This exceedingly wholesome fruit should be often used, raw preferably. Select perfect, bright-looking apples and arrange prettily with oranges or other fruit in season, and serve at beginning to any meal.

1. Baked Apples

Wash and core a sufficient number of good-sized tart apples. Put a little sugar in each core (or omitted if desired) and bake in a hot oven until soft. About one-half an hour will usually suffice, but much depends on the apples.

2. Apple Sauce

Pare and cut up tart apples. Put in saucepan, and with just enough hot water to prevent burning and cook quickly until soft - about fifteen minutes. Put through colander or potato ricer, and then return to the stove with enough sugar added to sweeten to taste for five minutes. A rose geranium leaf, washed well and put in the bottom of the dish into which the sauce is poured, imparts a very delicate flavor. Cook apple sauce in graniteware, never in tin.

3. Stewed Crab Apples

Wash a quart of crab apples, and stew twenty minutes in one pint hot water. Add one cup sugar, cook five minutes longer, and set to cool.

4. Dried Apples

Wash carefully and stew very slowly for two to two and a half hours.