It’s that time of year when the chill in the air makes you want to cozy up inside and cook something special. We are so lucky to have organic fruit trees at Discoveries Preschool. We have an apple tree full of delicious apples and 4 pear trees to pick from.
The Mustang class made apple chips first. We used a special tool that cut the apples into rings while peeling the skin off the apples. Everyone got a turn to pick their apple and wash it. Then Miss Dawn put the apple on the holder and we got to crank the handle to cut and peel the apple. Then we put the apple slices on the racks for the dehydrator. We sprinkled cinnamon and sugar onto some of the slices and turned on the dehydrator. Some slices were plain without spices. It took all day for the apples to dry out to become apple chips. The next day we ate the chips for the morning snack. Most people liked the cinnamon and sugar chips the best.
In the next cooking lesson, we made apple and pear sauce.
We used the apple tool to cut apples and then we cut the pears into pieces. We put the fruit into a big Crockpot and sprinkled in cinnamon and sugar. We cooked the fruit all day and had the apple and pear sauce for a snack. Most children had never had pear sauce and didn’t think they would like it. It is good to try new things. We did discover we did like the pears in with the apples. There were so many pears left on the trees that we got to pick some with our parents and take them home to share with our families. Fall is a tasty time of the year.