How do you like them apples?

Mom's friend Ellen brought a sackful of apples over tonight, so I grabbed some and made some apple crisp.

I've been wanting to bake something for a few weeks now, but I hadn't gotten around to it. So, I figured when she walked up with the apples, that must have been some kind of sign. I thumbed through my "Beat This" and "Beat That" cookbooks and found a recipe.

It's called "Very Controversial Apple Crisp." It wasn't at all controversial at first - Adam, Mom and I all agreed that it tasted dee-lish. But, when Mom headed home with Dad's bowlful, she called later and said HE BROKE A TOOTH ON IT!

Oops. Not all my fault, though, she said last time he was at the dentist, he was told he'd need a crown on one of his teeth pretty soon, so I'm hoping that's the one that got chipped tonight. Then I won't feel AS bad.

Now that I've told you all that, you probably want to stay miles away from the recipe, but I promise you - it is worth your time and effort. It is super easy. The worst part was peeling and slicing the apples, but even that only took about 20 minutes. (It could probably be done much faster with the right equipment.)

There's my bowl. See below for the finished product in the loaf pan. Here's the recipe, from "Beat That!" by Ann Hodgman.

4 generous cups tart apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 tsp ground cinnamon, mixed with 1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1/8 tsp salt

Vanilla ice cream, if serving warm

Preheat oven to 375. Butter a 9x5 loaf pan.

In a large bowl, toss the apple slices with the lemon juice and cinnamon-sugar.

In a small bowl, blend the brown sugar, flour, butter and salt together, first with a pastry blender or 2 knives, and then with your hands (consider it a nice exfoliating hand treatment!)

Put the apple slices in the loaf pan. Press the topping over them. Bake for 1 hour. You'll have a really dense, chewy candlylike topping (that can break teeth, apparently).

Serve warm with ice cream. Serves four to six.

And it makes your house smell damn good.

I'm hoping the 900 calories Mitzi and I burned while running nine miles today equals out to my serving of Apple Crisp!