Peanut Butter Baked Apples

I've been really inspired by apples this season. I have been meaning to make baked apples for a while now. Well, there were only two Fuji apples left in the fridge so I knew it was now or never (maybe that's a little dramatic. Now or wait until I make it to the store again). I have looked through a dozen different baked apple recipes and they're all pretty much the same: oatmeal, cinnamon, and brown sugar. Some add raisins. Some add pecans or walnuts. I wanted something a little different. Then I found one with peanut butter. Apples and peanut butter, there nothing else like it.

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients:
2 large apples
1/2 cup instant oatmeal
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons, plus 1 teaspoon creamy peanut butter

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Slice the tops off the apples and scoop out the core, seeds, and flesh. I used a regular spoon, but a melon baller probably would have been easier. Discard the insides.

In a small bowl, mix together the oatmeal, brown sugar, salt, and cinnamon. Add peanut butter and mix until it forms a crumble. It's easiest to use your hands.

Stuff the apples with the mixture and place them in a glass baking dish.* Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour or until the apples are tender. Remove the foil for the last five minutes to allow the tops to crisp.

*My apples were small so I cut the recipe in half and used ramkins to bake them because, honestly, I didn't want to dirty my 8x8-inch glass pan for two little apples.

Enjoy!

~Krissy

More Apple Recipes
Baked Apple Chips
Savory Baked Apples Stuffed with Sausage
Delicious Apple Pie
Apple Cider Cupcakes with Caramel Filling and Spiced Rum Frosting

Applesauce Cookies with Caramel Frosting

I will use just about any excuse to try out a new dessert recipe. Visiting my parents for Independence Day was the perfect excuse to test not just one recipe, but two. These applesauce cookies were the second batch of cookies I prepared, the Baileys Cookies being the first. Applesauce cookies don't exactly scream summer--they do, however, yell out for autumn--but I had all the ingredients and I didn't want to wait months to try them. And I'm glad I didn't wait. They are cakey, fully of spice, and super yummy.

I slightly adapted this recipe. It makes about 3 dozen cookies.

Cookie Recipe
Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup shortening
1 egg
2 cups flour
1 ts baking soda
1 ts baking powder
1 cup applesauce
1/2 ts cinnamon
1/4 ts ground cloves
 
Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and cloves together. Set aside.

In a second large bowl, cream the sugar and shortening with an electric mixer. Mix in the eggs and applesauce. Gradually stir in dry ingredients until well combined. Spoon a heaping tablespoon of dough on a cookie sheet, spacing the cookies about 2 inches apart. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes. Allow to cool.

Naked Cookies

Frosting Recipe
Ingredients:
3 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup half and half
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup powdered sugar

Directions:
Place the butter, half and half, and brown sugar in a saucepan. Heat over medium heat, stirring until the mixture boils.* Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla. Allow to cool and then stir in the powdered sugar. Spread over the cookies.

*The caramel taste of the frosting isn't really that strong. My mom commented that she thought it tasted more maple than caramel and I agree with her. The brown sugar just didn't get to caramelize long enough, so next time I make these, I'm getting my candy thermometer out and boiling the brown sugar mixture until its temperature reaches 248 degrees. That should give it a good, strong caramel flavor.

Applesauce and Baileys cookies

Enjoy!

~Krissy