Like many of us, my husband's a sucker for a good marketing ploy. Which is why, in the supermarket produce department the other day, he picked up a plastic clamshell container and asked if we could buy it. The container encased four red apples, but the label identified them as Sweet Grapples®... "Looks like an apple. Tastes like a grape."

"Smell it!" Chip said. I took a sniff. It smelled like grapes in the way that strawberry Starburst candy vaguely recalls the scent of strawberries — a fake, cloying, chemical-factory's idea of what a grape might smell like. It reminded me of how, when I lived in Chicago, I often drove past a factory that made extracts and flavorings, and every day the air would be saturated with a different sickly-sweet candy aroma, one day butterscotch, the next day watermelon.

But I was intrigued enough to put the package of Grapples in our shopping cart ($3.99 for a pack of four).

When I got home, I did some research. I'd assumed the Grapples got their crazy identity through some fluke of genetic modification. But, no. According to the Grapple Web site [1] (Grapple is actually a trademarked product, manufactured by a company called Grapple Fruits LLC, based in Washington State), the product begins its life as a Washington Extra Fancy Apple or a Fuji Apple. Artificial grape flavor (as listed on the "ingredients" on the packaging) is infused into the apple or, as the Web site describes, "A relaxing bathing process prepares our apples for you or your kids." The process isn't explained much further than that, although apparently it's been featured on the Food Network show, Unwrapped [2].

My biggest question is, why? It's not like an apple has such a horrible taste that it needs to be masked or sweetened further. And, if you like the taste of grapes... why not just eat some grapes? They're about as good for you as an apple. What's more, the Grapple doesn't actually taste that much like a grape... if I'd eaten a Grapple unwittingly, mistaking it for a normal everyday apple-flavored apple, I think I'd just assume it was remarkably sweet. The only difference is that after eating a Grapple, I had a lingering chemical aftertaste in my mouth, sort of like when you drink Gatorade.

Call me old-fashioned, but I'd like my apples to taste like apples and my ketchup to be red (remember Heinz's purple and green ketchup [3]?). I don't want my fresh fruit to need an ingredient list.

And here's something a bit scary. One of the questions on the Grapple Web site's online survey was, "What other flavors would you like to experience?" 

Could a chocolate-flavored apple be too far behind?