Caramelized Baked Apple “Pie”

A recent trip to the farmers left me inspired to make baked apples. I always loved the simplicity of baked apples and how versatile they can be. As a kid my mom always made them. And little did I know, she added soda! Its such a shame when you take a wholesome food like an Apple and drown in in soda. Same goes for grapefruits; I always see people adding sugar to them. Like, why? Enjoy the fruit for what it is instead of masking its natural taste with sugar.As I was making this dessert I came to a realization. Generally speaking, people who tend to eat a lot of sugar and refined carbohydrates never like “healthy desserts.” They often claim that they just don’t taste good. But that’s because their taste buds are so used to sweet and processed foods that fruit is never satisfying enough. They need to add honey, maple syrup, agave syrup etc…But when you wean yourself off sugar you find yourself so satisfied with just fruit or just one “healthy” cookie!

And then all of a sudden it’s like you are eating foods with an exclamation point. Shocker –  you can actually taste your food! That is why people who switch to a healthier lifestyle find more success than those people who are always eating diet foods, which just feed or mask their cravings for sugar with artificial foods. And they tend to over eat healthy foods just the same because they are used to things tasting sweeter. Bottom line is: eat more fruits and vegetables and less processed foods. I swear it’s that simple! I always explain these points to my clients who are struggling in the beginning. I promise them that in the end it all pays off – they just have to trust me.
I have experienced so many success stories among my clients. They constantly inspire me by their willingness to change and devote themselves to this cleaner life style. Any type of change is hard – I know because I myself I hate change! I find that I can be so stuck in certain ways that it’s pathetic. But hey, at least I’m eating clean and working out daily so I really can’t complain. Although I should change out of my workout clothes from time to time!

My mom was recently inspired to get on the healthy bandwagon and I started her off with this baked apple as a midday snack. One for me, one for her 🙂 It is so good and I even managed to slip in that “soda” effect by using a little apple juice. It helped to caramelize the apple the way soda would.The good news is you can make this way ahead of time. I made this on Friday but didn’t have a chance to taste it until Sunday. A quick warm up in the oven and it was good as new. I used unsweetened dried cranberries but since this might be hard to find, you can always use raisins or any dried fruit you like – figs, dates, prunes or apricots!

Recipe pre heat oven 350

• 2 medium sized apples- scoop out the center leaving the bottom of the apple in tact.
• 1/4 cup apple or orange juice
• 1/4 cup oats
• 2 tablespoons unsweetened raisins- or any dried fruit
• 1 tablespoon nut butter
• dash cinnamon

1. Place your apples in a medium pyrex.
2. Puree oats, dried fruit, nut butter and cinnamon in a mini food chopper or food processor until well combined and you have a crumbly mixture.
3. Take your mixture and stuff the cored apples with it.
4. Then pour juice over the apples.
5. Cook covered for 30 minutes than take off the cover and cook an additional 30 minutes uncovered or until brown and caramelized.