6 Extinct Foods From History - Page 4 of 8

Taliaferro apple

Thomas Jefferson cultivated Taliaferro apples at Monticello. In an 1814 letter to his granddaughter, Jefferson said the small fruit produced “unquestionably the finest cyder we have ever known, and more like wine than any liquor I have ever tasted which was not wine.” Though it’s believed that the apple was lost with the estate’s original orchard, some horticulturists still hold out hope for its survival—but with few written descriptions of the fruit available, we likely wouldn’t be able to identify Jefferson’s apple even if we did find it.