Tuesday Try A New Taste - Apple Treats

* Apple Brownies *
From Stacia Mureness

Ingredients:

• 3/4 C. butter
• 1 1/2 C. sugar
• 2 C. all-purpose flour
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 2 C. peeled and chopped apples

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F.
Mix all above ingredients and pour into greased 13 x 9" baking pan (I've found through trial and error that glass tends to work better than the metal ones... for some reason the metal baking pans leave a metallic taste YECH!).
Bake for 35 minutes.
Cool slightly and cut into squares.
Serve warm.
You may serve this with ice cream or whipped cream, if you desire.

* Apple Butter Crescent Cookies *
From Better Homes and Gardens Cookie Classics

Ingredients:

• 2/3 cup butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3 cups flour
• 2/3 cup apple butter or seedless raspberry jam
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  

In a large mixing bowl beat butter with an electric mixer on med.-high speed for 30 sec. Add the 1 cup sugar, baking powder and salt. Beat until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally.
Beat in eggs and vanilla. 
Beat in as much flour as you can with the mixer. Stir in remaining flour.
Divide dough in half.
Cover; chill dough in refrigerator for 3 hours or until easy to handle.
Line cookie sheet with foil or parchment paper; set aside.
On a lightly floured surface, roll half the dough into a 12" square. Cut into sixteen 3" squares.
Spread about 1 teaspoon apple butter or raspberry jam down the middle of each square. Fold 1 edge of the dough over the filling. Fold over the other edge.
Place on prepared cookie sheet.
Make 3 cuts halfway through dough on one long side of each cookie. Bend cookie slightly to separate cuts.
Combine the 2 tablespoons sugar and the cinnamon; sprinkle cookies with some of the
sugar-cinnamon mixture.
Repeat with remaining dough, remaining filling and remaining sugar-cinnamon mixture.
Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 min. or until golden brown. transfer to wire rack; cool.

Since ancient times it has been deemed unlucky to harm an apple tree. Fortunately, this does not include the yearly pruning of the apple tree which, in fact, keeps apple trees healthy by preventing their limbs from becoming overburdened with fruits and breaking.

The branches and twigs that are pruned from the apple tree are often used for making magical items such as wands, beads, wreaths, pentagrams for the walls, and even stick birdhouses. With a wood burner and a carving knife, runes and rune sticks can also be made from the branches that have been pruned off of the apple tree.

Among the Celts, the fruit of the apple tree symbolized knowledge, magic, and prophesy. The tree was of the Celtic Underworld and acted as a sort of bridge between the living and the dead.

To the Gauls, the apple tree was as sacred as the oak tree.

When you cut the apple fruit breadthwise you see the five-pointed star made from the placement of the seed casings. This symbol, the pentagram, is the traditional symbol of knowledge. That the five-pointed star, pentagram, is surrounded by the circular shape of the halved apple, the symbol becomes a pentacle. This is a symbol of protection, the protection of sacred knowledge.

Numerous superstitions surround the fruit of the apple tree which has most commonly been used in love magic and divinations. People once believed that apples would keep them young forever. Also, to eat an apple without first rubbing it clean was a symbolic gesture of challenging the "Devil."

In Germany there was a belief that if a woman, one that had given birth to many children, ate the first apple from a young apple tree, the tree would have many fruitful years to come.

One custom regarding the apple fruit is to bury a few apples, after their harvest, to appease the spirits of the dead. My children and I continue this custom every year on Samhain: burying apples in the garden in the hopes of appeasing the spirits of our dead ancestors. We also use this as a time of remembrance.

Lore from Sacred Spiral

Disclaimer: No one involved in this blog or its contents may be held responsible for any adverse reactions arising from following any of the instructions/recipes on this list. It is the reader's personal responsibility to exercise all precautions and use his or her own discretion if following any instructions or advice from this blog.