I hope all of you had a great Halloween! Mine was especially great because I got to dress up in 3 different costumes haha. Anyway, this year I decided to try making caramel apples for Halloween. I love caramel apples, but I don’t really love having to try and bite into a huge apple or slicing it and taking the risk of any chocolate, caramel, and nuts pieces breaking off. So to avoid the mess, I wanted to try something new and make miniature versions. After some research, I found that a lot of mini caramel apple recipes started with a large whole apple and scooping out apple pieces with a melon baller. Sounds simple enough, but the results just didn’t look as appetizing as a whole caramel apple.
So, I decided to go on a search for the smallest apples I could find. Luckily, Whole Foods had a huge selection of small apples and I finally found what I was looking for. I ended up buying “crab apples” which are the smallest apples I’ve ever seen. Most of the crab apples were slightly larger than ping pong balls, and they tasted a little sweet and tart.
The whole process of making the mini caramel apples took longer than expected. Mostly, due to the fact that I had about 20 apples, and each took a while to prep and dip. The hardest part was sticking the lollipop sticks in…my hands were so sore from having to shove those little sticks in and you had to be extra careful because they bend so easily. I suggest wearing oven mitts while doing this or something to protect your hands. But after all the hard work, the best part was the decorating. I went a little overboard and decided to try and come up with every caramel apple combination I could think of (caramel, chocolate, nuts, m&ms, sprinkles, etc.). Overall, the outcome was a success and I’m happy to say that my friends enjoyed these mini caramel apples more than those ginormous ones haha.
Mini Caramel Apples
Ingredients:
about 20 crab apples
20 lollipop sticks
2 bags of caramel bits
1 bag of chocolate chips
an assortment of toppings (m&ms, sprinkles, nuts, etc.)
Directions:
1. Prep apples (wash, dry, and de-stem)
2. Place lollipop sticks into the center of apple where the stem used to be.
3. Place wax paper on baking sheet and spray with cooking spray.
4. Melt caramel and dip apples into the caramel. Place on baking sheet. Let apples cool.
5. Melt chocolate and dip the caramel apples into the chocolate.
6. After dipping into chocolate, immediately place any additional toppings on the apple.
7. Place finished apples on baking sheet and let them set in the refrigerator.
8. Take apples out of fridge 15 min. before serving.
Cute tiny crab apples
Prepped and ready for dipping!
These caramel bits were very easy to use and tasted great.
The finished product!