Apple oat bars with dulce de leche

If you're like me and you like apple crisp but wish the crisp to apple ratio were a little bigger, try this recipe. Mostly crisp, then some apple on the side. Hehe. And the brown sugar/oats combo is awesome. Add in some dulce de leche for some caramelly goodness and you've got yourself a really really good dessert.

Makes ~32 bars

For the bars:

1 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups old fashioned oats (NOT instant oats)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3-4 apples, peeled, cored, and diced
juice of half a lemon
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup dulce de leche or 1 cup from a 14 ounce can of sweetened condensed milk (you can buy this in the store or you can make your own, I made my own so it's included in the recipe)

Peel the label off of the can of sweetened condensed milk. Fill a pot with enough water to cover the can, with about an inch between the top of the can and the water. Place the can in the water to check, then remove it and set it aside. Bring the water to a rolling boil over high heat, then reduce to simmering over medium to medium-low heat and add in the can.

Add in enough warm water to keep the water at the same level every 30 minutes or so (I did about 3/4 cup of water every 30 minutes). Simmer the can for a minimum of 3 hours. After 3 hours, turn off of the heat and place the pot on a different, cool burner. Do NOT remove the can from the water immediately, as the temperature change may cause the can to explode. Allow the can to sit in the water for 30-45 minutes, then carefully, with tongs, remove the can to another surface and allow it to sit for another 20 minutes or so, until it is cool enough to touch.

Use a can opener to open the can. Set aside.

Preheat your oven to 400°F. Cream together the butter and brown sugar, until fluffy, about 3 minutes. In another bowl, combine 1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, the oats, the cinnamon, the salt, and the baking soda. Set 2 cups of this oat mixture aside and press the remainder into a greased and/or lined 9×13 baking dish.

Core, peel, and dice your apples into thin, bite-sized pieces. Toss them with lemon juice and 3 tablespoons of all-purpose flour. Spread the apples over the dough pressed into the dish. Take your set aside dulce de leche and drizzle it evenly over the apples (it doesn’t have to be perfect). Sprinkle the 2 cups of oat mixture that was previously set aside over the apples and dulce de leche, then press down to be sure that everything sticks together. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until set and golden.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely. Cut into small bars and refrigerate until ready to serve. 

Recipe from Crepes of Wrath

Mini apple pies

Mini apple pies are the definition of cute.

Makes ~9 mini pies

For the pie:

2-3 granny smith apples, cored and cut into very small pieces

1 1/2 tablespoons ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

3 tablespoons granulated sugar

2 teaspoons white wine vinegar

pinch salt

For the crust:

2 store-bought pie crusts (from my experience, it's better to use a high-quality crust, as the pies will be much more flakey and yummier).

... or make your own!

1 egg 

Preheat the oven to 375°F. In a large bowl, mix your cut apple slices with the cinnamon, sugar, nutmeg, salt, and vinegar. Set aside.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out your pie crusts and, use a 3-inch (or anywhere around that diameter) cookie-cutter to make small rounds. Create a small bowl with the dough in your hand, then scoop a small amount of apple mixture into the center of the dough. Brush water around the outside of the dough, then stack a second circle over the dough and seal it by pressing the edges together. Using a fork, create little indentations around the outside of the mini pie. Set on a parchment-lined baking tray.

Scramble your egg and brush it liberally onto the tops of the mini pies. Finally, use a sharp knife to make air pockets on the tops of the mini pies. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until the tops of the mini pies are golden brown. 

Apple roundup and a cinnamon apple cake

I ruvv fall. The leaves are changing, the air is crisp, and the colder temperatures mean I can start wearing sweaters again. Oh, and it's apple season. Apples. My favorite fruit. Crunchy, sweet, tart, fresh, and absolutely delicious. So naturally I jump at any opportunity to make apple desserts. Here's a quick recap of my previous apple adventures:

Upside-down apple biscuits: delectable little guys. 

Scrumptious apple pie: an elegant pie perfect for company. 

Applesauce spice cake: one of the best cakes I've ever eaten. 

Apple cinnamon coffeecake: my go-to fall cake. So dense and flavorful. 

