To pick up the sweet theme again - a nice treat for young and old alike, and a recipe that requires a healthy disregard for Health and Safety, as it involves Hot Things. You have been warned.

Ingredients:

8-10 small apples - coxes or russets are good. (I do mean small - you want more candy and less apples!)

One stout kebab stick per two apples

A greased baking tray (or use baking parchment)

1/2 lb granulated sugar

1/8 pt water

Pinch tartaric acid (cream of tartar)

Method:

Make sure the apples are clean and dry, then starting at the stalk end, push half a kebab stick almost though the core. Wipe off any juices.

Put the sugar and water in a heavy pan with the tartaric acid, stir gently till sugar dissolves, then boil hard without stirring till the syrup is just turning a gentle straw colour (145 degrees C on your thermometer). Take off the heat, and twirl each apple in the toffee, allow to drain for a second, then put on the tray to cool.

If any toffee is left over, pour it out and break up when cold.

Eat as soon as they are cool: the combination of glassy toffee and cold sweet apple is magic. Leave them a few hours at this damp time of year, and you'll have dripping browning apples to look forward to!

To make more grown-up ones, you can leave the toffee for a few seconds more till it's darker - but it continues to cook off the heat, so don't overdo it or you have black bitterness to look forward to.