image by Marius Watz; via Flickr CC license. NYC0712 142 Red Hots
This is a family recipe. I remember these VERY well from my childhood.
Ingredients:
apples (however many you want to make).
white sugar
flour
salt
red-hot candies (see photo)
small white marshmallow
Peel apples. Cut them in half and dig out the cores, leaving half apple cups.
Rub a little lemon or orange juice on them if you don’t like them getting brown.
image by Kat Martinez, via Flickr CC “peeled, stacks and stacks”
Mix together:
3/4 c. sugar (Grandma used white — this amount of sugar covered a 13×9 pan full of apple halves)
1 T. flour
dash of salt
Place apples cut side up in a glass or stainless steel baking pan. Sprinkle the flour/sugar/salt mixture over the top of the apples. Add a couple of handfuls of red-hot candies trying to keep most of them IN or ON the apples. (*NOTE: These are not Hot Tamales. They are the little red cinnamon candy pieces.) Pour some water carefully into the bottom of the baking dish (not all over the top so you don’t mess up the goodies). Bake until tender. Right before it is done, put marshmallows on. (She used the small white marshmallows). (*Continue baking for just a few more minutes until the marshmallows melt and puff up. You can brown them a bit if you watch them carefully, but don’t let them burn!)
image by Kent Landerholm via Flickr CC license: marshmallows
That is it. That is all there is on the recipe card. It looks like my very young handwriting so I’m assuming she must have dictated it to me when I asked her for the recipe.
I’m guessing 350 degrees for about 30 min.? The card doesn’t say.
The apple trees in my grandparents very large backyard were mostly a variety my mom called “transparent.” They were fairly small, light green or pale yellow-skinned and very tart. Grandma made delicious pies and baked apples, and she must have made other stuff, too — like apple sauce.
I really liked the pie, but I think the baked apples were my favorite, though, because of the red-hot candies and marshmallows.
If I were going to tweak this recipe, I would definitely add some a dusting of cinnamon and maybe some nutmeg or Penzey’s Apple Pie Spice. I would probably use less sugar and would think about using all or at least half brown sugar. Baking the apples in apple juice instead of water would probably improve the taste, too.
You could use the larger marshmallows if needed. I would probably cut them in half or even quarters. The small ones work really well for this if you can find them.
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