And now to add to the list, this cinnamon apple cake! It's super moist but also light, and makes a lot of cake, seeing as half of the volume is apples. So that means half the calories, right? No, who am I kidding. It means twice the portion size.

Yaaaay. Fall. 

For the cake:

4 1/2 cups diced apples (roughly 3 apples)
3/4 cups medium brown sugar

3/4 cups granulated sugar
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt

6 ounces plain or greek yogurt

1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
whole or slivered almonds to decorate (optional)

Preheat oven to 350° F and grease a medium baking pan. Set aside.

In a large bowl sift together the flour, and the rest of the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, combine wet ingredients and mix until well incorporated. Fold the flour mixture into the wet ingredients, gently mixing the ingredients just until combined. Mix in chopped apples.

Pour the batter into the baking pan, making sure it is evenly distributed. Decorate the top of the cake with a handful of almonds.

Bake in an oven for 40 minutes or until a knife comes out clean when inserted into the pan. Allow to cool completely before serving. 

Recipe adapted from the whinery. 

Scrumptious apple pie

Apple pie is most definitely a conventional winter dessert. And good apple pie, now that's kind of awesome. Even Rebe, who doesn't like apple pie, told me, "this is great!" Now, the secret to this apple pie is the brown sugar and vinegar. As weird as it sounds, the vinegar becomes sweet when cooked and adds an extra layer of flavor to the pie. And brown sugar? Well, let's just say if brown sugar and granulated sugar were my children, brown sugar would be the favorite child. It makes things so much gooier and moist! So go ahead and make this delectable apple pie and see what my fuss is all about.

2 standard store-bought pie crusts
6 large apples (use a variety!)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon salt
juice from 1/2 lemon
1 teaspoon vinegar
1 large egg

Preheat the oven to 425°F. Begin by blind-baking the pie crust. Blind baking is important in making any pie because it involves baking the crust initially on its own, allowing for the final produt to have a crispier bottom crust, not gooey and still uncooked like those aaaamateur pies). To blind bake, grease a glass pie plate and set down the bottom pie crust. Starting from the middle and working your way out, pat down the crust so it lies flat on the plate. Using your fingertips, ruffle the edges to make it look pretty. Use a fork to make 7-10 indentations in the bottom of the crust (this allows air to escape from the crust and prevents bubbles from forming). Now grease the inside of the crust and line it with a piece of aluminum foil. Next, pour in dried rice or beans to line the aluminum foil. Bake for 20 minutes (your crust won't be fully cooked, per se, but it will make a world of a difference. Trust me!).

While your crust is baking, peel and core 6 large apples. I used 4 crisp granny smiths and 2 sweet jonagolds. Cut each apple into roughly 16 slices. In order to prevent browning, mix half of the juice from your lemon with water in a large bowl. Place your cut apple slices into this mixture to keep them fresh and from turning gross colors. 

The quintessential pie-cooling-by-the-window picture :)

In a large bowl, combine the sugars, cinnamon, allspice, and salt. Mix until combined. Then add the rest of the lemon juice and the vinegar. Finally, rinse the apples from the water mixture and pour them into the large bowl. Using your hands, toss the apples in the sugar mixture until the apples are well coated.

Turn the oven down to 375°F. Place the apples into the baked pie crust in a circular fashion, eventually creating a rounded mountain of apples. Set the second pie crust over the top of the pie and, again using your fingers, create a ruffled edge around the outside rim of the plate. Cut 4 slits in the top of the crust to allow air to vent out of the pie. Whisk the egg and brush it over the crust. Bake for roughly 55 minutes, until the crust is golden brown and the apples have fully baked. Allow to cool for ~2 hours before serving. Enjoy with a dollop of ice cream!

Upside-down apple biscuits

I'm feeling very wintry today. Maybe it's the fact that our furnace has been on the fritz for 3 days and I am relegated to wearing Uggs and my winter coat around the house. Or maybe it's the fact that I decided to go for a run yesterday, realizing only after I ran down the huge hill that our house is on that it was definitely too cold to go running (I mustered up the courage and ran anyways. Thank you, Under Armour). Either way, it's cold out. And cold temperatures mean warm desserts (hazzah!). So I woke up this morning and had a little baking adventure. And out came these beautiful biscuits! The warm apple-cinnamon smell filled the house with a spiced goodness reminiscent of fall and no-snow-time. A perfect way to start the day.

