Baked Apples with Sweet Potatoes

The original recipe, “Apple Stuffed with Sweet Potatoes,” is from the 1941 edition of Ruth Wakefield’s Toll House Tried and True Recipes. We adapted the recipe to make a delicious and quick snack, but the original recipe is perfect as a sweet side dish or a dessert.

Forgive today’s photos—I took them after sunset so it was dark in the house. I’ll try to remember to take a few more next time we have this as a snack or dessert.

Here’s the original recipe.

Apple Stuffed with Sweet Potato

Core large red apples and cut crosswise into two circles. Allow one half for each person. Place in shallow baking pan with cut side of circle up. Fill core and cover cut side of apple with brown sugar and bake slowly until tender.

Have ready well seasoned and smoothly mashed sweet potato. Pile on top of apple, swirling potato into attractive peaks. Cover with melted butter and place into oven long enough to reheat and brown lightly.

Pineapple rings can be used in place of apples. If you do this, flavor the sweet potato with the pineapple juice.

Our Snack Version

We cored and sliced the apples and then followed the instructions above, covering each slice with brown sugar and baking. We then covered each slice with mashed sweet potatoes and butter and browned the slices a bit. You can mash canned sweet potatoes to really speed things up.

Results

This is one of our favorite snacks. The apples are warm and soft, and the brown sugar, sweet potatoes, and butter make this a sweet treat that we never seem to make enough of. If you crave a little crunch, adding chopped nuts would add that extra bit of texture. Make more than you think you’ll need—you can never have too many!