Saturday, October 9, 2010

fall-licious


Yesterday, I savored one of my favorite fall treats, a crisp, luscious caramel apple. It's a variation of the candy apple, or toffee apple. While the toppings vary from place to place, there is always a stick inserted in the core, for easy eating. My personal preference, is a firm, tart apple, like Granny Smith or Fuji, dipped in caramel and coated in chopped peanuts. The orchard where we like to buy apples sold the world's best homemade caramel apples, made by a local farm woman. She passed away several years ago, and I've never found one quite so delicious as hers, until yesterday. Where did I find it? My little Aldi store, of all places. Three in a pack for $1.29.

Toffee apples are a common treat at autumn festivals in Western culture in the Northern Hemisphere, such as Halloween and Guy Fawkes Night because they happen to fall in the center of the annual apple harvest. In Germany and Latin American countries, they are most often associated with the Christmas season, and in China, a similar treat called Tanghulu is made by coating small fruits, traditionally hawthorns, with hard sugar syrup.

The most common coating is a hard layer of cooled sugar syrup, usually tinted red and sometimes flavored with cinnamon. The sugar syrup is heated to the "hard crack" stage before coating the apple to make a hard coating when the syrup cools. Other variations include caramel or taffy apples, and chocolate apples, rolled in assorted goodies, like sprinkles or coconut.

I'm not sure we Americans can claim the first candy apple, but this is what the Newark Evening News had to say in 1964:

William W. Kolb invented the red candy apple. Kolb, a veteran Newark candy-maker, produced his first batch of candied apples in 1908. While experimenting in his candy shop with red cinnamon candy for the Christmas trade, he dipped some apples into the mixture and put them in the windows for display. He sold the whole first batch for 5 cents each and later sold thousands yearly. Soon candied apples were being sold along the Jersey Shore, at the circus and in candy shops across the country, according to the Newark News in 1948.



62 comments:

  1. I have actually made caramel apples myself, but it's kind of a mess. It's more of a treat to eat one ready made. Since no one else at the manor is as crazy about them as I am, I get to enjoy all three! mmm.

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  2. Willow,
    mmmmmm, applelisious!
    rel

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  3. There really is no better fall treat, is there? And so pretty to photograph. You've given me an idea. I think this year, I'll buy my daughter a red candy apple and then photograph her lips during and afterward. Yeah. That's what I'll do.

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  4. Mama Mia Willow!

    I'm sugar addict (a little joke and a bit serious). My sugar box is closed and I have hidden the key ....

    Your photos are magical and you have a wonderfully free spirit. Your comments on my Wabi Sabi are small sugar bombs, but without the calories!

    Love from Sweden

    Agneta

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  5. Hey, is it just me, or is anyone else having a problem with Google Reader? My posts aren't showing up.

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  6. We are do to visit the nearby Aldi store to restock. I will be looking for those apples. Anything I do in the kitchen turns into a colossal mess so I wouldn't even attempt caramel apples. Aldi it is

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  7. Aren't apples versatile fruit? I adore them cooked.

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  8. Unbelievable, we just made some of these yesterday, no nuts though!

    Great tastebuds think alike!

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  9. Wrong spelling - I meant Fellatious - I think...

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  10. sounds delicious and i remember eating them as a child. now, however, i would fear for my teeth.

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  11. mmmmmm, yes, caramel, my fav also!! xxo

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  12. I love caramel apples with roasted almonds
    I always loved the idea of the bright red candy apple...they really are beautiful, but I could never get past just a few bites.

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  13. Hi Willow,

    Oh how absolutely tempting! Makes me hungry, and takes me back a few years.

    Marjorie

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  14. Willow,

    It seems yours would be the house to stop by during H'ween!

    TFool

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  15. Yes, let somebody else make a mess in the kitchen! Yumm, though!

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  16. I love a caramel apple. I agree I prefer the inside to be tart but I like just caramel and nothing else on mine. YUMMMMMMMM!

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  17. I was drooling over the apple, then you said where you got it. I had a friend recommmend Aldi to me (it's been YEARS since I've been inside one) so I was planning to go this weekend. So now I have something specific to look for in there!

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  18. it is very hard to make caramel apples (cause im a horrrible chief :)

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  19. A caramel apple = pure joy in my book!

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  20. I make 'em, and don't find it too hard. I also like to use the sharper apples as that makes the taste contrast that much zingier.
    Always big on Guy Fawkes night here, for some reason.

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  21. willow - you'll find this off because i love food, i'm a bit of a sensualist and ummm i love food but i've never had a caramel or candy apple. weird because i'm often surrounded by them but i've never tasted one. this is the fall to burst that one wide open!!! beautiful yummilicious post!!! steven

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  22. Holy healthy decadence. I have to have one!

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  23. That sounds fun! I love caramel apples--I am not as fond of the candied ones. Aldi's, eh?? I'll have to tell Joe to go see if our Aldi has them. Fabulous! Thanks for the tip! Great photo!

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  24. When I was young they were always the Guy Fawkes Night treat. We watched the fire burn, and the fireworks explode, as we crunched our way through delicious toffee apples.

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  25. Oh, no, not the hard candy red ones--caramel all the way, just melted Kraft's caramels. I loved them. Last time I ate one, I was about ten, and Mom asked for a bite. She handed it back with her teeth still in it and then chased me all over the house when I couldn't stop screaming. Somehow I could never eat another one. I don't drink Scotch anymore either but that was a whole different form of aversion therapy.

