A simple treasure culled from my mom’s recipe box, as written:

Very Special Baked Apples From James Beard

Core apples and cut away a slice of skin from the top. Place apples on rounds of bread fried in butter to a delicate brown crispness. Fill apple cavities with sugar, 2 o 3 drops of vanilla and a good dab of butter and bake them in a glass or earthenware baking dish in a 350 oven until the apples are tender, and serve them with pouring cream.

The crisp, buttery rounds of bread transform into their own delicious pastry treat after becoming saturated with the warm sugared apple juices – very special, indeed.

p.s. Jessica, thank you for the heavenly butter-hued, grass-fed raw cream.