apple Archives - Page 2 of 2

Apple Chips Recipe

September 17, 2013 By Deirdre

Apple season is in full spring here in South Carolina. It seemed like the perfect time to try an apple chips recipe I found online. Well, actually I found two apple chip recipes online. Believe it or not they were both different from each other. After reading through both recipes, I decided to follow a couple of directions from each one and add a twist of my own. I have mentioned to you that JDaniel shares most with me about his school day when we sit down after school and have a snack this looked like snack he would like.Ingredients
3 large Gala apples
4 tablespoons of cinnamon1/4 cup of melted brown sugar1/2 cup white sugarDirections

Preheat the oven at 200 degrees F.
Line two cookie or baking sheets with parchment paper.
Create a mixture of the cinnamon and sugar in a small bowl and set it aside.
Lay an apple on its side.
Slice apples thinly or as thinly as you can cut them. My slices are on the thicker side. When I tried to cut them thinly I didn’t end up with complete slice.

I just used small leaf shaped cookie cutters to make fall themed apple chips.

Place the apples onto the baking sheets in rows.
Melt the brown sugar in the microwave with a little water for about 35 seconds.
Brush the melted brown sugar onto the apple slices.
Sprinkle the apples with mixture of the cinnamon and sugar.
Bake for 1 hour and then flip the apples over.
Bake the apples for a second hour.
Turn of the oven and let the apples sit in the cooling over for 30-45 minutes.

Some of the apples may be a little chewy and some may be a little crunchy. It will depend on the thickness of the apple slices and how hot your oven tends to run.

My guys think that I need to try this apple chips recipe again. They really loved these. It is probably due to the two kinds of sugar and cinnamon. They both love sweet snacks. I love that we are getting fruit along with the a sweet treat!

What is your favorite fall treat?

Kid’s Lunch – Apple Chicken Salad Bento

September 2, 2013 By Deirdre

We are all trying to eat more fruit at my house. JDaniel and my husband have always been great about eating fruit. The one that really needed to work on it was me so, that means I will be serving more fruit. Since I plan most of the meals and search for new recipes, I decided to find one for a salad that would great for lunch and had fruit in it. The one I found was an apple tuna salad. Which sounded great, but I decided to switch out the tuna for chicken. Not only was I going to enjoy the apple chicken salad, I decided JDaniel would too. A kid’s lunch filled with apple chicken salad served in a bento would be fun for him. Apple Chicken Salad

Ingredients

1 large can of chicken
1 tablespoon of olive oil
2 tablespoon of mayonnaise

1 small apple chopped into small pieces
1 teaspoon of dried onion

1 tablespoon of sweet pickle
Salt and PepperDirections

Stir all of the ingredients together in a small bowl.
Add a dash or two of salt and pepper. (JDaniel doesn’t link pepper so we left it out.)
Refrigerate overnight.
Serve with crackers or on a bed of lettuce.

The salad was really wonderful. I used gala and Granny Smith apples in the salad. They made it a little tart and a little sweet. We also added fresh sweet onions instead of dried onions to the salad. Oh! I added just a tad more mayonnaise to the recipe. It made it just a tiny bit more moist. If you prefer a drier chicken salad you may decide not to add the extra tad of mayonnaise.

JDaniel enjoyed the salad. I think if was the inclusion of crackers I added to his lunch that in encouraged him to try it. I love that he is willing to try new things like an apple chicken salad in his bento box.

What kinds of salads do you put in your kid’s lunch?

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Bread Recipe- Apple Cinnamon Bread

August 20, 2013 By Deirdre

Whether you are looking for a special treat to send into your child’s teacher or you just love desserts with apples, you are going to love this apple cinnamon bread recipe. JDaniel and I made a trial loaf last week to make sure it would taste great and turn out well. Both my husband an JDaniel loved it. Actually I love it too. It is a little tart due to the Granny Smith apples and a little sweet due to the brown sugar.I remember at the beginning of the school year having a parent stop by at the end of the first week with a treat. She thanked me for a great start of the year and wanted to give me something to celebrate the beginning of the year with. That was over 25 years ago and I still remember her generous gift.

JDaniel’s kindergarten teacher deserved to have the same thoughtful gesture at the end of her first week so, JDaniel and I made this wonderful apple cinnamon bread. (It a simple enough recipe for families to make together.)

Apple Cinnamon Bread RecipeIngredients1 1/2 cups of flour
1 1/2 cups of tart apples chopped finely
1 tsp of baking powder
2 tsp of cinnamon
1 cup of dark brown sugar

1/2 TBSP vanilla2 eggs1 cup of milk
1/4 of vegetable oilDirections

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Rub the inside of your loaf pan with oil or shortening.
Mix together the flour, apples, baking powder, brown sugar, and cinnamon in a large bowl.
Mix together the eggs, oil, vanilla and milk in a small bowl.
Pour the contents of the small bowl into the large bowl and mix thoroughly.

