How to Eat a Lot of Apples, On the Cheap

How to handle cooking enormous amounts of apples, from apple-picking or general fall excitement.

ByGabriella Paiella

Published OnSeptember 17, 2014

Cooking on the cheap shouldn't mean minute rice and buttered pasta every night. With a little creativity and a little planning, Gabriella Paiella shows us how to make the most of a tight budget -- without sacrificing flavor or variety.

Today: How to handle cooking enormous amounts of apples, from apple-picking or general fall excitement.

Can you feel it? The air is getting crisper. You've traded in your jorts for jeans. If you, like me, live in New York, you've noticed that it's smelling less like hot garbage and more like regular garbage these days.

As the Earth observes the ancient call of the Autumnal Equinox -- the leaves changing color, animals preparing to hibernate -- so must we, by choosing a new seasonal activity to Instagram: Apple picking.

Apple picking, like playing shuffleboard and eating porridge and antiquing, is an activity that folks have been doing for ages but is experiencing a resurgence. Should you go this year (and you should; the fresh non-garbage air is good for you), you'll likely have more pounds of apples than you know what to do with. You'll be sick of eating them whole, but you know you have to power through the rest because a) c'mon, food waste is terrible and b) it's like burning money and then throwing it in the trash. (PSA: If you can afford to burn money and then throw it in the trash, click out of this column and consider becoming my personal angel investor.)

For those of you overloaded by apples, here's how to stretch them out: