When lifelong Virginians Rona and Tim Sullivan left city life behind in 1998, their goal was to live close to the land and enjoy a natural existence farming goats and chickens. Relocating to Virginia’s bucolic Middle Peninsula, an historic area rimmed with picturesque creek and river views, they eventually settled on a farm in Wake with rolling hills and big sky.
Fondest memories of shopping roadside stands involve apples that grace markets with their myriad colors, aromas and levels of crisp-crunch. Apple season in Virginia starts tentatively, with Ginger Gold and Piney River Gold fruits making their debut, followed by Honey Crisp and then the endless palettes of the reds. Rome Beauty, Stayman Winesap, Red Delicious (nothing like the uber-polished tasteless pretties at the grocery stores), Empire and York, among others.
My favorite apple is any type one can incorporate into desserts. So, really, any apple will do, although I profess a fondness for super crisp and slightly tart apples for eating out of hand.
The reds have arrived and I say let the dessert making begin in earnest. Continue this for as long as there are apples at the stands.
Stayman apples at Berry’s Produce in Hanover, Virginia
This crumble is like an upside down pie, with a cinnamon scented buttery crisp topping serving as our convoluted crust, and a sour cream custard, not too sweet, binding thin slices of twice cooked apples. Cooking the apple slices with butter, sugar and cinnamon until tender before baking avoids the problem of apple pileup. In that scenario, your stack of fruit lies so high in the pan you can’t avoid overflow and there’s no room for custard or topping. I like walnuts in the crumble topping, but you can substitute pecans or almonds, or eliminate nuts altogether.
This dessert is easy, feeds a small crowd and may be enjoyed chilled, at room temperature (best, I think) or lightly warmed. Crowning with a dollop of vanilla bean ice cream or cinnamon dusted whipped cream will elevate it from homey simplicity to elegant comfort food.
recipe by Michele Humlan, The Good Eats Company
makes ten to twelve servings
ingredients
2 ½ pounds apples, peeled, cored and cut in thin slices
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
½ cup sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 cups sour cream, preferably full fat
3 tablespoons heavy cream
2 eggs, room temperature
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
crumble topping
1 cup all purpose or gluten free flour (see apple cake with caramel glaze for my favorite homemade mix)
¾ cup packed light brown sugar
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¾ cup chopped walnuts
one stick (½ cup) unsalted butter, cut in small pieces
directions
Comfort has always been a pot of beans simmering on the stove. It’s a favorite childhood memory – my mom’s white beans cooked simply, with or without meat for seasoning. Gloriously overcooked so that beans and broth melded into a creamy slurry of bean goodness, and accompanied by a biscuit fresh from the oven.
At Thanksgiving many of us take the literal approach to preparing sweet potatoes by making them even more sweet. Candied yams, sweet potato casserole topped with marshmallows…nothing inherently wrong with these dishes, except that some folks simply do not care for treacly sweetness alongside their savory foods.
The heady perfume of Virginia apples at my local roadside stand draws me in, and I load up my box with way more than I can use in a week. What’s a cook to do? Well, cook ’em up, of course.
When you are given a gift of late season tomatoes, you have only two choices; you can eat them all right away, or make them last longer by preserving them for later enjoyment.
fresh Bombolini gluten free shells with kale apricot pesto
What I love about greens : kissed by the first frost of autumn, they are tender and flavorful; picked in springtime, they are equally tender and just as flavorful. Something else to love about greens ? Their versatility in the art of cooking.
Pity the poor rutabaga. Mislabeled, misunderstood, underused and unappreciated. Somewhat hesitant to list rutabaga as a solo agent on the menus of The Good Eats Company, I include it in, for examples, a creamy colorful root vegetable soup, and white balsamic glazed root vegetables. Folks ask me what rutabaga tastes like, and I answer, for lack of better comparison, that it tastes like a cross between carrot and turnip. But dear rutabaga is so much more than this simplistic description! Carrot haters and turnip despisers may remember childhood battles at the dinner table, bargains struck with parents offering vegetables in earnest, and rejection in the form of a tiny mouth set in a grim line and the Word : “NO”. And so my answer seems less than adequate.
Alfredo Neuman has merry eyes and a kind smile. He spends his retirement as a beekeeper, maintaining at least 120 hives on the grounds of Brookview Farm in bucolic Manakin-Sabot, Virginia. Alfredo and his wife Barbara operate Alfredo’s Beehive at the well-attended South of the James Market in Forest Hill Park (now at Patrick Henry School for the winter term). This is a man who loves his work. Born and raised in Colombia, South America, Alfredo honors his late brother by practicing the art of apiary science. He offers a number of products and gives samples of two types of honey : clover, from nectar gathered in spring, and wildflower, a rich dark amber liquid from summer blooms at Brookview Farm and environs. This latter honey, pictured and used in today’s recipe, is exceptionally fragrant and rich tasting. Alfredo’s honey may also be purchased online or at Good Foods Grocery here in Richmond.
