We love apples, and so must a lot of you as last year more than 280 million bushels of apples were harvested in the United States. While most varieties are available year-round, October is the peak of the largest harvest season.
When you're In need of a quick carbo snack, it's easy to grab a small apple and eat it on the go. It'll supply 15 grams of carbohydrates at the cost of only 60 calories. An apple makes a perfect ending to most any meal, and with a small piece of low-fat or nonfat cheese, a superb dessert. Select ripe apples that are firm and deeply colored, whether that be red, green, or any of the colors in between. Remember that apples continue to ripen once picked, even when refrigerated. So buy apples in reasonable quantities that you can use within two weeks.
One of our favorite research tools that we use when developing recipes for our books and this site, Culinary Artistry by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page (Van Nostrand Reinhold) lists these flavor enhancers among the many ingredients that can be used when cooking with apples:
blackberries
brandy
brown sugar
Calvados
celery
cheese
chestnuts
cinnamon
cloves
coriander
cranberries
ginger
honey
horseradish
Kirsch
lemon
nutmeg
nuts, especially almonds, hazelnuts, pecans, and walnuts
oatmeal
oranges
pears
pepper, black
prunes
raisins
rosemary
rum
sauerkraut
sherry
sour cream
vanilla
vinegar
wine, red
yogurt
In September, 1998, we gave you a primer on what apples are best for cooking in the opening pages of "what's for dinner?" Here we've employed some of those varieties in new recipes that you'll want to use throughout the coming fall and winter.
(for the recipes, click on The Recipes or click on the individual recipe above)
