Posts Tagged ‘Manitoba Apples’

Apple Curry Soup

You know you have too many apples when you start making apple soup!

 

I was a little skeptical about this simple apple soup recipe.  Apples and onions – really?

Really, it’s great!  Simple and elegant, this soup makes an impressive first course to any special dinner.

Apple Curry Soup
Apple Curry Soup

Ingredients
1 Tbsp. butter
1 large onion, sliced thinly
4 cups vegetable stock
3 Manitoba Goodland apples, cored, peeled, & chopped
1 tsp. curry powder (or to taste)

3 sprigs of curry plant leaves (optional)
2 Tbsp lemon juice
2 Tbsp. butter
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup light cream
salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

Sauté onion in 1tbsp of butter until soft.

Add soup stock, apples, curry powder, curry leaves and lemon juice.
Bring to a boil.
Reduce heat and let simmer for 10 to 20 minutes until apples are soft but not mushy.
Strain mixture through a sieve or a food mill.
Compost the remaining pulp.

In another large saucepan, melt remaining butter.
Mix in flour and cook 1 to 2 minutes.
Whisk in the strained soup.
Heat through.
Adjust seasoning.

Heat cream in the microwave.*
Add cream to soup.
Garnish with sprig of curry plant.
Serve.

Makes 4 servings.

*Heating cream will help prevent it from curdling when being added to a hot liquid.
Sauté onions.
Add apples, stock and seasoning.

 

Strain mixture through food mill.

Dried Apple Rings

We finally made those oven dried apple rings that we mentioned several weeks ago. They’re fabulous!  The adults love them as much as the kids do.  They make a perfect snack for back to school.

These apple rings still have a little moisture to them.  If you are going to store them for a long time, you might want to dry them out even more by keeping them in the oven a little longer.  Storing them has not been an issue in our house since they’re all gone within a couple of days.

In an effort to be somewhat energy efficient, I throw in a fresh batch whenever the oven is already on after baking something else.

We’ve also discovered that sprinkling a little cinnamon on top before they go in the oven, is a great addition.

 

Here’s a photo gallery of how we made them.
Wash, peel, core and slice apples.

 

Soak in lemon water for 5 minutes.

 

Drain and pat dry.
Place on rack on top of cookie sheet.
Put in oven for 3-4 hours. 

 

Take out when dry – chewy but not crispy.

 

After a busy day of picking some more gorgeous Goodland apples, Fruit Share passed a major milestone of 1000lbs of fruit.  That’s a lot of fruit!  Thanks everyone!

Yesterday, Aidan felt more comfortable climbing the tree rather than the ladder.  He swears by his new found technique and claims he picked the best apples from his vantage point.  Meanwhile, Melanie, who decided climbing ladders or trees wasn’t her thing, was busy snapping these photos.
 
After we picked as many apples as we possibly could, we shook the the last few remaining branches.  But this time, we held out a blanky to catch them all.  Well, we didn’t catch them all, but we were able to save quite a few from the “bruised box”.
Linda, Janet and Scott went on to pick at yet another location -an even bigger tree with even more apples. 
Everyone walked away with several big boxes of apples and today Teen Challenge, Agape Table and Janet’s church will get their share too.

Agape Table Gets Apples

Agape Table has been serving hot meals to people in the inner city since 1980.  It is able to provide this service through the support of the Winnipeg community.  Fruit Share is proud to share some of its bounty with this great organization.

Mike, a volunteer with Agape Table gladly takes in one of the two big boxes of apples we brought earlier this morning.

Come join us as we rescue more apples.  We have two locations for the morning of Wednesday, September 1.

Exact times and locations will be sent to all registered fruit picking volunteers.

Hope to see you there.

Drying Apples

Chris, another great FruitShare volunteer found a recipe for dried apple rings.

If you try this recipe, please let us know how it works.

Dried apples
Ingredients
4 medium tart apples
2 tbls. lemon juice
2 cups water


Preparation
Pre heat oven to 300 Combine water and lemon juice in a large bowl
Core apples and slice into 1/4 inch rings
Place apple rings in water, juice mixture and make sure to cover apple completely for 5 minutes. This will keep apples from discoloring.
Drain well and pat dry
Lightly spray 2 wire racks with cooking spray
Arrange rings on racks in single layer making sure not to touch
Set each rack on a baking sheet
put into oven one sheet on top oven rack and the other on the bottom rack.
Bake for 15 minutes
Reverse sheets in the oven.( Place the top sheet on the bottom rack and the top sheet on the bottom
Bake for 15 more minutes
Shut oven off and let rings dry in the oven without opening the door, about 3 hours.

