Yesterday was a nice cold, Fall day out here in the Texas Panhandle, with plenty of wind and rain. The type of cold that isn’t quite Winter but comes after the last really hot Autumn day.

Now is the time to dig out your sweaters and warm socks because you will need them in the mornings and evenings.

It’s also the perfect weather for nice, warm, comfort food! So we made a homemade stew with fried Apples and homemade cornbread!

It was the perfect Fall dinner for a cold day. The stew simmers slowly on the stove all day until the meat falls apart and the potatoes have soaked up the flavors of the stew.

We had gone to the corn farm on Saturday ( Gee Family Corn Farm), got lost in the maze, roamed the cotton field, picked pumpkins from the pumpkin patch, and bought some fresh ground cornmeal. ( They also had homegrown popcorn, which we bought the week before- along with the last of their sweet corn- delicious!) So, I decided to try out their cornmeal and cornbread recipe.

I also quite a few leftover apples from all the apple butter we made last month. One of my favorite things to do with apples is to fry them up over our firepit in a cast-iron skillet, but since it had been raining for a few hours, we had to make them on the stovetop this time.

Putting the fried apples with the cornbread was AMAZING!!!! It is a very tasty spin on apple pie. So, if you love apple pie, but don’t want to deal with making the crust- this is the perfect alternative, plus it makes a great breakfast the next day- if there are any leftovers.

Gee Family Farm Cornbread:

( https://www.geefamilyfarm.com/web/index.php?page=recipes )

1 c. cornmeal

• 3 c. all-purpose flour

• 1⅓ c. sugar

• 2 Tablespoons baking powder

• 1 teaspoon salt

• ⅔ cup vegetable oil

• ⅓ cup. melted butter

• 2 Tablespoons. honey

• 4 eggs, beaten

• 2½ cups whole milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease a 9×13 inch baking dish.

1. In a large mixing bowl, stir the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.

2. Pour in the vegetable oil, melted butter, honey, beaten eggs, and milk, and stir just until moistened.

3. Pour the batter into the greased baking dish and bake at 350-degree oven for 45 minutes. Watch the cornbread towards the end, you want it to be turning golden and starting to show some cracks.

4. Remove from oven, serve warm with butter or honey, or simply plain. It’s amazing!

***** I don’t use vegetable oil, so I did half melted butter and half coconut oil- turned out great!*****

Fried Apples

Butter ( I use 1/4c- 1/2c, depending on how many apples I am cooking)

Apples ( we used about 15 apples, you can use more or less )

Cinnamon ( to taste)

Honey

slice and core apples. We used an apple corer/slicer/peeler, but you don’t have to peel the apples unless you want.

Heat up a skillet large enough to hold your apple slices. Melt the butter in the skillet. Add apples when the skillet is HOT! you want them to sizzle!

fry apples by letting them cook for a few minutes before stirring them. As they cook, the juices and sugars from the apples will start to caramelize and brown your apples. This can take a while, especially with a lot of apples. I made my cornbread first and put it in the oven to bake while I fried the apples.

Keep frying the apples till they become soft and start browning. Add your cinnamon and turn off the heat.

to assemble your cornbread and apples:

take a slice of hot cornbread, cut it in half, and butter the inside. Put hot, fried apples on top of the cornbread, drizzle with honey. You can also add whipped cream, but I didn’t have any.

Enjoy!

just to note- the cornbread and apples can make a lot! My kids loved the apples and cornbread and came back for seconds ( and thirds- but they had to eat their stew first) Chris even really enjoyed the fried apples and cornbread as well!

Do you have a favorite Fall recipe? Share it in the comments!

~Chris & Carrie