ve when eaten before breakfast or at night.

Cooked entire, and without any addition, the well-flavored apple is
among the most perfect and economical of the subacid fruits for
every-day use, and for the invalid's tray is seldom surpassed. Baked in
its own juice, with sugar and additional flavoring, or boiled in syrup,
it is relished equally with the breakfast mush, the dinner meat, and the
supper bread and cake. Combined with cream, custard, whipped white of
egg, or tapioca, which add nutriment without destroying the fruit
flavor, it affords a delicate dessert, inexpensive and easily prepared.
Steamed or baked, with a light covering or crust of biscuit dough or
pastry, it has a variety of forms, all used for dinner, and usually made
complete with sweetened cream, or in other cases with a bit of good
cheese.

The skin, while not digestible, is not often injurious, and as the best
flavor is contained in the surface portion of the apple, careless paring
is wasteful and unnecessary, especially when the fruit is to be baked.
The unbroken envelope retains the steam produced as the juice is heated,
thus hastening the process of expanding and bursting the tiny cells and
converting the firm pulp into a delicate sauce. This suggests that, in
order to produce the desirable lightness, the oven should be
sufficiently hot to change the water of the fruit into steam. If the
skin is tough or for other reasons is removed, the clean, unblemished
parings, with the cores, may be simmered in water until the flavor and
color make it a useful addition for pudding sauce, preserves, or jelly.
It is usually best to remove the core before cooking, and, when the
apple (as for compote) is not to be otherwise cut after paring, it
should be cored before the skin is taken off, to prevent breaking.

The various forms of boiled and steamed apples are attractive and
generally liked. The requisites are: To select good fruit and wash it
clean before cutting; to remove only a thin paring, _all_ of the core,
and the bruised, discolored and defective parts; to intensify rather
than obscure the apple flavor, using only enough of sugar, spice, or
lemon, when any is needed, to accomplish this purpose; to use granite or
porcelain-lined utensils (avoiding even tin covers) and silver or wooden
spoons; to retain by slow cooking and careful handling the perfect form
of the fruit, or else to produce, by stirring and straining, a light,
lumpless sauce; to serve the