Apple Chips

Many years ago in an airport, I bought Pascal a sandwich.  We hadn’t been together long and our lives up until that point had been largely sandwich free.  While my go-to had always been and still is ham and Swiss (a cheese that incidentally doesn’t exist in Switzerland, but in desperation Emmenthal will get you most of the way there), I had no idea what to get him.  Unwilling to give up my chosen sandwich, I offered him the other with the disclaimer that he might not like it.  He looked up and replied “I’m not going to look a free horse in the mouth!”   This was the first of many Pascalism’s which are both endearing and a testament to his intelligence.   But the sentiment is one that I truly believe, “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”  This is how I feel about my apple tree.

It seemed a bit premature to begin at the end of the August but already the apples have started falling from the tree and we are faced with yet again another glut of apples.  I have a hard time throwing things away.  I am not a hoarder per se but there is the odd sweater from high school I cannot seem to part with.  So you can imagine that I am at odds with the amount of apples we have.  Looking for a way to turn them into treasure I thought the sweet apples would make nice dried apple slices.  Trimming away the bad bits (the bees like them too), I cored them and sliced them very thinly on the mandolin.  I popped them in a very low oven on a silpat mat and promptly forgot about them.  When I remembered them, they looked ok, I turned them over and forgot about them again.  I am not sure how the time got away but apples were clearly, for that one moment, not on my mind.  By the time I remembered them the chewy apple rings I had imagine were a distant memory and what remained were much much better.  As crunchy as potato chips but sweet.  Extremely addictive to adult and child alike.  If you are looking to upgrade your snacks I recommend you make them. 

You will need apples and an oven.  Some specialty kit is helpful like a mandolin and an apple corer but you can get around it if need be. 

Just core the apples and slice them very thinly.  I put mine on a silpat but parchment paper works too.  You just need to prevent them from sticking.  Then put them in a low oven, about 75°C or 170°F, for a while.  Then turn them and wait another while. 

After eating an entire bowl, Pascal proclaimed, “you should sell these.”  Unfortunately they don’t hold their crisp for more than about 12 hours so unfortunately you’ll have to make your own.