow and one of the shortest keepers.

Within reason, yes, and the size helps — a single apple produces a great many slices, so one fruit fills a plate. Slice it an hour or so ahead and it will still look presentable.

For all-day platters use AutumnCrisp or SnowSweet, which are slower still.

Yes, and that is genuinely useful given the size. Half a Shizuka wrapped and refrigerated is perfectly good at the next meal, where half of most apples would be unappetising.

Press the wrap against the cut face to exclude air. The slow-browning trait does the rest.

Sometimes, and it is worth knowing what you are looking at. Low-acid apples can show a faint brown watercore-adjacent tinge near the core when very ripe, which is not spoilage.

If the flesh is firm and smells right, eat it. If it is soft, brown and smells fermented, do not.

Sliced, yes — the slow browning means morning slices still look right at lunchtime. Whole, no: this is a half-pound apple and it will come home uneaten.

For a whole-apple lunchbox fruit, Lady apples at six to ten to the pound are the right scale.

Mid-autumn, with a peak around mid-October in the North. It is a later apple than McIntosh and earlier than the very late keepers such as GoldRush.

See Harvest Times for where this year’s crop actually stands; picking dates move with the season.

Up to about three months at good quality, which is respectable rather than exceptional. In a home refrigerator that means from October into January.

What fades first is the aroma and what little acid it has, so a February Shizuka is sweeter and blander than an October one. It is not a spring apple — for that buy GoldRush or EverCrisp.

Cold and humid — the crisper drawer, in a loosely closed bag with a few holes punched in it. Do not wash before storing.

Keep them away from onions and anything strongly scented, and away from bananas, whose ethylene will hurry them along. On a fruit this size, a bruise goes deep and stays.

More than most, for two reasons: thin waxy skin, and sheer weight. A half-pound apple dropped six inches lands with a great deal more force than a small one.

Its parent Golden Delicious is notoriously easy to bruise, and Shizuka inherits some of that. Handle it as fruit, not as freight.

For a few days, and it is a striking thing to have out — the size alone draws comment, and the whole fruit has that floral cinnamon scent.

Beyond a few days you are spending the texture on the display. Keep a couple out and the rest cold.

Eventually, as all low-acid apples do. The flesh is crisp-but-tender to begin with, which means there is less firmness in reserve than in a hard apple.

A soft Shizuka is not spoiled, just past its best raw. Cook it — it is an excellent baking apple and the texture stops mattering.

Yes. Peel or not, core, slice, tray-freeze until hard, then bag with the air pressed out. About a year, and they come out well for pie, crisp and sauce.

The slow-browning trait means you can be relaxed about the lemon dip, though a light one is still worth it for a long freeze. Freezing destroys crispness in every apple.

Reasonably. Aim for 32 to 38 °F with high humidity, in shallow layers rather than deep bins — deep bins are a bad idea with a heavy apple, because the weight bruises the bottom layers.

Check weekly and pull anything damaged before it spoils its neighbours.

It moves with the season, so we do not publish a fixed date. Harvest Times tracks where each variety stands as the crop comes in.

Apple Crop Growing 2026 lists what is still on the tree, and Ready to Ship shows what is leaving the farm today.

No. Washing strips the natural wax bloom that slows moisture loss and leaves water sitting in the stem cavity, which is where rot starts.

Store them dry and wash at the point of eating. Our general handling advice for every variety is on the Honeycrisp.com apple FAQ.

Heavy fruit on a vigorous tree does tend to drop if left too long, and half-pound apples come down hard. We have not seen a published pre-harvest-drop rating for the variety.

Practically: pick it when the ground colour turns rather than waiting for the last possible day. A dropped Shizuka bruises on landing.

Apples do not ripen after picking the way peaches or bananas do — they soften and convert starch, but a green-picked apple never develops the sugar it would have gained on the tree.

So a Shizuka picked too green stays a disappointing apple. Ground colour at picking is everything with this variety.

Baking above all, and the size is the reason. Stuffed baked apples, tarts, pies, poaching, and anything where one apple needs to be a serving.

It is also perfectly good fresh if you like a mild sweet apple — just be ready for how much apple it is.

Very. It holds its shape well, it is large enough that three or four make a pie, and the low acid means you should cut the sugar by about a third against a Granny Smith recipe.

Because it is mild, many bakers blend it — two Shizuka for bulk and ease of prep, plus a sharp apple such as Northern Spy or Granny Smith for acid.

Yes, notably well — it has structural integrity for cooking, and that is one of the traits it is specifically recommended for.

Expect distinct, recognisable slices rather than a collapsed layer. It is firmer in the oven than its parent Golden Delicious, which softens more readily.

