How to Make the Best Apple Recipes

I learned how to make apple recipes because they are so popular here in the United States in the fall time of the year. Depending on what part of the country, you could see apples ripening as early as July. I have fond memories of growing up in Ohio and having bushels of them setting around in the fall.

How to Make Apple RecipesApple Pie Cake with Rum Sauce

In my early years, Mom and Dad would visit the orchard and buy several different kinds; some for eating and some for showing me how to make apple recipes. Mom did a lot of cooking with apples and we all ate a lot of fresh fruit. They didn’t last long around our house. Around Halloween, the kids would fill the old galvanized tub with water and dump our “allotted” apples in the tub. Now we would spend hours dipping our heads in the water to try and get an apple with our teeth. This is not an easy task!


Thousands of varieties of apples are grown in North America for learning how to make great apple recipes. It is questionable whether or not this great land could have survived without this wonderful fruit. They were eaten for food as well as used medicinally.


Apple recipes are made with fresh, canned or dried apples; they are baked, stewed or fried. Apples can be turned into sauce, apple butter or made into sweet cider, hard cider and vinegar. Over the years many great uses for apples have been discovered. The following are a few:

  • An apple placed in a bag of potatoes will help to keep the potatoes from sprouting.
  • An apple placed in brown sugar will help to keep the sugar moist.
  • An apple in the cookie container will help to keep the cookies moist.
  • Add lemon juice to an apple recipe if you are lacking tartness in the apples or if more flavor is needed.
  • If you cannot brush your teeth after eating, eat an apple. A raw apple will cleanse the mouth of more than 95 percent of bacteria that causes tooth decay.

APPLES FOR EATING

Baldwin

Braeburn

Gala

Golden Delicious

Janathan

McIntosh

Pink Lady

Red Delicious

APPLES FOR BAKING & COOKING

Cortland

Gala

Golden Delicious

Granny Smith

Grimes Golden

Pink Lady

Rome Beauty

Stayman

Winesap

If you do not have the apples recommended for the purpose that you want to use them, don’t stop there. Again, this is personal taste and you may stumble onto something that you like. Try what you have and see how it comes out. For instance, the best apple pie I ever ate was made with the McIntosh, which is not the top choice for cooking.

APPLE PIE CAKE WITH RUM SAUCE a yummy apple recipe

Apple Pie Cake with Rum SauceApple Pie Cake with Rum Sauce
  • ¼ Cup soft butter
  • 1 Cup sugar
  • 1 Egg
  • 1 Cup flour
  • 1 Teaspoon salt
  • 1 Teaspoon cinnamon
  • 2 Tablespoons hot water
  • 1 Teaspoon vanilla
  • 3 Cups peeled diced cooking apples
  • ½ Cup chopped pecans


Preheat oven to 350F degrees.

Cream butter and sugar. Add the egg and beat until blended. Combine the flour, salt and cinnamon; add to the cream mixture. Beat until smooth and then stir in the vanilla and water. Fold in the apples and pecans. Spoon into a greased and floured pie plate. Bake for 45 minutes or until a pick comes out clean. Serve with warm butter rum sauce.

Butter Rum SauceButter Rum Sauce

Butter rum sauce:

  • ½ Cup firmly packed brown sugar
  • ½ Cup sugar
  • ¼ Cup soft butter
  • ½ Cup whipping cream
  • 2 Tablespoons rum


Combine first four ingredients in a small saucepan. Mix well and bring to a boil; cook 1 minute. Stir in the rum.

After I married and had my children, I started going to the apple orchards in the fall. My children looked forward to this trip every year. The orchard use to tape “Happy Halloween” and “Merry Christmas” on the Red Delicious ones. When they ripened, the owners of the orchard would peel off the tape and these words would still be light green. It was a thrill every year to buy some of these special apples. Like Mom, I would drag out all my apple recipes. In my younger days, I only made desserts. Since then I started adding this fruit to many of my entrees like my stuffed pork chops recipe.


There are so many delicious apple recipes but I have not found a good apple butter recipe. I have tasted this product from all over the country and only found one that I really like. It is made in the mountains of North Carolina. It is thick, dark in color and very, very flavorful. The type of apples certainly must have a lot to do with making good apple butter but I am told it is mostly in the cooking process. . Of course, they do not want to give their recipe away or too much of their secret, but eventually I will learn how to make it.


Apples provided our pioneer ancestors with food and drink. The pioneers ate them fresh and dried them but also made a sauce, cider and vinegar. The fruit was also used medicinally which reminds me of when my children were young and teething. I would peel a cold apple, hold my child on my lap and let them bite on the cold fruit. It would ease their pain and also reduce any temperature that they had. It worked like a charm!


I remember reading stories when I was young of how people had “apple peeling parties” as a way of socializing in the 1900’s. Family and friends were invited to gather together on Saturday nights in the fall specifically for this purpose. Each would bring a covered dish and after dinner, the evening was spent peeling apples, usually in the barn. Pans, knives and bushels of the fruit were provided for the peeling. This was a chance for everyone to visit but also accomplish a major chore. The following days were spent in the kitchen canning and preparing the apples for winter storage for later use in apple recipes.

APPLE TIPS:

  • One in a bag of potatoes will help keep potatoes from sprouting.
  • A piece in a brown sugar container will help keep the sugar moist.
  • A piece in the cookie container will help keep the cookies moist.
  • If you need tart ones for apple recipes, add a little lemon juice to the apples.
  • If you can’t brush your teeth after a meal, eat one. Eating this fruit will cleanse the mouth of bacteria that causes decay.

RED CINNAMON APPLE RINGS

This is the best apple recipe to garnish a dinner plate with; tasty and very eye appealing.

  • 5 Cooking apples
  • 2 Cups water
  • 2 Cups sugar
  • ½ Teaspoon red food coloring
  • 3 Sticks cinnamon 2 ½ inches long

Peel and core apples; slice in ¾ inch rings.
Combine water, sugar, food coloring and cinnamon sticks in large skillet.
Stir over low heat until sugar dissolves; bring mixture to a boil stirring often.
Simmer for 10 minutes; arrange apple rings in the syrup.
Cook over low heat basting often until apples are tender