Cinnamon Apples

• 4 apples (Granny Smith or Honey Crisp work great)
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• Optional: red pepper flakes

1. Cut each apple in half and remove core. Slice into thin slices - about 1/4 inch wide - and place them on a plate.
2. Drizzle honey over apples, and carefully sprinkle cinnamon over apples. If using, add a pinch of red pepper flakes.
3. At this point, you can either serve the apples, add them to a pan and sauté them until tender, or place them in a baking dish and bake for 20 minutes at 350ºF.

The crabapple is the only apple native to North America.

Apples come in all shades of reds, greens, and yellows.

2,500 varieties of apples are grown in the United States.

7,500 varieties of apples are grown throughout the world.

Apples are grown in all 50 states.

Apples are fat, sodium, and cholesterol free.

The pilgrims planted the first United States apple trees in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Apple varieties range in size from a little larger than a cherry to as large as a grapefruit. The largest apple picked weighed three pounds.

The apple tree originated in an area between the Caspian and the Black Sea.

It takes the energy from 50 leaves to produce one apple.

Apples are the second most valuable fruit grown in the United States. Oranges are first.

In colonial time, apples were called winter banana or melt-in-the-mouth.

America's longest-lived apple tree was reportedly planted in 1647 by Peter Stuyvesant in his Manhattan orchard and was still bearing fruit when a derailed train struck it in 1866.

Archeologists have found evidence that humans have been enjoying apples since at least 6500 B.C.