Cooking with Apples
When buying apples, the flesh should be firm, the skin should be smooth, tight, and free of blemishes and bruises, and the scent should be full and fresh. Don’t judge an apple by its looks alone. The best tasting are often not the most beautiful. As an apple ripens, its texture, color, flavor and aroma all change. The flesh softens slightly, the color deepens, the sweetness intensifies, and the acidity drops as the aroma becomes stronger.
Store unripe apples at room temperature until they are ready to eat. Keep apples that are ready to eat in the refrigerator. To make apples last as long as possible, store them so that they aren’t touching each other. Keep apples away from strong-smelling foods such as onions, as apples easily absorb odors.
When peeling, use a vegetable peeler (a knife takes too much of the fruit with the peel). Remove the stem. Hold the peeler at the stem end and begin turning the apple into the blade of the peeler. Angle the peeler at about 60 degress so that each rotation moves you farther along the circumference of the apple, resulting in a spiral of apple peel. With practice, you should be able to peel an apple in about 20 seconds.
To core and keep whole, use an apple corer made especially for the job. If you don’t have a corer, carefully push a small paring knife down through the top of the apple just off-center from the core, and cut around the core. With baked apples, hollow out the core using a melon baller, without going all the way through the bottom.
To preserve apple, peel, core and cut the apples into wedges. Toss in lemon juice, then sugar. Spread on a baking sheet and freeze until firm. Transfer to a zipper-lock freezer bag and freeze for up to 6 months.
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