It may be the best apple we grow for it. The size gives you a genuinely generous cavity once cored, one apple is a full serving, and the flesh holds together rather than bursting.

Sausage, sage and breadcrumbs for a savoury version; butter, brown sugar, cinnamon and walnuts for a sweet one. Rome holds its walls marginally better and tastes of less.

Yes, and it is a classic use for it. Peel, halve and core, then poach gently in white wine or cider with lemon peel and a cinnamon stick until a skewer meets slight resistance.

The low acid means it takes on the poaching liquid’s flavour readily, which is an advantage here rather than a weakness.

It makes a sweet, pale, mild sauce that needs little or no added sugar — and which is, honestly, a bit one-note on its own.

Blend it. A third McIntosh for aroma, or a third Granny Smith or Northern Spy for acid, transforms it. The size makes prep far quicker than usual.

Good, and the slow browning helps. Diced or matchsticked it holds its colour longer than most, and the gentle sweetness works with bitter leaves and salty cheese without competing.

One apple will overfill a salad for four, so plan for half.

Sweet cider, yes — it presses a generous, sweet, aromatic juice, and there is a great deal of juice in an apple this size.

Use it as the sweetening component and take structure from Golden Russet or GoldRush.

Most people do, and on this variety it is a reasonable choice — the skin is thin but slightly waxy, and on a large apple there is proportionally more of it in the finished dish.

Leave it on for a rustic crumble or a sauce you will mill. Peel for a tart, a poached half or anything where the texture should be uniform.

Usually yes, and for one reason: acid. Shizuka brings sweetness, bulk and shape-holding, and almost no sharpness. A pie made from it alone tastes pleasant and slightly flat.

Two or three Shizuka plus one Northern Spy, Granny Smith or RubyFrost fixes it. Failing that, a good squeeze of lemon into the filling does most of the same job.

Less, not more. It is a sweet, low-acid apple, so a recipe written for a tart variety will produce something cloying. Cut the sugar by about a third and taste the filling before it goes in.

What it does often want is acid — a squeeze of lemon in the filling does more for a Shizuka pie than sugar ever will.

It works, and the large diameter gives you handsome big rings. The low acid means the rings will want a lemon or ascorbic dip more than a sharper apple would, despite the slow browning.

Slice an eighth of an inch and dry at 135 °F for six to ten hours. Being juicy, it shrinks a good deal.

Yes, though blend it. Apple butter wants an apple that breaks down and enough acid to stand up to hours of cooking and heavy spicing, and Shizuka brings the first but not the second.

Two-thirds Shizuka for bulk and sweetness, one-third Rome, Jonathan or Stayman for backbone.

Well suited. It holds its shape under long caramelisation, it is large enough that a few halves fill a pan, and the low acid caramelises readily.

Add lemon to the caramel rather than to the apples. The dish wants the acid; the apple will not provide it.

Yes, and the size suits it — quarters or thick wedges around a pork loin or a tray of sausages hold together through the roasting rather than dissolving.

The sweetness caramelises well against fat and salt. Add them for the last twenty to thirty minutes.

Very. It holds its shape, it is sweet enough to need less sugar in the topping, and three apples fill a large dish with very little peeling.

Add lemon juice to the filling. A crumble made from a low-acid apple with no acid added tastes flat, and this is the commonest mistake people make with sweet varieties.

Yes, and the diameter gives you large, handsome rings — better looking than anything from a normal apple.

Slice thin and even, dip briefly in acidulated water, and dry at 135 °F. It is juicy, so allow longer than you would for a dense apple.

A stuffed baked apple. One fruit is a whole serving, the cored cavity is genuinely generous, the flesh holds together instead of bursting, and the gentle flavour takes on whatever you fill it with.

Very few apples do that job properly. It is the reason to grow this variety rather than a more exciting eating apple.

A medium Shizuka — about 380 grams — is roughly 185 to 210 calories. A small one is nearer 130 to 150; a large one runs 245 to 275.

The figure to work from is 52 calories per 100 grams, from USDA, for a raw apple with the skin on. Size matters more than usual here: a Shizuka can weigh twice a standard apple, so a “medium apple” panel can understate one by half.

A large Shizuka of about 500 grams comes to roughly 245 to 275 calories.

Across the sizes we pack: small (~270 g) about 140, medium (~380 g) about 198, large (~500 g) about 260. Multiply the weight in grams by 0.52 for a close estimate at any size.

A small Shizuka of about 270 grams is roughly 130 to 150 calories.

A kitchen scale beats guessing from the word on the bag — and the apple count on a case is the quickest guide, since a 72-count fruit is considerably larger than a 125-count.

