Sliced Apple Fritters

Written by Karen D | Sep 24, 2024 3:30:00 PM

If you’ve been keeping up with The Chopping Block’s blog, Facebook page, and Instagram posts, you’ve undoubtedly noticed a lot of apple references! Well, it’s definitely the season with apples aplenty, whether you pick your own or buy them at the farmer’s market or grocery store. Add to that Lincoln Square’s Apple Fest coming up the first weekend in October, complete with TCB’s famous Apple Pie, you can begin to understand why apples are a very big deal around here!

Well, I’m certainly no exception: I love apple season! Whether I’m eating them plain (the varieties are endless), stuffing and baking them, wrapping them in pastry, making pies, tarts or cakes, apples just make the transition to Fall a happy one for me. This time around, I wanted to make a quick apple fritter “snack” – nothing fancy, not always super-pretty, but definitely delicious! I wanted something I could put together as a quick treat when I have an apple or two on hand. It also needed to be something that would taste just as good fresh out of the pan and still warm, as well as later on at room temperature. Finally, I wanted it all to take 30 minutes max and use ingredients always in my pantry.

Does this sound tempting to you? I hope so – let’s give it a go!

You will need:

2-3 large apples of your choice, washed and dried

4 tsp (1 T + 1 tsp) cinnamon

6 T (1/4 cup + 2 T) granulated sugar

200 g (approx. 1 1/3 cups) self-rising flour

3/4 cup whole milk

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla (not pictured)

4 T (1/2 stick) butter (you will need more if working in batches)

First, whisk together the cinnamon and sugar, breaking up any clumps of sugar so both ingredients are well-combined. Set this mixture aside. Note that if you want to vary this flavor at all, you can add or substitute whatever spice you like! I’ve been known to swap out some garam masala or a bit of cardamom for some or all of the cinnamon, depending on my mood. They’re all nice, warm spices that complement the apples nicely.

Next, core and slice the apples. You can use any size apples. These days, I’m really enjoying the Cosmic Crisp variety for their sweetness and solid, crunchy texture. I’ve never seen a small Cosmic Crisp; they all tend to be on the larger side and I get 5 to 6 slices out of each apple. Smaller apples will yield fewer slices, so it’s really up to you how many and what size slices you would like.

I prefer to use an apple corer to core the apples. However, I have no idea where my corer came from but as you can see in the photo above, the coring end of it is not long enough to go all the way through the apple from end to end. But there’s always a way! So, I had to make do and here’s what I did:

As with any apple corer, I pierced through the top of the apple, twisted and pushed. If you have a normal corer, you can push all the way through the apple and remove the core in one fell swoop. In my case, it stops about two-thirds of the way down.

I sliced the top off (reserved for another use) and then made 1/4” slices down to just before I ran out of “cored” apple. You can see the slices off to the right in the photo above that all I had to do was poke the centers out of the middle of the slices. The piece on the left side is the remainder of the apple.

Then I cored the rest of the apple, twisting and pushing the corer all the way through.

If your apple corer goes all the way through (I believe most do), just proceed to slice your apples into 1/4” slices, reserving the tops and bottoms for another use.

If you do not have an apple corer, you can simply use a paring knife to cut out the core. For me, I find the easiest way is by cutting the apple in half first so I can let each half sit, cut-side down, on my cutting board. I then insert my paring knife vertically down to the board through one of the halves, lift it out, insert it again next to where I made the first insertion and continue in this manner until I’ve cut all the way around the core. Use your fingers to push the core all the way through. Repeat this process with the other half. Then slice your apple halves into 1/4” slices.

Before moving onto the batter, start warming your skillet over medium heat. While you can use a non-stick pan for this, I prefer to use stainless steel. Since I’m using butter to fry the fritters, stainless steel allows me to better see if the butter starts to darken too much and burn; this is more difficult on a dark, non-stick surface. My preferred skillet is 12” in diameter and will hold 5-6 large apple slices.

To mix the batter, simply whisk together the flour, milk, eggs and vanilla in a bowl until well-blended. It will be a nice coating consistency, on the thicker side, almost like pancake batter.

Add as many apple slices as will fit in your pan to the bowl and gently toss them with the batter. Make sure the slices are well-coated with batter.

Add the butter to the pan, allowing it to melt and heat up.

Place the battered apple slices in the hot, melted butter. Whenever I’m frying a batch of anything that will need to be flipped, I like to lay my first piece where the handle is attached to the pan and then lay the rest of the pieces clockwise. As a general rule, the first piece that will need to be turned will then be the one at the handle and I can then work my way around from there. For me, it’s just a nice guideline. Allow the slices to cook for 2-3 minutes. The exact amount of time will depend on the temperature of your apples, the size and thickness of the slices, as well as the heat on the pan.

You’re looking for a golden brown color on the fritters. If you run the back of a knife along the fritter, you should hear a nice scraping sound. Once flipped, turn the heat down just a bit and allow another 1-2 minutes until golden brown on the other side. I prefer a spatula to turn them; tongs can tend to scrape batter off the uncooked side. If you ever feel like they’re not quite the color you want, just keep flipping them.

Do be sure to watch the butter. It will get darker, but you want to be careful it doesn’t get black. A dark brown color is fine, but once dark brown, it can blacken very quickly. If it does, it will impart a burnt taste to the fritters. This is the reason why I turn the heat down once the fritters are flipped. When you first put the fritters in, they cool down the butter and the pan, but once you turn them, everything in the pan has heated up, so the butter has a greater risk of burning.

Transfer the cooked fritters to a sheet pan in one layer and immediately sprinkle generously with cinnamon sugar. I like to use my hand or the back of a spatula to give the fritters a little pat to push the cinnamon sugar in a bit, allowing it to adhere better. Turn them over and do the same on the other side. If you are working in batches, portion out the cinnamon sugar accordingly, making sure you’ll have enough for all your batches. If you were to place the still-warm fritters on a plate and/or stack them in any way, they will steam on themselves and get a little soggy. The rack allows for free air flow around the fritters. While these are not overly crunchy, they will better hold onto what crunch they have if they don’t steam.

Please note that if you are working in batches, I recommend pouring off any remaining butter in the pan and wiping the pan out with a paper towel, taking care if the pan is still hot. Then melt another half stick of butter to do the next batch.

We often just eat the fritters right off the sheet pan! But certainly, if you want to serve them in a more civilized manner, you can plate them in whatever way suits you. We enjoy the fritters just as they are, but sometimes like them with a bit of maple syrup or caramel drizzled over the top. They make for a terrific little treat, especially on a cool Fall day!

Apple lovers, take note: Apple Fest is coming to Lincoln Square October 5 and 6! Be sure to look for The Chopping Block tent right in front of our building, where we’ll be serving up slices of our amazing apple pie - with freshly whipped cream if you wish! We’ll also be offering Right Bee Cider hard cider, Laird’s Apple Mule (a canned cocktail), and non-alcoholic apple cider. If you’re interested in taking home a whole apple pie – complete with the cast iron skillet it’s been baked in! – they will be available by pre-order only on our website: Order Apple Fest Pies. All you need to do is click on which day you’d like to pick up your pie and enter your contact/credit card information. I’ll be at Apple Fest both Saturday and Sunday until 2 pm - I hope to see you there!