Claudia Fleming's Maple Baked Apples

In the blink of an eye, my melancholy about the end of summer evaporated - poof! - like the puff of steam rising off a cup of coffee in the cold. I think it might have something to do with our Sunday - the day that started out with cozy, chocolate-studded rolls on the couch, the lazy morning that was too cold for my flimsy summer nightgown and called for my beloved 12-year old high school sweatshirt to be donned (much to Ben's chagrin, I'm sure).

In the crisp afternoon air (is there anything better than a September afternoon in New York City? Anything better at all, seriously? I don't know how there can be), we hopped on our bicycles for our first (we've been unpacking for a looong time, I suppose) real exploration of our neighborhood. Down one street, then another, past the archetypal Forest Hills high school, over a flimsy overpass, down a set of crumbling stairs, we emerged triumphant near Meadow Lake - a pretty little body of water situated conveniently between two highways (aaaah, New York, so pretty, so peaceful - does there need to be a highway everywhere? Apparently, yes.).

From there, where we saw a little turtle sunning himself insouciantly on a water pipe and wild geese getting their webbed feet wet, we cycled over to Flushing Meadows Corona Park where we saw cricket matches and soccer games, heard the crowd roaring for the Mets at Shea, and felt our bicycle tires whooshing through the very first little yellowed leaves, fallen and crisping along the walkways. Back home, we kept our balcony door closed, and cooked up our gateway meal into the colder season - the perennially delicious lemon chicken. And all the while I was thinking, practically humming: fall is here and it is glorious.

I am fickle, aren't I?

The next few months stretch ahead deliciously - with tickets to The New Yorker Festival (finally, after years of spending that week at a convention center in western Germany), a blustery weekend for walking on the beach, reveling in the cloudless blue skies on near-constant repeat, and apple-picking galore. The apples now are so good - hard and crisp, snowy-white, glossy-skinned. I know I was just mourning the passing of those mounds of warm summer tomatoes, but if I can have a counter top filled with new apples, bursting with juice and crunch, I can be happy indeed.

The truth is that these first apples of fall are best eaten raw, really, polished to a high sheen on the lapel of your jacket (ooh, jackets, appealing again after so long) and munched on an outdoor walk, or quartered and coupled with a piece of cheese, beads of apple juice pooling at the bottom of the plate. But if you've got your mother, say, coming to town and need to serve a wholesome dessert after dinner that can be eaten with a spoon (is there anything more soothing after a transatlantic flight or at the close of the kind of day that makes your hair stand on end?), you'd be well-served to bake a few of your apples in an inch of fragrant apple cider, stuffed with a chunky mixture of dried fruits and nuts.

Basted with the cider and a spoonful or two of syrup, the apples soften and swell, turning cloud-like in the heat. Firm apples are the ones to choose, but even those might not be immune to an explosion here or there, snow-white flesh spilling out of its red-jacket casing like a Victorian bosom. You could pour a thin line of heavy cream around the apples, creating a caramel-cream sauce, but that almost goes too far - we ate these warm and plain and found them divine.

Oh, fall. 

Maple Baked Apples
Serves 6

1/3  cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
3 tablespoons roughly chopped dried cherries
3 tablespoons chopped dried figs
2 tablespoons roughly chopped toasted sliced almonds
2 tablespoons roughly chopped toasted pecans
6 large firm baking apples, cored but not peeled
3 tablespoons butter, cut into 6 pieces
1/2  cup apple cider
2 tablespoons maple syrup

1. Heat the oven to 400 degrees. In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar, cherries, figs, almonds and pecans.

2. Place the apples in a baking pan or casserole dish and stuff their cavities with the fruit and nut mixture. Place a piece of butter on top of the stuffing.

3. Pour the apple cider and maple syrup into the bottom of the baking pan and bake the apples, basting every 5 to 7 minutes, until they are tender, 25 to 35 minutes.

4. When the apples are tender, transfer them to a serving platter and cover with foil to keep them warm. Strain the pan juices into a small saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat and simmer the mixture until it becomes syrupy and reduces to a sauce, about 5 to 10 minutes. Spoon over the apples and serve immediately.

Comments

[claudia]

forest hills high school is my high school. i graduated in '78... i know i know. i'm old.

unbelievable to hear it mentioned. i feel like i'm a million miles away... but tomorrow i am off to nyc - although my mom is in manhattan now... no more queens. they moved in '81. but what a great childhood it was growing up in FH. i lived on 69th and yellowstone...

all that just to say that i enjoyed this post...

[Mercedes]

Ah, I've made this recipe at least five times, and I've never had them implode like that! Mine usually stay quite round (and I use usq market apples too), maybe it has to do with the type of apples. No matter what, I agree they are wonderful, and I often make them just to eat them cold, the next day, for breakfast.

Enjoy your time with your mom, I know you all will have a great time!

P.S. we got festival tickets too, I'm super-psyched!

[radish]

Oh yes, apples!! I am in love with all things apple, and baked apples are my favorite!! I just love how the ones in the picture have collapsed! I so badly want to go apple picking!!

[Caroline]

I have a spring in my step too...breathing in the fresh, fall September air. I just bought a huge bag of apples at a neighborhood apple fest. I will try this recipe out!