Per 100 grams of raw Shizuka with the skin on: about 52 calories, 13.81 g carbohydrate, 2.4 g fiber, 0.26 g protein, 0.17 g fat, 107 mg potassium and 85.56 g water.

For a medium apple of about 380 grams that is roughly 198 calories, 52 g carbohydrate and 9.1 g fiber. The full table by size is in the nutrition section above.

About 48 to 56 grams of total carbohydrate in a medium apple, of which roughly 9.1 grams is fiber — so approximately 43 grams of net carbs.

Per 100 grams that is 13.81 grams. That is typical for an apple.

Roughly 52 grams of total carbohydrate in a medium apple, with about 9.1 grams of that being dietary fiber.

Essentially all of an apple’s calories are carbohydrate — there is almost no fat and, in this cultivar, about 0.26 grams of protein per 100 grams.

About 36 to 42 grams in a medium apple, all of it the fruit’s own — nothing is added. That is 10.4 grams per 100 grams of fruit.

Shizuka is sweet, floral and gentle rather than sharp — a honeyed apple with very little bite to it. Its sibling Mutsu carries rather more tartness.

About 9.1 grams in a medium apple with the skin on — 2.4 grams per 100 grams.

That is about average for an apple. Peeling costs you roughly a third of it.

Very little of either: about 1.0 grams of protein and 0.6 grams of fat in a medium apple, and virtually no sodium.

Apples are almost entirely water and carbohydrate — Shizuka is about 85.56 percent water by weight.

About 107 mg per 100 grams, so roughly 407 mg in a medium apple.

That is typical for an apple.

About 17.5 mg in a medium apple — 4.6 mg per 100 grams.

Apples are not a major vitamin C source next to citrus; an orange carries roughly ten times as much. What there is sits mostly just under the skin and degrades with heat, so a raw unpeeled apple retains more of it than a baked one.

For fiber, yes — roughly a third of it sits in the skin, along with most of the fruit’s colour compounds.

Shizuka skin is thin, waxy and satin-finished, spring green to yellow with tan russet crackles and darker lenticels. It is perfectly edible, though on an apple this large many people peel it for baking. Rinse under running water and rub with your hands before eating, as with any fresh fruit.

Roughly two large, three medium or four small apples make a pound — three medium is the standard working assumption in American recipes.

Shizuka is a very large apple — commonly 300 to 500 grams, and sometimes over a pound apiece — so expect roughly one to one and a half to the pound. A 9-inch pie takes three or four, and a single Shizuka will fill a small baking dish.

Full siblings from the same Golden Delicious × Indo cross, and the closest comparison available. Mutsu was released in 1949; Shizuka in 1986.

Mutsu carries more acid and is the better balanced of the two — a reviewer who has tasted both prefers it while noting the family resemblance is obvious. Shizuka is sweeter, gentler, more floral and slower to brown. Both are triploid, both are enormous, both bake beautifully.

Parent and child. Golden Delicious is smaller, softer, bruises very easily and browns normally. Shizuka is far larger, firmer, holds its shape in the oven and browns slowly.

The flavour is recognisably the same honeyed low-acid direction. Think of Shizuka as Golden Delicious made bigger and tougher.

Both Japanese, both very sweet, both low in acid. Fuji is denser and finer-grained with a cleaner, more sustained sweetness, it keeps far longer, and it is a genuine global commercial apple.

Shizuka is much larger, more floral and more aromatic whole, and considerably softer. Fuji is the better keeper and the better everyday apple; Shizuka is the better baking apple and the more interesting one to smell.

Almost opposite apples. Honeycrisp is bright, balanced and explosively crisp, with a light cell structure and real acid. Shizuka is gentle, sweet, floral and crisp-but-tender.

Shizuka is much larger and a far better cooking apple; Honeycrisp is the better fresh-eating apple for most palates. They have nothing in common except a harvest season.

Both are excellent baking apples and they do different jobs. Rome holds its walls better than anything — it is the classic baked-whole apple — and tastes of very little raw.

Shizuka tastes considerably better, is larger, and holds its shape well without being quite as rigid. For a stuffed baked apple you want to eat rather than admire, Shizuka.

Half-siblings — both are Golden Delicious children — and both are triploids with sterile pollen. Jonagold has Jonathan as its other parent and carries far more acid and complexity.

Jonagold is the more interesting eating apple. Shizuka is larger, milder and slower to brown.

Two very different answers to “sweet apple”. Ludacrisp is loud — tropical, perfumed, assertive, the sort of flavour people compare to chewing gum. Shizuka is quiet, which is what its name means.

Ludacrisp is crisper and keeps longer; Shizuka is much larger and a far better cooking apple.

Both are very sweet and low in acid.

