Apple Tart with Oat Crumble and Apple Infused Caramel

I accidentally made a tart. Yeap, you read that correctly. I accidentally made a tart.

Initially, I was trying to make hand pies. But my first attempt at those failed abysmally. And they didn’t even involve apples. I was trying a new recipe for dinner with my neighbors and it was the dough and the oven versus me and the timer. Sadly, I was on the losing team. Something, somewhere just didn’t quite go right. My neighbors still ate them, bless their hearts. And, they inspired me in the process!  

With a mouth full of less-than-impressive hand pie one said, “How quickly do apples go bad? You’ve got, like, eight sitting here.” He motioned to my overflowing fruit bowl. Apparently, no proper single gal has eight apples sitting on her counter. I decided not to tell him I had more apples in the fridge…

I knew that despite eating one or two apples a day as a snack, they were going to go south before I got around to finishing them. I figured baking with them would be the best use of my time, but I couldn’t stomach the idea of more cake. Then I remembered the extra pie dough sitting in my fridge and knew exactly what I would do. An apple tart!

When the going gets tough, the tough make tarts.

Candied Ginger Scones

You know that episode of The Office where Michael burns his foot on a George Foreman Grill? I fear this may be my future. And by that, I mean burning my foot, not being the manager of a paper company’s Scranton branch.

See, the heat isn’t on in my apartment yet. This wasn’t such a problem the past few weeks, with the temperatures hovering around 60 most days and even passing 70 on occasion. But now, in the midwestern fashion of dramatic highs and even more extreme lows, the temperature dropped a solid 30 degrees overnight. And my apartment has become a very large, very expensive refrigerator. 

I have been keeping warm by wearing multiple sweaters, wrapping myself in blankets, and keeping the oven on to get a little bit of heat into the chilled wooden floors and icy window panes of my apartment.

While this last step may pose a fire hazard, I’m tired of feeling like a character in a Dickens novel. But, I have a new fear of slipping or tripping in my kitchen and putting my foot in the broiler. Of course, standing in front of the oven and alternately standing on my right foot, then my left, then back again, so I can evenly toast them may add to the likelihood of this outcome.