Fried Apples!

I had worked up a step by step article on fried apples, and somehow it never got posted anywhere. I think it may have been due to the size of the file, so I'll try again here.

Long years ago, my grandmother would buy apples when the truck came around in late fall. She normally got at least two bushels, one of yellow delicious and one of red delicious and sometimes more. The smoke house was a good storage area and they kept well in the central Missouri environment. Her apple pies were fantastic and my wife learned her technique/method well! Of course, she made crust with lard, so we have had to substitute butter for the fat and it turns out just about as good.

Fried apples went with breakfast, where there was usually thin cut ham (cut off of the ham hanging in the smoke house) fried eggs, biscuits and fried apples for a biscuit topping! She fried her apples in the ham drippings.

My wife, in her usual wisdom, learned the method during one of our visits back to the old home place. Grandma usually peeled her apples, but we tend to like the peeling left on, thinking there may be more vitamins left in the finished product. A cast iron skillet is an asset, but not absolutely essential.

With a healthy amount of butter in the skillet, the frying process is started with the addition of the sliced apples (take the core and the stem out first).




As the apples cook down some, sugar is sprinkled over the top, which will help them cook down more as the juice forms.






The amount of sugar depends on how "candied" you want them and how sweet you want them.

On this occasion, we were having pancakes, so we layered the apples between pancakes.



Then we finished off the layers with a goodly portion of apples on top and they were great!



Pictures make it easier for you to see what I'm attempting to describe with words. The excess liquid from the apples is used as a syrup and it helps moisten the pancakes for eating.

The past two years, we have been able to buy Missouri apples through the Mennonites. So, we had 5 bushels to share with children and friends while eating more than a few. They aren't $2/bushel, like my grandmother bought, but they are still very reasonable compared to produce stands and grocery stores. We store ours in a cooler and they keep for a long time. It really doesn't hurt if they wrinkle a little in storage, because they will still fry up in grand fashion!

The pictures are all over the place, but you should get the idea of what goes where. They will get bigger if you click on them. Enjoy, if you get the opportunity!

Thanksgiving 2011

As usual, we had a crowd for Thanksgiving dinner! I think there were about 19 here, including our great granddaughter and a few visitors. My girls (wife, two daughters and 3 granddaughters) are all pretty good cooks, so we had an abundance of food and tons of leftovers. I didn't even do the desserts justice, since I was so full of real food!

The table tops we had made really helped with seating. With two tables 6 feet by 4 feet butted together, we can seat 13 or 14 before we have to use the table in the sitting room.






As usual, I didn't get enough pictures, so I'll have to see what my granddaughters captured and figure out how to post them here.

It seems like the "news" for the day is expecting another great grandchild in July of 2012! Out of 8 grandchildren only one is married, so great grandchildren in abundance are still in the future.