Obituary: RW ‘Johnny’ Apple Jr

RW Apple Jr, the renowned New York Times correspondent whose talents included wine and food writing, has died aged 71.

For over 40 years, Johnny Apple, as he was known, reported for the Times, and the subject was frequently his immense culinary appetites.

Apple’s most recent wine article dealt with Austrian wines and Terry Theise, an importer who helped put them on the map in America.

‘I have a soft spot for the Wachau; decades ago I tasted Austrian wines for the first time at Jamek, a riverside restaurant now almost a century old,’ he said. ‘The warmhearted Landhaus Bacher in Mautern came as a thrilling discovery to my wife, Betsey, and me on a cold, dark night not too many years after that.’

Apple wrote enthusiastically about such diverse wines as the Sauvignon Blanc of Cloudy Bay, New Zealand, and the late-harvest gewürztraminer of Navarro, in Mendocino County, California.

RW ‘Johnny’ Apple Jr died on Wednesday in Washington of complications of thoracic cancer. He is survived by his second wife, Betsey, and two step-children from her first marriage.

Written by Howard G Goldberg in New York

Howard G Goldberg is a wine writer and critic based in New York City. He made his name writing about wine for The New York Times, where he worked for 34 years. He has written various books on food and wine, including Prime: The Complete Prime Rib Book and All About Wine Cellars. He compiled The New York Times Book of Wine – a collection of the publication’s best wine articles.