Simple Uses for Apples

 

When you have a large crop of apples from the garden or farmstand, you don't have time to casually include them in complicated recipes or to frantically figure out how to use them up before they go bad without getting sick of them.  You want to make the most of your harvest and to actually enjoy it.

Here at Plant to Plate, we like to keep things simple!  Here are some of my favorite ways to use or preserve apples:

• Roast them with fennel and onions.

• Stuff them in a winter squash with amaranth and bake.

• Make a crumble by sprinkling apple pieces with cinnamon, brown sugar, and graham flour and baking.

• Add them to a basic quickbread, alone or with cheddar.

• Add them to zucchini bread, alone or with carrots.

• Add them to other baked goods such as muffins and bagels.

• Add them to pancakes.

• Make grilled cheese with them along with gouda, cheddar, and/or feta.

• Add them to paninis.

• Add them to quesadillas along with gouda, provolone, or cheddar.

• Top a flatbread with them along with arugula and rosemary or sage.

• Top a flatbread with them along with purslane.

• Top a pizza with them along with beets and onions.

• Stuff ravioli, tortellini, and other filled pastas with a purée of apple, pumpkin, and sage.  Alternatively, if you are not making your own filled pasta, this apple-pumpkin-sage purée can be used as a standalone sauce or added to another sauce and served with store-bought filled pastas.

• Make a simple soup with them along with carrots and fennel.

• Add them to other soups and broths.  Apple fruits, peels, blossoms, and leaves can be added to broths.  It is not recommended to use the seeds in a broth since they have a higher concentration of pre-cyanide compounds than these other plant parts.

• Mix them with almond butter, pepitas, and amaranth or oatmeal.

• Toss them with pumpkin chunks, pepitas, and sage.

• Use them to fill a lettuce wrap along with chicken, fresh or dried cranberries, and pecans or walnuts.

• Make a coleslaw with them along with fennel and cabbage.

• Make a creative twist on bruschetta with small apple pieces, cinnamon, and bleu cheese or any goat or sheep cheese.  Serve on top of toast, crackers, crostini, and bagels.

• Add them to sandwiches, especially those with ham, chicken, and/or cheddar.

• Add them to chicken salad.

• Make a Simple Salad.  A few ideas for Simple Salad combinations with apples are as follows:
• Lettuce and fennel
• Arugula and fennel
• Lettuce and pecans.  You can also add chicken and/or feta cheese to this to make it a Waldorf salad.
• Walnuts and roasted beets
• Endive and rosemary
• Kiwi and banana
• Pears, lettuce, and pecans

• Use them as Walls in an Interesting Salad.  (Wondering why I capitalized those letters?  Read more about Interesting Salads here!)

• Add them to other salads.

• Make caramel apples.

• Make homemade apple cider vinegar. 

• Make a tea with the leaves and blossoms.  Apple blossoms and leaves can be made into a tea or added to a tea blend.  They are best suited for an infusion.

• Make a tincture with the leaves and blossoms.  The suggested herb:solvent ratio for an apple leaf and/or blossom tincture is 1:4 in 40% alcohol.

Further Reading

Growing apples?  Check out these quick facts like their best growing conditions, companion plants, and expected yields.

Apples are also featured in these articles:

• Quick Facts: Growing Apples
• The Interesting Salad Protocol: How to Build an Interesting Salad

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