If you could only smell these...wow. It's apple pie without all the fuss. It's comfort food. It's home.
What an easy little recipe that gives so much flavor and taste. The cinnamon-laced juices are just incredible. Heaven on a plate.
Apples also made the top 20 in a USDA list of foods with the highest antioxidant scores. The richest concentration of antioxidants is found in the fruit's skin, how perfect since this recipe calls for unpeeled apples.
Halving the apples before baking them also saves cooking time and lets the fruit soak up all the amazing maple-ness and cinnamony goodness.
You are going to love these.
Baked Apples with Maple-Walnut Sauce
Adapted from Vegetarian Times
4 large apples, such as Gala or Granny Smith, halved crosswise and cored
2 teaspoons lemon juice, divided
2 Tablespoons light or dark brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup maple syrup
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped toasted walnuts
Preheat oven to 400o F.
Brush cut sides of apples with 1 teaspoon lemon juice. Arrange apples, cut sides up, in a baking dish. Combine brown sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl (you might need more than the recipe calls for depending on the size of your apples); sprinkle cut sides of apples with sugar mixture. Pour maple syrup in bottom of dish.
Cover with foil and bake 10 minutes. Uncover and bake 15 minutes more (mine actually took 32 minutes, my apples were quite big) or until apples are tender. Transfer apples to a serving platter.
Pour pan juices into small saucepan and stir in remaining 1 teaspoon lemon juice and salt; bring to a boil. Cook 3 to 5 minutes or until sauce is thickened, stirring constantly. Sprinkle walnuts over the baked apples.
Spoon sauce over apples and serve warm.
Cathy runs her own vineyard and winery in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. She is a food writer for Davis Life Magazine and blogs daily about wine, food and everydayliving. She lives with her husband and two sons. You can visit her at noblepig.com.