[andrea]

Luisa,

I cut this recipe out from last week's food section too! i just need to get my hands on some apples.

I am feeling the loss of summer, but also, the joy of crisper mornings and cool afternoons.. today's weather signaled it, as there are finally, FINALLY some grey clouds in this LA sky and they are saying it may even rain tomorrow--to which i say, hooray!

and, i'm welcoming it all by finally making that lovely tomato bread soup you posted about a week or two ago, and my home is smelling all delicious and warm right about now!

[lolobstersquad]

jackets! when!?! I´ve been eying my thinnest cotton jacket for weeks now, wistfully, but it´s still a no go. 30ºc, and counting.

[Victoria]

Hi, Luisa,

I have a good recipe for baked apples, but this one looks a pip (sorry about that). I will get gorgeous apples and homemade cider from my farmstand upstate this weekend and make it - even if the weather turns hot as it's supposed to. Fall is my FAVORITE. I just love when the air turns crisp, and the sky is blue, and the leaves change color. All I want to do is walk all over the City. I hope it's like that when your mother is here so she can enjoy this glorious season at its best - especially with you, Ben, and those apples.

[ann]

No Luisa, you are not mistaken. There is, in fact, nothing more glorious than a perfect September day in New York. Nothing. We walked across the Manhattan Bridge on Sunday and I felt like I was just going to lift off my feet and fly out over the water I was so elated. This is the season those I heart NY t-shirts were created for.

[deb]

I read this post and the recipe and just said: Yes. Yes, yes, yes. 100 percent agreement about everything, and I can't wait to make these.

Great to see you on Tuesday, traumatic as it was. Even better was that we got out early enough that I could pick up MY new thin jacket, with time leftover to bake kugel. I suppose not a bad day at all, in the end.

[Luisa]

Claudia - thank you for telling me! I loved reading that someone reading me was having a Proustian moment ;) What a bucolic-looking high school...

Mercedes - it's definitely the apple type, I think. Mine were Cortland... doesn't matter - they still tasted delicious! What tickets did you guys get? Would be fun to see you there. I'll be at the Pamuk-Rushdie conversation, the McEwan-Remnick one, and then the Kite Runner sneak preview...

Radish - well, perhaps something can be arranged...I've got a car, am near Long Island and all those orchards, wink wink.

Caroline - I have yet to buy that big apple sack, but I'm positively itching to! How funny that peaches are now a distant memory.

Andrea - oooh, the tomato soup! I'm so glad you're trying it. September tomatoes are probably even better than August ones, especially in your neck of the woods! Enjoy the gray rain :)

Ximena - 30 degrees?! My goodness. Enjoy it while you still can! When does Madrid usually start cooling off?

Victoria - fall IS the best, I agree. And it's so much fun with my mom around. We're having a good time, indeed.

Ann - yes! exactly. I'm glad you agree.

Deb - you got your trench! Hooray! It would have been far worse, Tuesday, if you all hadn't been there. What an experience! I don't even know how to write about it.

[Sarah]

Nope, nothing better than NY in the fall. So glad you're blog isn't really called "Weds Chef" cause that would be weird. ;) Can't wait to Forest Hills with my own two eyes!

[Hillary]

My grandma used to make the best baked apples when I was a kid! I haven't had them in years so seeing this recipe made me smile! I'll have to give it a go! Thank you so much.

[rachelk]

These look stunning, as well as the buns! It was great that you were on the Martha Show!

[Lisa (Homesick Texan)]

You're not fickle. I seem to recall that summer left you, not the other way around. It's perfectly fine and proper to embrace this sparkling new season!

[Tammy]

I think that's the most delicious bosom metaphor I've ever heard!

[Kevin]

Last year was a bumper apple crop here. This year, I've had one. After all the work saucing and cooking and eating apples last fall, I though I'd have had enough for a while, but I miss them!

[Lydia]

I love baked apples and, as I don't have much of a sweet tooth, I actually make them using an old recipe that my mother got on Weight Watchers about 30 years ago. It sounds awful, but it isn't. Core the apples (but don't cut all the way through) and remove the top ring of peel to expose the apple flesh. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Then fill the apples to overflowing with -- get this -- diet black cherry soda! Bake in a 350 oven for 30 minutes or until apples can be pierced easily with a knife.

[Luisa]

Sarah - ha! Yes indeed. Can't wait to have you guys out. I'll be in touch.

Hillary - there must be something about grandmothers and baked/cooked apples, because I still have found no one (NO ONE!) who can make applesauce like my grandma did.

Rachelk - yes! It was such a trip. Still wrapping my head around it ;)

Lisa - you're right, thanks for pointing that out. I was feeling a little ditzy! :)

Tammy - well, thanks!

Kevin - you grow apples, too? Is there anything you DON'T grow? I am so envious.

Lydia - okay, this put a smile on my face. Does the baked apple taste like soda? I love that it has to be diet soda!

[Antonia]

So pleased to have discovered your blog this morning. I just love baked apples - such a comforting autumnal dish indeed. I've not tried them with cider and maple syrup thugh - delicious!
My mother always taught me to run a knife around the middle of the apple before baking (just piercing the skin) to prevent them exploding during baking. The skin splits in half but they do tend to keep their shape (though who cares, really? They taste gorgeous whether exploded or not!)