Forbidden fruit? I'll take three dozen: Apple Picking at Libby & Sons

Apples have been trying to live down the whole "Adam and Eve incident" for centuries. Sure, there were claims of being "forbidden fruit" and igniting "the fall of man into sin." But the past is the past. And with a few decades of therapy and an expensive PR campaign, even a naughty apple can turn its image around.

Besides, before the tale of that misbehaving couple surfaced, apples were Aphrodite's fruit. The Greeks believed throwing an apple at someone was to symbolically declare one's love. To catch the apple was to symbolically show one's acceptance.

In Norse mythology, the goddess Iounn provided apples to the gods to give them eternal youthfulness. [Many thanks, ye all-knowing Wikipedia]

I'm still managing to age despite my own large apple consumption, though I do admittedly chuck apples out the One City Center windows at good-looking fellas on the street, because you just never know.

This time of year, it's a small orchard adventure to pick your own. And at Libby & Sons in Limerick, it's apples as far as the eye can see.

The pick-your-own spot had plenty of plump fruit when we swung through - even a lot of blueberries still awaited picking.

But we were here for the round fruit of eternal youth - or sin, depending on how you look at it. And the apples here were of Guinness size - some as big as your head.*

*If your head were a softball.

Employees shuttle pickers to the orchard via golf cart - a perk for the return trip when most folks were lugging several pounds of apples in each arm.

And some went above and beyond in their quest for the best.

Fresh apples inspire baking prowess in even the most incapable cooks - I even entertained the thought of whipping up an apple crisp or crumble or coffee cake. But why hassle with the kitchen accouterments when Libby and Sons has a hot-from-the-over apple delicacy at the ready?

Apple donuts.

If Aphrodite were here, she'd be throwing apple donuts at her love interests.

For a Maine apple map and some local apple info, check out Meredith Goad's fabulous story in the Portland Press Herald.