Name: Apple Fritter Bites
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 15 min
Ingredients: 3 cups cake flour; 1 cup milk (plus a hair more if needed); 1 egg; 4 tbsp butter (melted and cooled); 1/4 cup white sugar; 2 tsp baking powder; 1 tsp vanilla; 1 Pinch of salt; 1 orange (zest and juice); 1 cup diced apples (chopped small); Crisco for frying (as needed); Powdered sugar (as needed)

Apple Fritter Bites

MAKES ABOUT 30 BITES · PREP 15 MIN · FRY 15 MIN

Adapted from the Apple Barn & Cider Mill, Sevierville, Tennessee. The cake flour is mine.

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Prep Time 15

Cook Time 15

Servings: 30 Bites

Course: Appetizer

Cuisine: American

Ingredients Equipment Method Notes

Ingredients

3 cups cake flour
1 cup milk plus a hair more if needed
1 egg
4 tbsp butter melted and cooled
1/4 cup white sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla
1 Pinch of salt
1 orange zest and juice
1 cup diced apples chopped small
Crisco for frying as needed
Powdered sugar as needed

Equipment

1 Caste Iron Dutch Oven
1 Mixing Bowl

Method

Milk, egg, vanilla, orange zest and juice, and the cooled butter in a bowl.
Toss the cake flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together.
Bring it together with the apples. Add a hair more milk if there’s dry flour.
Crisco in a cast iron Dutch oven, 350°. A scrap of dough should sizzle and float.
Drop by small cookie scoop, about 10 at a time. Don’t crowd them.
Fry until golden and floating, turning once.
Drain on paper towels. Let them cool a minute, then toss in powdered sugar.
Serve with warm apple butter for dipping.

Notes

The Oil Temperature

350° in a heavy pot. Drop a scrap of dough in first. It should sizzle right away and float in a few seconds. Sinks and sits there, too cool, and they soak up grease and come out heavy. Browns before you can count to five, too hot, and the middle stays raw. That’s the only thing that goes wrong with these.

The Orange

Zest and juice, the whole orange. That’s what makes these taste like the Apple Barn, and it’s what nobody can ever figure out. Don’t skip it and don’t swap it for lemon.

Good to Know

Cake flour makes them lighter and more tender than all-purpose. Same 3 cups, don’t convert.
Let the melted butter cool before it meets the egg, or it’ll scramble.
Chop the apples small, about the size of a pea, so you get apple in every bite.
Leftover cooked apple pie filling works. Drain it a little first.
Small scoop. Any bigger and they puff up and the middle won’t cook.
Cool a minute before the powdered sugar or it melts right in.

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Apple Fritter Bites