Hate Peeling Apples? There’s An App For That!

Better known as a “device.”

As much time as I spend playing with very sharp knives, I have never cut myself with a knife from my arsenal. My hands have chosen another arch enemy: the vegetable peeler – a device designed to take skin off in strips instead of slices.

I can’t blame the vegetable peeler – my wrists and thumbs are painful and stiff from arthritis so the mechanics of hand-peeling is difficult for me. The kitchen equipment isn’t faulty, my physical equipment is faulty. I have found workaround hand positions that allow me to do other wrist-centric activities like cutting and grating without too much pain (or risk of personal injury), but I can’t seem to find a workaround for peeling.

Potatoes? Cook ’em with their skins on! Apples? Forget about it!

But things are looking up for me now. A friend of mine in Arkansas recently sent me a box of beautiful Arkansas Black apples – apples from a farmer’s market – apples that came from an orchard address instead of a supermarket. Apples in the peak of their season. What’s a whiny arthritic to do?

Fortunately, mechanical apple peelers are, like, a thing this season. They’re making a round in different stores with different brand names at anywhere from $10 to $20.

An apple peeler is like a miniature lathe for apples. A spindle advances a whole apple through a fixed assembly line where a blade shaves-off the peel and another blade cores and slices the apple. They were invented over 200 years ago – Thomas Jefferson had one of the originals at his Montecello plantation home. If it’s good enough for Thomas Jefferson (and it’s only $10 or so) then it’s good enough for me.

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Here’s the apple that inspired the purchase of a dedicated device:

In sunlight, the apple has a garnet-black color – it is the darkest colored apple I have ever seen.

In kitchen light, this apple looks more like a stemmed plum – sort of an indigo-black.

These apples have a unique taste that I can only describe as somewhere between a Braeburn and a Granny Smith – yet different. It is firm and crunchy. The best cooking apple I have ever worked with! The only fault I can find with them is that they tend to start browning VERY quickly when peeled and exposed to air. But I’m going to be cooking with these gems so who cares about a little premature browning…

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And here’s my new kitchen friend that made the pies and fritters you’ll see in the next two posts possible:

Enameled cast iron with a suction cup base (it can also be clamped) – stainless steel spindle with a spiraled feed groove – three-pronged fork to hold the apple from the top – spring-loaded peeling blade that can be adjusted for depth – and, to the far left, a blade that spiral-slices and cores the apple.