apples


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Pay What You Want

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Driving through rural Pennsylvania I came across a great roadside family farmstand. In addition to all of the late summer and fall produce, the warm summer weather has made the apple harvest in the state come a little bit earlier. Think crisp apples with intense sugars.

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Especially surprising was the fact that payment at this stand was based on the honor system. There was even a sign saying if an item wasn’t marked, to pay what you wanted. In a world where organic often means more expensive, there is something beautiful about the simplicity.

in Rants & Raves 4 comments
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Making the Most out of Manischewitz

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Once again, I am home for Passover. When I was younger I never understood why so many foods were off limits. Sure, bread is bad. No toast, bagels, challah. I get it. But gum? Peanut butter? Mustard? I knew that corn syrup was off limits, whatever the hell corn syrup was. No one, however, could really tell me why some of the other foods were off limits.

I guess it’s kinda like religion in general. It can’t all be explained.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t look for special holiday recipes. Or get excited to cook dishes for the first time. I’d never contributed to the sedar plate before. But with only 20 minutes til the sedar, I jumped on the chance to make this traditional dish my own.

Apple Two Way Charoset

I diced two apples, let my cinnamon obsessed sister sprinkle some of the sweet brown powder over top, then stirred it around with fresh lemon juice and just a pinch of salt.

Boring. And wrong.

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in Holiday / Recipe / Veggie 0 comments
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Foolproof Fruit Crisp: A Dessert Even an ESer Can Bake

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Like the rest of ES, I don’t do desserts.  Which is not to say that I haven’t tried.  My torrid history of dessert disasters goes back many years. I’m sure my mom still remembers the day my fifth grade best friend and I attempted chocolate chip cookies.   Amateurs both, we used the recipe from the back of the package of chocolate chips.  Careful adherence to the directions left us with a concoction that was more early-December-snowfall than Pillsbury doughboy.  So we tapped into some sandbox wisdom – we added water.  Baking the resulting quicksand yielded a burned, slippery looking substance that firmly coated the doomed cookie sheet.  Mom was more upset about the wasted ingredients and the lingering smell of burning than the charred cookie sheet, which was logical given the infrequency of her own cookie baking.

Undaunted, through the years I have managed to produce (accidentally) sugarless banana bread, baking-soda-flavored butterscotch cookies and Rice Krispie treats so hard that they actually made someone bleed.

My friend Sarah received a cake-making book for Christmas in order to carry on her family tradition, wherein the birthday honoree gets to choose a cake from the book for their party.  The cake is made from scratch, of course, with a long, scary list of ingredients and Mensa-approved instructions.  And that doesn’t even take into account the frosting.  My children better either ingratiate themselves with Aunt Sarah or learn to love brownies from a box.

All this poses a problem, though, when I am asked to bring dessert to a friend’s dinner party.  Believe me, visions of artfully arranged Chips Ahoy have danced in my head, but high fructose corn syrup freaks me out.  Fortunately, discount farmers’ market produce has led me to seek out (and find) a dessert that is not only practically foolproof, but also meets some of my beloved recipe criteria: few ingredients, use of food just this side of the compost pile,  and general crowd pleasure.

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in Desserts / Recipe 2 comments
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Artsy Photo of the Day

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Fruit of the Loon

in Photos 3 comments
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Feed Us Back: Comments of the Week

apples and honey

JoeHoya does some research into why we eat apples and honey on rosh hashanah:

Found two sources that seem to offer similar explanations for both the apples and the honey:

http://www.aish.com/h/hh/rh/48959531.html
(From aish.com. Slogan: Your Life. Your Judaism.)

http://reformjudaismmag.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=1280
From Reform Judaism Magazine, the official voice of the Union for Reform Judaism).

Long story short: the apple was seen as a symbol of rare beauty (see the Song of Songs for a comparison to Israel) and affection by the Israelites at various points. The fruit is further praised and compared to Israel for its bold appearance before any protective leaves surround it (see aish.com for the reasoning).

Good to know. And happy Yom Kippur everyone (can you say happy Yom Kippur?) Anyway, let us know if it raises any further food questions.

– Jessica J shares her own ice cream micro-snack:

I do something similar. Spoonful of honey roasted PB, sprinkle a few chocolate chips over it, then dip the tip in Nutella. Lord have mercy.

And Erica has one as well:

I always thought a couple spoonfuls of vanilla ice cream in a cup of hot lipton tea was divine. then again, i’m kind of weird.

– Finally, thanks to everyone who has already sent in their photos for the smallest kitchens contest. Keep those entries coming — we’ll be posting the best next week.

(Photo: ForestForTrees)

in Contests / Desserts 1 comments
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