A Is For Apple

A Is For Apple
More than 200 Recipes for Eating,
Munching, and Cooking
with America's Favorite Fruit

By Greg Patent and Dorothy Hinshaw Patent

A Is For Apple
"I've had a love affair with perfect apples since I was a young child." ...Dorothy Hinshaw Patent

"Perfection with possibilities: Perhaps more than any other food, that's what apples mean to me."...Greg Patent

A tart-sweet, sun-crisped apple plucked from a hundred-year-old tree and eaten out of hand. A mug of hot curried apple soup enjoyed as an autumn lunch. Cider-braised duck legs with onions and cabbage. Warm deep-dish apple pie topped with a melting scoop of apple-cinnamon ice cream.

Everyone has tasted Golden Delicious and Granny Smith apples, but how about Esopus Spitzenbergs or Sweet Sixteens? As markets are overflowing with long-last varieties and favorite standards, apple lovers Greg Patent and Dorothy Hinshaw Patent, coauthors of A Is For Apple, help decipher the differences, reintroduce heirloom apples, and explain the hundreds of ways this all-American fruit can be prepared and served.

We've all had apple sauce, apple pie, and apple cobbler, but, as the Patents show with more than 200 recipes, there are many other uses for apples. According to Greg Patent, "Apples are so versatile they can both support the flavors of more assertive foods and assume the lead role." The Patents offer recipes for savory soups, salads, and main dishes as well as recipes for sweet cookies, cakes, breads, and desserts. The subtle flavors of the apple are highlighted in recipes such as Gingered Carrot and Apple Soup, Apple and Asparagus Risotto, Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Apple and Goat Cheese, and Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Sour Cream Cider Sauce. Additionally, the Patents offer plenty of examples of the apple's taking "center-stage" with recipes such as Hot Apple Soufflés, Cinnamon Apple Cake, and Apple Loaf.

A Is For Apple is a fully comprehensive guide to selecting and cooking with apples with some basic apple horticulture for growing your own. With a fresh narrative style, the Patents also explain the folklore and history of this year-round fruit. So whether you enjoy Apple Crisp a' la Mode or just savor biting into this juicy, shiny fruit, A Is For Apple is a helpful addition to any American kitchen.

Greg Patent is a cookbook author, food writer, spokesperson, and chef. He was the national spokesperson for Cuisinarts, which funded a twenty-six-part cooking series on food processor cooking. Since 1992, he has been a contributing editor at Cooking Light magazine. He is the author of Food Processor Cooking Quick and Easy, Shanghai Passage, a nonfiction account of his childhood during World War II in China, and New Cooking from the Old West.

Dorothy Patent is the author of over fifty children's books. With a Ph D. in zoology from UC-Berkeley, she began writing science and animal books for children in 1972 and is the coauthor of two gardening books for adults.

Buy the Book!

A Is For Apple
More than 200 Recipes for Eating,
Munching, and Cooking with America's Favorite Fruit
By Greg Patent and Dorothy Hinshaw Patent
Broadway Books, June 1999
Trade Paperback, 288 pages, $15.00
ISBN: 0-7679-0203-3
Information provided by the publisher.