Apple Kugel

Have you heard of the Secret Recipe Club? It's this fun idea where members are assigned a blog of another member, and get to choose one recipe from that assigned blog to make and post about all on the same day. And no one knows who has whose blog until the posting date. Thus... secret!

I heard about this club a while ago, and instantly wanted to join.  So I immediately set about working on my blog, making as many improvements as I could, and I applied. But the wait list was lllllloooooonnnnnnggggg.

I almost gave up hope, to be honest.

Until last month! I got the exciting message that they were working down their waiting list and that I was now a member! Hooray!

I eagerly awaited my first assignment, and when it came, I couldn't wait to check it out.  I was assigned Bizzy Bakes, which is a really great blog chock full of delicious looking recipes!!

Seriously, every single time I checked her blog, I found more recipes that I wanted to try.

So I finally just had to choose... and the recipe that I kept coming back to me was one for Apple Kugel.  I had always thought of kugels as noodle puddings, so this noodle-less kugel intrigued me, and I just knew that it would be my choice.

The stars of this recipe are the fruits - and veggie.  Apples (I used two gala and two fuji), a carrot and dried cranberries.

All that fresh goodness is shredded, chopped and combined.

In a separate bowl, you mix together a batter. I made a couple of minor changes to the recipe as it was posted... instead of one cup of white sugar, I used a half a cup of white and a half a cup of light brown sugar.

The other change that I made involved the wet ingredients - the recipe calls for 3/4 cup of oil. To up the apple-ness (that's a word, right??), I substituted 1/4 of a cup of applesauce in place of 1/4 of a cup of that oil.

Then the batter is mixed up, and the fruit (and veggie) is folded in, and the whole thing is poured into a sprayed baking dish.

And then it bakes! And turns beautiful and golden and smells delicious.

We served this as a side dish to roasted chicken, and it was absolutely delicious. Seriously, daddy and little miss thought that I'd put a scoop of dessert on their dinner plates. And they both had seconds.

And little miss may have had another piece for breakfast the next morning...

I will definitely be making this one again, and can't wait to try more recipes from Bizzy Bakes!


Apple Kugel
(only slightly adapted from Bizzy Bakes)

4 -5 apples, peeled, cored and cubed
1 carrot, peeled and shredded
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1 cup all  purpose flour
1/2 cup grandulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup oil
1/4 cup applesauce
juice of 1 lime (or 1 teaspoon lemon juice)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 eggs, beaten
Ground cinnamon to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray 1 1/2 quart casserole or 8 inch square baking pan with non-stick cooking spray.
In a medium bowl, combine apples, carrots and cranberries.  Set aside.
In a separate bowl, mix together flour, cinnamon, sugars, baking powder, oil, apple sauce, lime (or lemon) juice, vanilla extract and eggs. Mix together until well combined.
Add apple, carrot and cranberry mixture to prepared batter.  Mix well.
Pour into prepared pan.  (If you would like, sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top. I didn't do it this time, but I will definitely try it next time!)
Bake for 45 minutes at 350 degrees until golden on top.
Serve warm or hot.

Enjoy!


To check out more of the deliciousness from Secret Recipe Club members, check these out!