Baked Apples

I have grown a fond for apples over the last two years. Rarely a day goes by where you won't find one in my hand or on my plate. My mother refers to my apple-eating habit as an addiction (in jest) and I'm beginning to think she's right. Yesterday alone, I had apples for breakfast, lunch, and dinner in various forms. Perhaps it's the crispness of the first bite of an apple I simply cannot resist. Or maybe it is the fact that I love to spread my apple slices with a thick layer of peanut butter.

Whatever the reason, I do hope that old saying about apples is true. I don't want to go to the doctor any time soon.

My neighbors had an apple tree while I was growing up. The tree was next to the fence and the branches hovered over our garden, growing apples no bigger than the palm of my small hand. In early fall, the apples would begin to turn color; shades of red and green and yellow took over the tree. Wearing light jackets and long pants, my sister and I would steal apples under the cover of darkness, munching the tart fruit in the backyard. The biting tartness of the fruit was enough to make my eyes squint. When we were finished, we'd hide the evidence in the bushes.

It was, in many ways, the forbidden fruit.

My babysitter was the first person to introduce me to baked apples. She'd fill her apples with brown sugar and cinnamon, baking them until the house smelled like a rich apple pie. Baked fruit has always been a favorite of mine. The firm, yet tender, fruit and sweet fillings are the scents of autumn daydreams. I have a bad habit of forgetting about baked fruit when the seasons roll around.

This year, with a love of baking and a kitchen counter full of apples, it seemed destined for fruit to find its way into the oven.

Baked Apples are sweet, tart, and tender at the same time. The apples are filled with a mixture of brown sugar, oats, and sliced almonds, which gives a little crunch to the filling to offset the soft fruit. As the apples bake, the scent of cinnamon and apple pie fill the house, which only adds to the cozy effect these apples have on an autumn evening. Different sized apples may require shorter or longer baking times, so please adjust accordingly.

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Pear Crisp

The falling leaves of autumn remind me that I'm growing older. When the leaves begin falling from the trees, I start dreaming of raking up a pile to jump in. I've always found the smell of fallen leaves comforting, even as I pull colorful leaf fragments out of my hair after I've had my fill. However, these little dreams are short lived as I quickly remember that I neither have a rake nor a yard of leaves to gather together. To make up for the disappointment, I like to trudge through the leaves on the sidewalk in my heels, crunching my way to and from the car with satisfaction.

Though I may often look and sound like an adult, there is a child resting just below the surface, longing for a pile of leaves to dance in.

There are two trees in front of my parent's home that begin changing colors as soon as a hint of fall is in the air. While my parents often wished the trees would hold onto their leaves longer than the first of October, my sister and I relished in playing in the fallen leaves wearing only a light jacket in the golden autumn sun.

These trees, however, are peculiar. Though a few leaves are lost to the wind here or there, the trees typically drop all of their leaves at exactly the same moment, usually taking only a few hours' time. I imagine the trees talk to one another, planning the occasion by passing messages through their entangled roots. The dropping of the leaves has quickly become one of my favorite moments of autumn.

When the trees drop their leaves, it is similar to a rainstorm; they fall from the sky in a moment that can only be described as wonderment. There are times when the leaves descend so hard and so fast, it is possible to become buried in only a few minutes' time if you found yourself lying beside the rough trunk of the tree. I remember one morning with particular fondness. It was a Saturday. My sister and I awoke to a windless morning and raining leaves. We ate our breakfasts in record time, spending the rest of the morning beneath the trees playing and laughing and reveling in the innocence of the moment.

Every year since then, as I watched the changing of the leaves from green to gold, I wished and hoped the leaves wouldn't drop while I was away. I was afraid to miss the moment. To miss the simple magic only fallen leaves could bring.

Pear Crisp is a sincere dessert to enjoy after a day spent in the autumn sun. The flavor of the crisp is clean and pure. The pears are roasted in brown sugar and vanilla (with a hint of bourbon, if you dare) while the crumble topping shines with a combination of oats and sliced almonds. Though I love to steal bites of cold pear crisp from the refrigerator, this dessert can be served hot with a side of ice cream to warm up cold noses and chilled ears.

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Almond Butter Cupcakes with Mocha Buttercream

Growing up, I was a picky eater, especially when it came to tree nuts. I avoided them during my childhood and teenage years simply because they looked "gross" to me. Each Christmas, my father would get a jar of mixed nuts wrapped up in a bow. He'd offer them to me to give a try and I'd turn him down. Though nuts were frequently found in the cupboards and in desserts at family get-togethers, I was so frustratingly picky I wouldn't give them a chance.

Not a single one.

I visited an allergist for the first time after my tongue swelled up like a balloon after eating fresh kiwi in a middle school Beginning Foods course. As long as we were there, my mother and I decided to test for a slew of random foods, animals, and plants. Most notable was my allergy for cats (already known) and, surprisingly, tree nuts. In fact, my arm grew so angry red and swollen, the allergist immediately wrote me out a prescription for adrenaline. I was severely allergic to most tree nuts and never knew it.

Since that day, I've landed myself in the emergency room ICU from a single, accidental bite of an "oatmeal raisin" (macadamia nut) cookie. I've developed the early symptoms of an allergic reaction when I'm in a room where other people are eating pecans just from breathing in the microscopic pieces hovering in the air. I've interrogated many bakers and cooks what exactly is in the food they make hoping that, unlike a particular lady and a "chocolate cake" incident (Oh, hazelnuts are a nut? Whoops.), they'll let me know what to avoid.

In a twisted piece of fate, the fact that I was such a frustratingly picky eater growing up may have saved my life.

Even so, I've always been inexplicably drawn to almonds. I remember moments of guilty pleasures when I'd sneak a few chocolate covered almonds from the cupboard before my parents came home from work. Though I am supposed to avoid all tree nuts as a precaution towards cross contamination, I am technically (and oddly) not allergic to almonds. If you pay attention to the sheer number of almond recipes on this website, you may think of me as either rebellious or an unnecessary risk taker.

However, if I wasn't a bit of a rebel, these cupcakes wouldn't exist and oh boy am I glad they exist.

Almond Butter Cupcakes with Mocha Buttercream are dark, gorgeous, and unexpected. The cupcakes are made with almond butter, which lends a texture to the cupcake that is both light and dense, while just barely sticking to the roof of your mouth. Frosted with a rich mocha buttercream, the flavors compliment one another immensely, making it impossible to eat just one. The almond flavor in these cupcakes is very real (no almond extract involved), which sets them apart from other almond cupcake recipes.

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