The McIntosh apple is 200 years old!
A chance discovery in 1811 by John McIntosh in Dundela, Ontario, every McIntosh enjoyed around the world today is a descendant of this original mother tree John discovered.
Does that include Mac computers? Rumour has it Steve Jobs worked on an apple farm in 1976, where he fell in love with the McIntosh!
Who will create the best candy apple recipe? (me?)
To celebrate, Ontario Apple Growers invited me to enter their blogger challenge: Best Candy Apple Recipe, while they gear up for their Winter Apple Ball, happening February 21st at the Westin Harbour Castle in Toronto. They're setting a Guiness World Record™ for the most people bobbing for apples! Free tickets are already sold out, but you could still be there. Click here for details.
Back to the candy apple recipe...
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT WORK IN THE CANADIAN LIVING TEST KITCHEN.
(Nor did I consult any of our recipe experts, which should be obvious.)
I've never actually eaten a candy apple, because I'm allergic to additives and food dyes. So I knew my creation had to be all-natural, delicious, and FUN! (to make up for the lack of candy)
I present: The Blushing Porcupine
The Blushing Porcupine
Ingredients
1/2 cup light corn syrup
2 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cups water
4 Cortland apples (a McIntosh descendant), de-stemmed, washed and dried thoroughly
8 currants, pressed down into flat discs for eyes
4 raw BC hazelnut halves, for noses
3 cups raw almonds, approx.
Special equipment:
Wooden handles or skewers
Candy thermometer (buy a good one, mine was 30 degrees off and batch #1 were apple hammers)
Preparation
1. With sharp kitchen knife, trim approximately 1/4-inch off each almond to create a flat bottom and pointy tip. Wandering husbands may now snack on the discarded ends. Like so:
2. Toast almonds in toaster oven or in small skillet until fragrant, about 4 minutes. Let cool.
3. Cover baking tray with aluminum foil or parchment paper. Take wooden skewers, insert into tops of apples until close to the bottom, and arrange on tray close to your sauce pan for the sugar. Comme ça:
4. Pour sugar, water and corn syrup into sauce pan. Attach candy thermometer. Stir mixture with wooden spoon to start dissolving the sugar, and continue stirring as you cook over medium-high heat until the sugar boils.
5. At boiling point, stop stirring (to prevent crystallization). Cook over medium-low heat until sugar reaches 290˚F. It feels like forever, then it suddenly gets very hot. This is not a good time to go brush the cat, like I did during batch #1. See the hideous out-takes at the very bottom of this post.
6. At 290˚F, remove the candy from the heat. (Making tea on your available back burner while you wait is also a bad idea, for this reason.)
7. Work quickly to dunk and spin apples into candy mixture and set back onto lined baking pan. Tilting the pot makes it easier to cover the entire apple. Allow apples to cool for about 5 minutes.
8. The candied apples will have formed a slight pool of hardened sugar, resulting in an unsightly '80s flat-top for your porcupines (refer to hideous out-takes at bottom). With a kitchen knife, gently tap off the hardened pooled sugar. Don't try to sculpt too much or you'll crack the candy coating off the apple.
9. The remaining pot of sugar mixture is now your glue. Place pot back onto burner on low, and stir to re-liquify.
10. Secure your candy apple upright (I used a water pitcher filled with decorative rocks). Determine the most rounded side for a "face".
11. Using a small carving knife, dunk the tip into the molten sugar - seen below - quickly paint the back of a currant and stick it onto the face. Repeat with the other eye and hazelnut half for a nose.
12. Starting with the top of the head, start adding almonds one by one using the method above, painting the flat part of the almond and sticking to the apple. I recommend placing each almond first, before gluing and sticking, as they tend to sit more uniform in one direction. The almonds will also cover most of the flat-top and/or cracks that occurred during sculpting.
13. Enjoy your chemical-free and sort-of healthy Blushing Porcupines!
Out-takes: The Blushing Porcupine's ugly older cousin
Because it is laughs aplenty, I am sharing Porcupine Apple Batch #1:
'80s flat-top: Made worse by the almonds I laid the apple on top of, thinking it could be "hair"
Warty candy skin: The result of leaving to brush your cat and over-cooking your sugar. This was also a Golden Delicious apple, and the yellow skin is too blah for an au naturel candy apple.
Chocolate snot-nose: Cute by design, a chocolate-covered almond will melt when in contact with molten sugar. Go figure.
Frenzied lentil eyes: This is where some candy would have been great, but I'm allergic. The lentil eyes, however, make this porcupine look rabid.
Ha ha. Happy Birthday McIntosh apples!
