Family Apple Picking at Carter Mountain

While Chuck enjoyed the weekend in New York City with his college buddies, I spent some time apple picking with my family in Charlottesville. My parents and I were visiting one of my brothers at JMU (the best school ever). Rather than spending another day walking around campus, we thought apple picking would be the perfect way to spend some of quality family time (how every college freshman wants to spend a Saturday afternoon). We found Carter Mountain Orchard online, hopped in the car and started our adventure.

Lizzie's Apple Squares

I was recently asked to make a dessert for a "fall comfort food" themed dinner. I knew wanted to feature apple or pumpkin as the star ingredient. Considering that I've been baking a lot of pumpkin whoopie pies this season, I decided to make my mother's apple squares, a favorite of mine growing up. I had long assumed that it was one of our family recipes, but recently discovered that was not the case. I must give credit to our long time family friends and neighbors' Auntie Lizzie, the woman responsible for these autumn treats. They are perfect served warm out of the oven or chilled (I actually prefer them chilled).

Recipe after the jump!

Hot applehol

Fall is here and apple season is in full swing. TWSF was inspired by the recent apples displays at local farmers markets and decided to take a closer look into the fruit that is American as apple pie. Did you know that the crab apple is the only apple native to North America, the pilgrims planted the first United States apple trees in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, today there are 2,500 varities of apples grown in the US, but only 100 varieties are grown commercially, this years US harvest is projected to be 241 million bushels (about 113 apples per American), 2% of the US apple crop is produced in Virginia, about 20% of the US apple crop is processed into apple juice and apple cider, it takes the energy of 50 leaves to produce one apple, an average tree can produce 800 pounds of apples annually (about 2000 apples), it takes about 36 apples to create one gallon of apple cider, it only takes 2 ounces of rum to spice up a glass of apple cider, it only takes a couple glasses of spiked cider to liven up your Autumn party......