Shaking Apple Trees

We had a great time picking apples on Tuesday night.  Gorgeous, delicious Goodland apples.

We picked as many as we could with our super tall step ladders.  But this was a very tall tree and we could only go so high.  In our eagerness to get every last apple, we did the only thing we could think of - we shook the apples from the tree.  We cringed as we watched and listened to them plummeting to the ground.  They landed pretty hard and most have big bruises on them now.  They’re still useable for applesauce and juice, but they’re not so great for eating, slicing or giving away.

Oops, maybe shaking the tree without a safety blanket to catch them before they hit the ground is not such a great idea.  Lesson learned – unless you intend to whip up a big batch of juice or applesauce right away, shaking apple trees is not a good technique for harvesting apples.

Since they’re in no shape to be given away, we’re researching the most effective way to turn them into juice.  Stay tuned as we find out what options are available to us apple shakers!

Delicious Apples

It took two of us, three hours to pick 210 lb of delicious apples from this tree.  The homeowner was as thrilled to see her apples being harvested and put to good use as we were to have them. They’re perfect for eating right off the tree or turning into endless apple recipes (stay tuned for Aleta’s great Maple Apple Crisp recipe).

This morning, the kids and I delivered four big boxes (about 120 lb) to Winnipeg Harvest.

Picking, eating, processing and sharing all those wonderful apples brought us and many others a lot of JOY! To learn more about the JOY flower you see in this photo visit Deb-Dawson Dunn’s site – Get It Dunn .

Apple Butter Recipe

From apple sauce

to apple butter.

After making tons of apple sauce, apple juice and apple deserts, I thought it was time to try something new – Apple Butter.  I found an easy, fool proof crock pot recipe for Apple Butter.

Turns out I am a fool and messed up this great recipe.  My first mistake was using cider vinegar instead of apple cider (oops!).  After the first 15 hours the acidity wasn’t fully cooked off.  At that point I hadn’t realize my cider/vinegar mix-up yet, so I figured it just need a little more time.  My second mistake was leaving the mixture to cook for an extra night (oops!).  The next morning the apple butter was no longer acidic but it was too burnt to eat.  What a waste.
Later that week, after finally realizing what I had done, I decided to try it one more time with another batch of homemade applesauce.  This time it worked – even after I reduced the amount of honey and omitted the cloves!

We use our apple butter on toast, pancakes and waffles.  It’s a thick, fruity alternative to syrup.

Apple Sauce and Apple Juice

Peeling and coring apples, whether they’re crabapples or the larger applecrabs, is tedious and time consuming.   Luckily, making apple sauce and apple juice don’t require those steps.

Basic Apple Sauce Recipe
Start with this basic recipe.  After you have the basic sauce, you can add whatever flavours (sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, honey, etc.) that you prefer.  You can also use it in other recipes or freeze it for future use.
Ingredients
Apples
Water

This recipe works for whatever quantity of apples you have.

Preparation
Wash apples and remove any leaves.
Quarter apples.
Place 1 inch of water in a large pot.
Add apples to the pot. Cover.
Bring to boil.
Turn heat to low and let apples simmer until they are soft and mushy (30 – 60 minutes).
Stir every 10 minutes and add more water if mixture is too thick or dry (consistency will vary depending on type of apple).
Take off heat.
Separate cores, peels, and stems from the sauce with a food mill or by squishing the mix through a strainer.
Enjoy your applesauce!

Basic Apple Juice Recipe
The juice from this recipe is cooked and ends up thick and opaque.  We like to dillute it with sparkling water or club soda for a refreshing drink on a hot summer day.  The kids prefer mixing it with Sprite for added sweetness.  



Ingredients

Apples
Water

This recipe works for whatever quantity of apples you have.

Preparation (similar to apple sauce recipe above)
Wash apples and remove any leaves.
Quarter apples.
Place 1 inch of water in a large pot.
Add apples to the pot. Cover.
Bring to boil.
Turn heat to low and let apples simmer until they are soft and mushy (30 – 60 minutes).
Stir every 10 minutes and add more water if mixture is too thick or dry (consistency will vary depending on type of apple).
Take off heat.
Separate all the pulp from the juice by placing the whole mixture into a cheesecloth or super fine strainer like the one pictured (Lee Valle fruit strainer).  
Allow to drip for 4 hours.  
Enjoy your juice!
This juice can also be used for making apple jelly.