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  26. Mmmmm, thanks for the reminder. Carmel apples are our annual fall treat, dipped in caramel & then rolled in chocolate chips, crushed candy bars, nuts, etc. So yum!

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  27. It looks wonderful, in particular because of the insertion of nuts.
    The candy apples i remember seeing in fun fair around here ("here" being a mixture of France, Holland and Italy) were only covered in red caramel. seduced by the glossy cover I once attempted to eat such marvel, only to discover an indifferent apple and that the caramel would stick to my teeth rather than to the apple, which found itself promptly un-candied while I struggled with the reddish gunk. Not an extremely positive experience, all in all.

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  28. Swoon! Hold the apples! I'll be over!

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  29. Dear Willow, Oh dear me no....I could not possibly......the thought of the dental work which would doubtless follow that first bite......I do have a marvellous Hungarian dentist, however!

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  30. This is one of my favorites too, willow. On very rare occasions, I go to a posh mall more than an hour away, if I need to find something very special for a special occasion. They have a Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory in that mall, and my "lunch" on such a day is one of their ultimate caramel apples, with homemade caramel, covered in pecans. I have to cut it in fourths to eat it, and the bloody thing costs $8 or something. Outrageous and fabulous.

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  31. I will have to check out Aldi. My daughter has been raving about it. I have been thinking about candied apples and thinking about making popcorn balls!

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  32. Oh I love caramel apples!

    ...And I would give a small fortune to taste the $8 ones Ruth described.

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  33. willow -- fun post about one of the treats of fall -- candied or taffy or chocolate apples. Your photo looked delicious. -- barbara

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  34. BTW, loving "Savage Beauty". Thanks.

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  35. If advertisers used photos like this one we would run out of carmel apples in this country. Now I want to get one today.

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  36. Boy, how long it's been since I've had one of those...

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  37. This is a great close up shot. My kids love these apples.

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  38. I love them, too. Haven't had one in years, perhaps it is time?

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  39. Fascinating history & background--& what a great photo!

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  40. Claudia, I'm glad to hear you're enjoying Savage Beauty. I read it when it first came out and have been entranced with Millay ever since.

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  41. Murr, I love your caramel apple "teeth" story! Priceless!

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  42. Hey, I just refreshed this post at 10:00 am on 10/10/10! Spooky.

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  43. now i have a craving.....

    i scheduled my post today for 10:10! how could i resist.


    have a magic day!!

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  44. ah, you stated that you "just refreshed" your post .....now i realize how your posts seem to always come up to the top of my blogroll! ah, tricky willow!!

    and here i thought it was magic! ha ha

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  45. I haven't had one of those since I was a kid.

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  46. That picture is yummy looking. I could SO take a huge, juicy bite!

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  47. I've always loved a good candy apple too...with peanuts on top. Now days I'm a little afraid I'll pull some expensive dental work out if I eat one. Getting old is so sad....

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  48. I love the caramel apples best, because they can be bitten into, rather than cracked through. Also, the flavor of caramel mixed with apple is just so dreamy!

    I am one of those odd people that don't like chopped nuts in or on anything, however. I love to eat nuts whole, on their own, but bits and pieces of nut jamming in my teeth while I'm trying to eat a treat just ruins my day. I don't want them in my cake, in my ice cream, or on my caramel apples. Nuts to that, I say!

    8-)

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  49. hi willow....these look so good....and funny thing..cause on my list for today is to make caramel apples with walnuts for tonight :-)

    have you seen those wrapple things...out here in california they are packages of a thin disk of caramel..all you do is unwrap and drape them over an apple and let melt in a slow oven. super easy. and good.

    happy to visit with you today on 10-10-10.
    kary
    xxx

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  50. Kari, that does sound super easy! Better than the back in the day when you had to unwrap a hundred little caramel pieces. I'll look for some. Thanks for the tip! xx

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  51. Carmel apples are wonderful, I like the peanuts too but I haven't had one in years...I'm overdo! Not so crazy about the candied ones. We are driving out to a local orchard today for apples and a piece of pie!

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  52. looks delicious.. I can almost taste it.. you are a great photographer Willow!

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  53. I love them! I can't get enough Honey Crisp apples this season...my new favorite.

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  54. Diet be damned! I'm having one of these babies this fall. Thanks for the memory, W.
    Catherine

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  55. Luscious! The photo, the apple, the history!

    What I love about these apples is the way there is a whole experience to eating them - biting through all the layers, the crunch, the juice, the mess.

    So autumn.

    Thanks for this - reading about it is easier of my teeth!

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  56. Yum! Yum! Every Friday we have Kindergarten Cafe in my class where we "put food together" with the children (we do not actually cook anything). This past Friday we had apples with caramel dipping sauce. It was not the biggest hit. Perhaps if they were dipped like yours we would have had more success.

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  57. Willow I never had a toffee apple, I do make toffee candy w/almonds every Christmas. I bet it would be delish.. Thanks

    yvonne
    That price was great I paid $1 for one apple (plan)

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  58. Caramel applies are one of my mother's favorites. I always find them hard to eat. I do enjoy dipping apples in caramel sauce. I tried to make them but most of the caramel just slid right off.

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  59. Can't beat a toffee apple on bonfire night!

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Inject a few raisins of conversation into the tasteless dough of existence.
― O. Henry (and me)