↪ Tastes of a New Year ↩
ACTIVITY: Make an Apples and Honey Plate
You and your child can make a special plate for your apples and honey. Purchase a package of clear plastic plates. Decorate one with apple stickers, words, etc. Use another plate over the top of this one to serve the apples on. This plate protects the artwork and can be washed and replaced as needed. You can also make a honey-pot cup with a small plastic cup or bowl, decorated with bee stickers.
ACTIVITY: Pick Apples at a Local Farm
Make plans to visit a local farm to pick your own apples. Learn about farms near you, and which kinds of apples to pick and availability.
ACTIVITY: Taste-Test a Variety of Apples
You can also taste-test a variety of apples. We are fortunate to have many varieties of applesavailable in local grocery stores and at farm stands, such as McIntosh, Jonagold, Red Delicious,Yellow Delicious, Granny Smith, Cortland, Fuji, Gala and Braeburn, to name a few. Check out this visual guide to apples to find out about varieties of apples, best uses and recipes.
ACTIVITY: Make Your Own Applesauce
In addition to dipping apples in honey, it’s traditional to make other kinds of sweet dishesemploying apples, honey, or both.
Easy Applesauce
12 apples, peeled or unpeeled
Brown sugar, white sugar or honey, to taste
Cinnamon and nutmeg, to taste
Optional: Try adding Red Hots cinnamon candies to your applesauce, which sweeten it and give it a cinnamon flavor and help create a wonderfulshade of pink!
Cut apples into quarters and place the pieces into a pot with a thin layer of water on the bottom (so the apples won’t burn). Add sugar or honey and spices.Cover and cook on low heat, stirring frequently, until apples are very soft and mushy. For a smoother variety, strain, mash with a potato masher, or run through a food mill. Enjoy warm or cold!
Save the Date
As with apples, you can also get honey from local farms. Or try something super tasty and from Israel ~ date honey (silan)! This is the honey that is literally mentioned in the Torah (Deuteronomy 8:8) and the honey we associate with Israel when we call it a land of “Milk and Honey.” You can get it online or at local specialty stores. If you’ve never tried date honey, you’re going to love it! It’s thick, dark, sweet and delicious, and great in yogurt, mixed with goat cheese as a delicious spread, and baked with chicken.
ACTIVITY: Sweeten up your holiday with some of these honey-based recipes.
Buttermilk Honey Biscuits (Adapted from Cooking Light)
About 2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons chilled butter, cut into small pieces
3/4 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons regular or date honey
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl; cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse meal. Chill for 10 minutes.
Combine buttermilk and honey, stirring with a whisk until well blended. Add buttermilk mixture to flour mixture; stir just until moist.
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface; knead lightly 4 times. Roll dough into a (1/2-inch-thick) 9 x 5-inch rectangle; dust top of dough with flour. Cut dough with a 1 3/4-inch biscuit cutter to form dough rounds.
Place dough rounds, 1 inch apart, on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Bake at 400° for 12 minutes or until golden.
Remove from pan; cool 2 minutes on wire racks. Serve warm with Cinnamon Apple Jelly.
Cinnamon Apple Freezer Jelly
1 3/4 cups unsweetened apple juice (14 ounces)
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 3-ounce pouch liquid pectin
3 1/2 cups sugar
A pinch each of cinnamon and nutmeg
4 plastic (8 ounce) freezer jars (or whatever small heavy-duty plastic containers you have)
Combine apple juice with sugar in a large bowl, mixing thoroughly. Let stand 10 minutes.
Add entire contents of pectin pouch and lemon juice. Stir for 3 minutes. Ladle freezer jelly into clean freezer jars, leaving 1/2-inch headspace. Apply caps and let jelly stand in refrigerator until set, but no longer than 24 hours. Serve immediately, refrigerate up to three weeks, or freeze up to one year.
Easy Delicious Honey Cake
(Adapted from The Jewish Preschool Teacher’s Handbook)
1 store-bought spice cake mix
1 3-3/4 ounce package instant butterscotch pudding mix
4 eggs
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup oil
1 cup of hot coffee (instant/decaf is fine)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 mashed banana
1 cup raisins (optional)
1/2 cup nuts (optional)
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Combine first 8 ingredients and mix for 6 minutes or until well blended. Add raisins/nuts if desired.
Bake in a greased pan for 35-45 minutes – depends on pan size – cupcakes take less! You can make cakes for the High Holidays in round pans, Bundt or regular cake pans to emphasize the round, circle, cyclical concepts.
Teiglach
Another yummy traditional dessert is teiglach (Yiddish: “little dough”), which are doughy honey balls, and can be a real potchke (Yiddish: fuss, pain in the tuches) to make, but you can use this modified monkey bread recipe to make an easy, fun, child friendly version.
4 7.5-ounce cans buttermilk biscuit dough (small size)
3/4 cup sugar
4 teaspoons cinnamon
1 stick butter
1/2 cup honey
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Cut the biscuits into quarters.
Mix the cinnamon and sugar together in a bowl; roll the biscuit pieces to coat.
Place the coated biscuit pieces in the greased pan. Sprinkle remaining sugar/cinnamon on top.
Melt butter and honey together. Pour over the top of the biscuit pieces.
Bake in a greased pan for 40-45 minutes. Cool for 5-10 minutes and unmold onto plate. Enjoy by pulling off pieces with your fingers – no licking in between!