For the sauce:

3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3 tablespoons unsalted butter

For the apples:

1 1/2 tart apples (I used Granny Smith, but you can use whatever you have on hand)
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon fresh-squeezed lemon juice

For the biscuits:

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, frozen
1 cup cold buttermilk

In a small saucepan, melt the butter and sugar on medium heat until a spreadable mixture forms, about 2 minutes*. Pour the mixture into the bottom of a 9" round cake pan and spread evenly to coat the bottom. Set aside.

In a large pan, melt butter for the apples. Add in the cinnamon, nutmeg, and apples. Sauté until the apples become tender and begin to caramelize. Once done, turn off heat and add lemon juice. Arrange the apples on top of the brown sugar mixture in a decorative fashion.

At this point, preheat the oven to 450°F. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, powder, soda, salt, and sugar. Using a large grater, grate the frozen butter into the flour mixture. Working quickly, use your fingertips to knead the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles a coarse oatmeal. Using a fork, mix in the buttermilk. Move the dough onto a floured surface and pinch the dough into 8-10 round biscuits. Arrange on top of the apples.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, until the top of the biscuits are golden brown. Let cool for 2-3 minutes. Turn the mixture over on a serving platter and serve immediately... with ice creammmmm.

Recipe from Pam Anderson's Perfect One-Dish Dinners via Cookin' Canuck.

*Be sure to put the butter and sugar in together. If you melt the butter first, the mixture will not congeal properly.

Applesauce spice cake with cinnamon cream cheese frosting

Hello, cake of my dreams. You are, like, the most fabulous, flavorful, superb, moist cake out there. I have to say, before meeting you I was a chocolate girl all the way. But after seeing your work, I think I have a new love. Oh, you want me to share you with the world? Well, OK, I guess I can do that. You're kind of the messiah of cakes, so I think it's only necessary that I pass on your righteousness.

For the cake:

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups  unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup chopped and toasted walnuts

For the frosting:

1 cup confectioners sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
5 ounces cream cheese, softened
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350°F. Thickly butter a 9"x9" pan. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. In a separate bowl, with an electric mixer, beat together butter, brown sugar, and vanilla until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs in one at a time, beating in between each addition. Then beat in applesauce. Turning the beater to low, pour in dry ingredients until homogenous. Last, fold in walnuts.  The batter may look curdled, but this is OK!

Pour batter into pan and bake for 30-40 minutes, until knife come out clean when inserted into the middle. Allow to cool completely before frosting.

While the cake is cooking: In a large bowl, with an electric mixer, beat cream cheese, butter, and vanilla until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. In batches of 3, beat in confectioner's sugar and cinnamon, beating until incorporated. Cool frosting in refrigerator for 20-30 minutes. Once cooled, frost cake! Sho gooood.

Recipe from Smitten Kitchen and can be found here!

Apple cinnamon coffee cake

My mom has been baking this coffee cake for years, and each time it's like a new experience in your mouth. It's dense and caky at the same time, and the cinnamon adds a smidgen of autumn-ness. It's a simple recipe that begs to be made over and over throughout the cold months!

For the batter:

3 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
2 cups plain yogurt
1 stick butter
2 green apples, peeled, cored, and thinly sliced (~1/4 centimeter thick)

For the swirlies: 

3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon


Preheat oven to 375°F. In a small bowl, mix together with a fork the brown sugar and cinnamon. Set aside.

In a large microwavable bowl, melt the butter until soft. Add sugar first, then eggs, vanilla, baking powder and soda, yogurt, and salt. Once mixed, add the flour in batches, making sure to stir between additions.

Butter and flour a large bundt pan. Pour in half of the batter and sprinkle half of the swirlies mixture over it. Using a fork, push in swirlies to integrate them into the batter. Place half of the apple slices over the batter. Repeat with the second half of the batter, sprinkling almost all of the swirlies (leave ~2 tablespoons) over the top and then place the remaining apple slices on top. Sprinkle the remaining swirlies over the apple slices. Bake for about 40 minutes, or until knife comes out clean when inserted into cake. Eat it right out of the oven, or let cool and refrigerate for days!