Shizuka is larger, more floral, softer, and better in the oven. CandyCrisp is the sweeter of the two; Shizuka is the more aromatic.

Mutsu, unambiguously — same parents, same size, same direction. After that Golden Delicious, its parent, and Orin.

If Shizuka is unavailable, Mutsu is a genuine substitute in almost any recipe, with a little more acid.

Not better — gentler. Most tasters who know both rate Mutsu higher for eating, because the extra acid gives it structure.

Shizuka wins on aroma, on browning, and for anyone who actively dislikes tartness. We grow both and would not choose between them.

Size, scarcity and timing. A half-pound apple does not fit the standard packing grades, the plantings outside Japan are tiny, and it is a triploid that needs two pollinators — which makes it awkward to establish in a commercial block.

None of that is about how it tastes. The same logic keeps Lady apples out for being too small and Golden Russet out for being brown.

If you bake, yes — the combination of size, shape-holding and genuine flavour is rare, and three apples make a pie.

If you want a sharp, crisp eating apple, no. Buy RubyFrost or GoldRush and leave the Shizuka for somebody who wants something quieter.

Here, shipped from the farm when the crop is in, and otherwise from heritage orchards, farm stands and specialist growers. It is not a supermarket variety anywhere outside Japan.

See Ready to Ship for what is leaving the farm today.

Carefully, and with more packing than most. A half-pound apple carries a lot of momentum in a moving box, and Shizuka has a thin skin, so each fruit needs to be held still.

Full details on packing, transit and destinations are on our shipping information page. Refrigerate the box on arrival.

Yes — case and bulk quantities are on our bulk and case apples page, and this is a sensible variety to buy that way if you bake.

Remember the count. A 40 to 42 pound bushel holds only about 45 to 60 Shizukas, against 80 to 125 ordinary apples. Fewer, much bigger fruit for the same weight.

Per pound, more than a commodity apple: small plantings, a short season, hand picking and careful packing for a heavy thin-skinned fruit.

Per apple, it is arguably good value — one Shizuka is two or three ordinary servings, and three make a pie. Judge it by what it replaces rather than by the shelf price.

Yes. It is a 1986 Japanese introduction with no US plant patent we can find, and specialist fruit nurseries carry it on a range of rootstocks.

There is one serious catch, covered below: it is a triploid, so the pollination arrangement is more demanding than for an ordinary apple. We sell fruit, not trees.

This is the question that matters most. Shizuka is a triploid with sterile pollen, so it cannot pollinate anything — and it needs two different diploid varieties nearby, within roughly 100 feet, that bloom at the same time.

Two, not one, because the two diploids must also pollinate each other for the block to set properly. A second Shizuka will not do, and neither will another triploid such as Mutsu or Jonagold. Gala, Golden Delicious, Liberty, Honeycrisp or a flowering crabapple all work.

Because a triploid takes pollen but cannot give it. Plant a triploid with one diploid and the triploid gets pollinated, but the diploid has nothing to pollinate it — so that tree sets poorly and the block underperforms.

Two diploids solve it: they pollinate each other and both pollinate the triploid. It is the single most common mistake people make planting Mutsu, Jonagold or Shizuka.

Large, and this one has real vigour behind it — triploids generally do, and Shizuka is described as a high-vigour tree. Rootstock is what controls it.

Expect 8 to 12 feet on a dwarfing stock, 14 to 20 on semi-dwarf, and well over 20 on standard. On a vigorous triploid, choose a more dwarfing rootstock than you think you need.

Yes, more than most. A vigorous triploid carrying half-pound fruit will overcrop, giving you watery apples and dangerously loaded branches.

Thin to one fruit per cluster four to six weeks after bloom. Japanese growers thin exceptionally hard and hand-pollinate, which is a large part of why their fruit is the size it is.

Two to four years on a dwarfing rootstock, three to five on semi-dwarf, five to eight on standard — the same as any apple. Rootstock governs it.

Remember that you need to plant three trees, not one, so plan the space before you order.

Aomori has cold winters and long autumns, and this is a northern Japanese apple, so cold hardiness is not the concern. Nurseries generally list it in the usual zone 4 to 8 apple range.

We have not found a variety-specific published zone rating for Shizuka, so treat that as the general apple range rather than a measured figure.

Yes, if you have the room. It is vigorous and productive, and it gives you those enormous apples that always get a reaction.

Give it full sun, decent drainage and another variety nearby to pollinate it.

Ask us. We grow it, pick it and ship it, and reliable information about this variety in English is thin — we would rather answer a question than have you guess from a nursery tag.

Contact details and our general handling advice are on the Honeycrisp.com apple FAQ, and the full apple varieties guide puts every apple we grow side by side.