How do you like them apples? How to make use of fallen autumn apples

It would be rude not to do something with autumn’s falling apples, says Valerie O’Connor.

Apples are falling from the trees everywhere. If pigs could roam freely in Co Limerick (where they inevitably do anyway), they would have a party chowing down on the windfalls littering so many unattended gardens. Why everybody doesn’t have a cider press is beyond me.

I live in the middle of Limerick City so the only way I’d get apples straight from the tree is to go robbing orchards like we used to do when we were kids. Growing up, we had five trees at the back of the house all standing in obedience along one side of the garden.