Fruit Foil Desserts

Foil can be used to cook some delicious fruit desserts. Apples and bananas are particularly popular fruits to cook using foil. Foil provides an easy way to cook with no-mess cleanup. It is often used to cook over coals, but foil may also be used to cook the same dishes right at home in your oven.

Baked apples are a camp favorite. To make this delicious dessert, take a large apple, leave the peeling on and core it, leaving a portion of the bottom intact. If possible, save a portion of the top to cover the filled apple. Fill the core with your choice of filling, such as cinnamon and sugar, walnuts, raisins, marshmallows, nutmeg, brown sugar, butter, and/or coconut. Replace a portion of the top to keep the filling in as the apple cooks. Wrap the entire apple in tin foil, shiny side up. Heavy-duty aluminum foil is best. It will be less likely to puncture and will help keep the food from burning. Place the foil-wrapped apple in coals and cook for about 10 minutes. Carefully remove the package, unwrap and enjoy.

A different way to do baked apples is to simply slice the apples, put the slices in the middle of the foil and sprinkle with the desired toppings. Close the foil, and cook on the coals. You can substitute peaches instead of apples for this if desired.

Another favorite foil fruit dish is banana boats. To make banana boats, cut a v-shaped wedge along the top entire length of the banana, leaving the peel attached at one end if possible. You can eat the wedge. Fill the cavity with fillings such as chocolate chips, mini marshmallows, nuts, peanut butter, butterscotch chips, Reeses pieces, or any other filling that you desire. Replace the peel over the top of the filling and wrap in aluminum foil, with the shiny side to the inside of the package. Place the fruit package on its side in coals. Cook for about 2-3 minutes on each side. The key is to get the fillings to melt, without totally cooking the banana, which makes it somewhat mushy. You end up with a dish that is a campfire version of a banana split (without the ice cream!).

Here is a simple way to make individual pineapple upside down cake. Take a plain cake doughnut and cut it in half, like a bagel. Take a pineapple slice and place it between each half of the donut. Wrap in foil and place on coals for 5 minutes, turning at least once. Serve with whipped cream.