I believe the goal is to show a blank so that the user knows they need to fill in something. Having a default of 'Apples' may be missed by the user and in some cases may cause some confusion.

I can't explain the blank mystery, but I have seen cases where people use other text, such as
'Select Fruit' or '?????'.

Is your cell completely empty or does it have a space (" ") character in it? If it is empty, would a " " work?

Pauley