How 'Bout Them Apples

I’ve been salivating over recipes for baked apples ever since this year’s apple harvest, such as it was this year in the Midwest.

With a half-dozen apples I bought at the last Farmers Market of the season, I hollowed out the core and filled each one with a mix of sugar, oats and spice.

The recipes I’ve seen suggest cooking in a crock pot on high for 3 hours. After 2 hours, my apples started to fall apart. But I can say for certain that the apples that fell apart we no less delicious than the ones that held their shapes.

Here’s what’s in the crock pot:

Slow Cooked Apples
6 apples, cored
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oats
1 tsp cinnamon
6 pats of butter
1 cup apple juice (I’ll probably try to skip the juice next time. I think this is one reason the apples started to fall apart so quickly.)

 Mix brown sugar, oats and cinnamon. Fill apples with mixture, then top with pats of butter. Place in crock pot, add the juice to the bottom, and cook on high for two- to two-and-a-half hours until apples are tender.

Serve warm as is or topped with a scoop of ice cream.

I imagine these would be great alongside pork chops. I’m serving ours with Asian-marinated chicken breasts and broccoli slaw.