A Gardeners Forum Forums Willy's Place Members Favorite Recipes Apple Crumble

The kids and I went apple picking the other day, for those of you without orchards this is the deal; you pick up a bag at the entrance to the orchard, grab a wagon and trek into the orchard. The rows are marked with what kind of apple trees in that row , you walk up and down the rows smelling , eating and picking apples off the tree until you fill the bag. The bag we picked weighed 30 pounds and cost about $18.00. It's probably more expensive to pick your own than it is to buy them at the supermarket, but there's no comparison to a fresh , crisp, right-off-the tree apple and the kids all have such fond memories of apple picking . This year my nine y/o remarked how the trees are smaller this year and she remembers a few years ago when the trees were ssssssooooooooo tall ! Her aunt and I laughed and told her it's because she's so much taller now, but she was adamant about how much the trees have shrunk!

Anyway, here's the recipe we made the first night :

Apple Streusel Squares

2 cups Flour
½ cup Sugar
½ tsp. Baking powder
½ tsp. Salt
1 cup Butter or Margarine
1 slightly beaten egg
¾ cup sugar
¼ cup flour
1 tsp. Cinnamon
6-8 medium apples, peeled, cored, sliced

Optional: 1 cup sifted powdered sugar
Milk

Preheat oven to 350°

In a medium mixing bowl stir together the 2 cups flour, the ½ cup sugar, the baking powder, and salt. Cut in the butter til the pieces are the size of small peas. Stir in the beaten egg; gently toss with a fork to combine. Divide the flour mixture in half. Turn half into a sprayed (Pam) 13 x 9 pan; spread evenly. Press onto the bottom of pan to form a firm, even crust.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the ¾ cup sugar, the ¼ cup flour, and the cinnamon. Add apples and toss to mix. Arrange apple mixture over crust. Sprinkle remaining flour mixture over apple layer. Bake at 350° for 40 - 45 minutes. Cool for one hour.

For icing, in a bowl stir together the powdered sugar and enough milk (1-2 Tablespoons) to make of drizzling consistency. Makes 15-18 servings

Instead of the icing we served it with caramel vanilla ice cream!

Mel,
I can atest to your story..
Pickin' fresh produce is the best, no
matter the cost..

We used to go do stuff like that all
the time with my Grandparents, and they are
THE BEST MEMORIES, we'd go pickin' strawberries,
one for the basket, one for me, one for the basket, two for me, none for the basket, all for me... I'd have a bellyache before I'd leave,
but gosh, WHAT FUNNNNNNNNNN!!
And we'd go cherry pickin', black and red raspberry pickin', apple pickin' *Grampy used to make the best apple cider, but he liked to make
the hard cider for the adults..* and vinegar too.

Thanks for bringing up the great memories....

AND A SCRUMPTOUS RECIPE TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!

The kids ate 4 apples each the first night, and I kept telling them they'd get diarrhea from it and finally my 9 y/o daughter says, that's fine, I like diarrhea .

Weezie, what about caramel apples?! They're o.k. at the fairs but made at home with FRESH apples are the best !!

The things kids will say, huh??

I have never made caramel apples,
have often stopped and looked at the mixes
to melt and stuff, but never made them...

Are they hard to do?

Melt the carmel, *package? or individual carmels'?*
Melt on low?
And take a stick into the apple and dip in
carmel, layout on wax papper????

I should do that, I just may...

What kind of apples did you use???
Granny Smith's *green ones'?*

Sorry , Weezie, just noticed here I never got back to you! I have done the kraft melt your own caramel apples, usually the bag of caramels comes with the stix too and directions, but they've made it even easier these days, you can pick up a package of caramel sheets (right in the produce section at my local supermarket) and you just wrap the sheet of caramel around the apple, put the stick in, and bake it for 5 minutes! Yummy!

We picked our own apples so we used macintosh and paula red's .

My daughter love tomake carmel apples Weezie. We use the package of carmels- unwrap them (Natch) melt them over a double broiler and then dip the apples in them. We ususally hae to use a spoon to get them completely covered.
For us through lot of trail and error is after they are dipped to place them on a rack over parchment paper. When we placed them on waxed paper they stuck! If over parchmentpaper you can peel of the carmeland eat it. yumm!

Can you melt those carmels in the micro?????

These are the best caramel apples.

Caramel Apples

6 med apples (tart ones make the best)

1 cup sugar
3/4 cup white corn syrup
1 can condensed milk
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 cup margarine
1 tsp vanilla

Insert sticks into stem end of each washed apple. Set aside.

I a heavy saucepan, combine sugar, condensed milk, corn syrup and salt, mix well.

Cook over medium heat, stirring gently but constantly to soft ball stage (about 30 min). Remove from heat, cool slightly. Stir in margarine and vanilla.

Working quickly, dip apples in caramel to coat well. Place apples stem side up to harden on buttered waxed paper.

Note: As the mixture cooks it kinda almost burns, but that is what gives it the caramel color and taste.

Nancy

Nancy..that's a great recipe for caramel apples...I have to eat about 3 when I make them...they are so addicting!
Mel, I just posted a good recipe for a brown paper bag apple pie up in another apple thread...you might want to try it with your fresh apples for something a little different!

I still haven't done these yet..
Maybe just for Thanksgiving...

It's been quite "BUSY" here.....
And they end up with SOOOOOO MUCH CANDYYYYY!
I am hesitant to make more on top of it....

You don't happen to have the recipe do you??

I have to admit, I was only 5~10*ish* when
he made all that stuff....so I was never on
the recipe end of it..
Although, I do remember RAISINS' in it...

Pickin' and peelin' the apples and eatin' the pies, and drinkin' cider was my end of the bargain....

But I don't remember him doing anything special..
other than using an apple pressing machine..and
squeezing the stuff out thru a burlap bag...
*and composting or feeding the reminates to the horses/chicken's etc...

And for the vinegar, he just jarred it up...
and corks would pop...

We're making some vinegar now, it should be done in a year or two... *we love strong vinegar*
We had to move it to my husbands dad's side shed..
the smell was wayyyyyyy to pungent for us here in the small house... wheewwwwww~eeeeeeeeeeee!!!