6.Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes. Check to make sure the bread is cooked with a toothpick. If it isn’t fully cooked, put it back in the oven for 5 more minutes.

This super simple recipe would be great to share with teachers and others your care for. It is a fun twist on giving the teacher an apple to show them that you appreciate what they do. I bet there are other people that work at school that would love to try this bread recipe for apple cinnamon bread too.

More recipes for apples beyond this bread recipe:

Applesauce Toppings Bar

Apple Chicken Salad Bento

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Kids Lunch Apple of My Eye Sandwich Sushi

August 19, 2013 By Deirdre

With school staring on Wednesday we have been field testing a wide variety of ways for me to pack JDaniel’s Easy Lunch Box container. One of his favorites was this kids lunch sandwich sushi meal with an apple theme. Part of the reason I think he liked it was that it had a fun name. I think he also liked that the foods were all compressed together in. The flattened bread tasted better to me than when it is fluffy he mentioned to me after he had eaten several sushi rolls.I am so glad he like it. Making sandwich sushi rolls is super easy and allows parents to sneak in new foods without their children knowing they are there.

Let me walk you through how I made the sushi rolls:

Roll a rolling pin over pieces of sandwich bread until it is the thickness you desire.
Spread or place the foods you want on top of the bread. We used apple jelly and honey baked ham.
Roll each slice of bread up to create a tube.
Slice the sandwich sushi rolls as thick or thin as you like.

I made apple and Colby Jack cheese apple shaped cutouts to place on top of the sandwich sushi rolls to dress them up a little bit. The outlines of the cutouts were placed in the upper right hand section of the lunch box. I sprinkled the apples with a tiny bit of lemon juice to keep them from going brown.

Kids Lunch Apple of My Eye Sandwich Sushi

Since the apple of my eye loves applesauce with a dash of cinnamon, I put that in the lunch too. JDaniel might not understand the phrase apple of my eye, but he really enjoyed having an apple themed sandwich sushi lunch in his kids lunch.

Oh! Another reason I like the sushi sandwiches in a kids lunch is that rather than having a whole sandwich or a half or even quarters is that this lunch has bite size pieces that kids can pop in their mouths. I think it might encourage kids to try new foods or eat more of a sandwich than being presented with big pieces of sandwich.

Mrs. Mariner’s Homemade Applesauce Recipe

September 20, 2012 By Deirdre

I have been dying to go to Skytop Orchards with JDaniel to get apples and make applesauce. Yesterday I showed you pictures of our trip to the orchard and today I am going to show you how we made applesauce.

Mrs. Mariner's Homemade Applesauce Recipe

I have never made applesauce before or at least I don’t remember having made it before. JDaniel and I checked a book out of the library called Applesauce Season that describes how to make applesauce using a food mill to break up the apples after boiling them.We don’t have a food mill and none of the other mom’s in my playgroup had one either when I checked with them. I turned to the women of my church who have set up a Facebook group to see if any of them had one. Three ladies called me within two hours to say that had one.

The first lady I talked to was Mrs. Mariner. I have never met her before, but she was a joy to talk too. She was so excited that we were going to make homemade applesauce. Not only would she bring her food mill to church to lend to me on Sunday she would take a few minutes on the phone to describe to me each step of the process.

Mrs. Mariner gave us foolproof or should I call it homemade applesauce that is novice proof.

Here is how we made homemade applesauce:

JDaniel and I cut up four pounds of apples. Mrs. Mariner told me to pick Jonathan Gold, Mats, Golden Delicious and Macintosh apples. They would give us a good mix of sweetness and tartness.

Once the apples were cut. I put them in a pot and filled the pot with enough water to cover the top of the apples. Mrs. Mariner told me that too much water would not be good for the apples.

The apples needed to boil for ten minutes and no more than that. They would get to mushy if I let them go too long.

Draining the apples in a colander sitting on top of a bowl was the step. We weren’t going to need all the water drained, but we were going to need some if the applesauce was too dry. (JDaniel loved drinking the apple water after it had cooled.)

Then we took the drained apples over to the food mill sitting on a bowl. The apples were added a little at a time to the mill. JDaniel and I took turns turning the mill and holding the mill onto the bowl.

When all the apples have been milled, you can store the applesauce in the bowl beneath the mill or you can as JDaniel did put the applesauce into plastic applesauce cups we had saved from store bought applesauce. JDaniel said they were supposed to hold applesauce and it didn’t matter what kind.