Apples : Get ‘Em Every Way But Fresh

While Los Angeles suffered through last week’s prolonged heat wave, the weather around Montreal was cool and cloudy. Leaves were beginning to change color and growers were anticipating the start of the apple harvest.

Some of those apples--the McIntoshes--will go into the sumptuous apple butter produced by Fin d’Hiver at Prevost, just north of Montreal. The apples are turned into puree, which is then sweetened and flavored with brandy, lemon juice and a bit of orange peel. The butter comes in an 8.8-ounce jar that is charmingly outfitted with a pleated paper cap and bilingual label.

Fin d’Hiver is an 11-year-old company that started by making maple syrup and honey, then moved on to jams, marmalades and fruits packed in liquor and started a line of spices two years ago. The apple butter with brandy-- beurre de pommes au brandy in French--is part of its Au Printemps Gourmet line. ( Fin d’Hiver means end of winter, and printemps is spring.)

Brandy also flavors the apple cider jelly put out by Paradigm Foodworks of Lake Oswego, Oregon.

Intensely flavored and sparkling clear, the jelly is made in small batches from apple cider concentrate produced in Washington State. It’s softly set, so you can easily dollop it onto hot biscuits, toast or scones. Paradigm has also introduced a line of English scone mixes.

The company was started in 1982 by Lynne Barra, a one-time math teacher nudged into the food business by her love of chocolate. In addition to the scone mixes, cider jelly and lemon curd, Barra has come up with 17 dessert sauces. These include seven fudge sauces, two white chocolate cremes, four caramel sauces and four fruit sauces.

The name Southern Honey Applesauce suggests a lavish breakfast on a plantation in the Old South. But the label indicates that the sauce is distributed by a company in Sherman Oaks. Further inquiry reveals that production and packing take place in Sierra Madre.

Actually, the recipe is genuinely Southern. Susan Hawkins, who introduced the product this year as her debut in the food industry--her previous career was in land development and residential building--says she acquired it from a family member who came from the South.

The “Hawkins Homemade” logo on the jar is also genuine because Hawkins cooks the mixture herself, working in a commercial facility. Packed in jars and also sold in bulk, the applesauce is made with Pippin apples from Northern California, honey, lemon juice and cinnamon. It’s chunky, golden brown, not overly sweet and includes no preservatives. Southerners tell Hawkins that it is similar to what is known as “stewed apples” in Virginia and the Carolinas.

Living on the Glenbrook Apple Ranch at Templeton, Calif. guaranteed that Evelyn Fisher would think up countless ways to use the fruit. Some of her ideas, including an apple cider syrup, were good enough to sell to ranch visitors. The next step was to launch them on the commercial market.

Now circulating under the Fisher’s Pantry label are the syrup, a companion apple pancake mix, apple butter and lemon curd. The products are no longer made at the ranch but manufactured at a commercial kitchen in Paso Robles. However, the cider for the syrup comes from Glenbrook, a 237-acre spread that includes 50 acres of apple trees.

For the pancake mix, Fisher adds dried apple bits, walnuts and cinnamon to an existing mix. The pancakes are tender and crunchy with nuts; they might even inspire late sleepers to rise early for Sunday breakfast. (The prepared mix has to stand before it is used.) The mellow buttery taste in the syrup comes from the flavoring, not from fat.

The Fin d’Hiver apple butter, Paradigm jelly, Southern Honey Applesauce and Fisher pancake mix and syrup are available at Jurgensen’s in Pasadena, Beverly Hills and Santa Barbara. Look for them also at other upscale markets and delis. The applesauce, for example, is on sale at Gelson’s, the Broadway Deli in Santa Monica, Village Catering and Food to Go on Larchmont Boulevard and other stores. Prices may vary at the different outlets.

Babies can get in on the apple harvest too, thanks to Earth’s Best Baby Food, a line of certified organic products that includes the following apple items: plain apples; apples combined with plums, bananas, blueberries or apricots; plain apple juice and an apple-grape blend.

In addition to using organically grown fruits and vegetables, Earth’s Best prepares its foods without sugar, salt, preservatives or concentrates. Juices are natural, filtered just enough to make them suitable for a baby’s bottle.

Earth’s Best was founded in 1987 by brothers Ron and Arnie Koss and is based in Middlebury, Vt. The products came on the market in 1988, first in natural food stores, then in retail groceries. They have sold so well that the company now ranks fourth in baby food sales behind industry leaders Gerber, Beech-Nut and Heinz.

Earth’s Best entered the Los Angeles market this year, carried first by Vons and now available also at Ralphs, Hughes, Alpha Beta, Quinn’s Natural Food Centers and Mrs. Gooch’s Natural Foods Markets. Incidentally, the jars of fruit are great for adult packed lunches.