Apples are more versatile than many of us give them credit for. They don't just have to be dessert in one form or other. They're a great mate for cabbage: slice and sauté tart ones with red cabbage you're going to braise, or add chunks of sweet ones to sauerkraut. (Hint: to really do up that sauerkraut add potatoes, celery seed, juniper berries or caraway seed with the apples and serve with a mess of sausages).
Apple fritters are an old-fashioned substitute for pancakes as well as a dessert. Here's what you need:
2 cups
all-purpose flour
1/4 cup
white sugar
1
tablespoon baking powder
1/2
teaspoon ground nutmeg
1
teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup
milk
2 quarts
oil for deep frying
4 large
apples, peeled and cored
1/2 cup
confectioners' sugar for dusting
In a
medium bowl, mix together flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg and salt. In a
separate bowl, beat together eggs and milk. Stir milk mixture into flour
mixture until smooth. Heat oil
to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) in a deep fryer or heavy bottomed deep pot or
skillet. Slice
apples into 1/2 inch rings. Dip apple slices in batter and fry, a few at a
time, turning once, until golden. Drain on paper towels and dust with
confectioners' sugar.
Baked apples are another old-fashioned treat that newfangled microwaves let you make in less than 10 minutes now. For this you need large, round apples like Empire, Rome, Cortland. You can also use Granny Smith. And all you need to do is wash and core them. Make a stuffing out of whatever you like: I like chopped walnuts, raisins, dried cranberries, cinnamon, nutmeg and maple syrup. You can jazz to the max with diced apricots, currants, almonds, chopped dates, shredded coconut, bits of butter, butter, brown sugar, cloves and cinnamon. Whatever you put inside, put them in a baking dish, sprinkle them with fresh lemon juice, pour apple cider or pure apple juice over them so there's about 1/4-1/2" of it in the pan for basting. Put a dollop of honey atop each apple, cover the pan tightly with foil and bake at 350º about 1 hour or until the apples are soft. OR you can line them up in a microwavable dish, cover with plastic wrap or another dish and let them cook on high for 2 minutes. Test for softness and cook on medium at 30 second intervals until they're done.
Serve with mascarpone, vanilla yogurt or whipped cream for a real treat.
If you're going to make a tart, use a firm tart apple like Granny Smith that holds its shape in the oven. Don't cook with Fujis: they aren't juicy enough. One of the easier tarts to make is the famed Tatin, the so-called upside down apple tart. Its beauty is nobody will see your crust so it doesn't have to be picture perfect. You need a large iron skillet or an 9-10" metal pie pan and you need to coat the bottom of whichever you choose with bits of butter and brown sugar. You want a caramelized effect. (You can melt the butter and sugar in the skillet to achieve this perfectly.) Slice the apples and lay them in a concentric circle pattern to completely cover the pan. You can fill any tiny holes with bits of apple or currants. For good measure throw on top a pinch of brown sugar, pinches of cinnamon and/or nutmeg and 2 or 3 tiny bits of butter. Make a basic pie crust (combine 1 1/4 c flour, 1 stick cold unsalted butter, then add 1 tsp vinegar and 1/4 c ice water to blend. Roll into a circle slightly larger than the pan and top the apples, crimping the edges by pushing them slightly down into the pan, Bake at 350º about 45 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. Remove from the oven and flip onto your serving platter.
And finally, an easy and slightly different apple pie that was my biggest hit in Mongolia because the cookies and sourcream make it irresistible. For the crust you combine about 2 doz. cookies--either butter cookies, gingerbread cookies or graham cracker cookies--with 1 stick of butter, 1/2 tsp nutmeg and 1/4 c light brown sugar in a food processor until clumps form. Butter a 9" pie pan and pat this crust into it, right up and around the rim. Refrigerate until ready to fill.
Now in a large bowl combine 2 tbsp flour, 1/2 c sugar, 1/4 c light brown sugar, pinch of ground cloves and 3/4 tsp cinnamon. In another bowl beat a large egg, then whisk into it 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract and 1 c sour cream. Carefully combine this wet mixture into the dry mixture. Peel six med/lg apples like Macs or Granny Smiths and chop them into bite sized chunks. Stir into the batter. Fill the pie pan with the mixture and bake at 350º about 40 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool before serving.
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