Chef Joost
Appelcompote
Appelcompote is the apple left with its dignity: soft enough to spoon beside pork or potatoes, still chunky enough to remind you autumn did the real work.
Culinary Explorer
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Appelmoes
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The little bowl beside the plate is never decoration: appelmoes is the Dutch treaty between sweet and savoury, spooned beside sausage, potatoes, pancakes, and childhood itself.
Sauces & Condiments
Dutch
Weeknight
Budget Friendly
10 min
Active Time
20 min cook•30 min total
Yield4 servings
In my grandmother's second notebook, appelmoes never had its own grand page. It lived in the margins, beside pork cutlets, beside boiled potatoes, beside pancakes for a Friday when money was behaving badly. That tells you exactly what it is. Not a dessert pretending to be useful, and not a sauce trying to become important. It is the quiet spoonful that makes the plate behave.
The name already tells you enough: appel is apple, moes is mash or pulp, the same old Dutch family of soft things crushed into usefulness. But let me tell you a secret. Foreigners often meet Dutch appelmoes with bafflement because we put it beside meat, fries, or schnitzel and think nothing strange has happened. We are right. The tart apple cuts fat, the sugar softens the apple's edge, and the cinnamon reminds you that even weekday cooking in this frugal country has long kept a spice drawer with opinions.
Use apples that collapse, and do not be too proud to mix varieties. A firm eating apple gives you cubes floating in syrup, which is not the dish. You want the fruit to surrender into a smooth, pale sauce with a little body left in it. Hou het altijd simpel, always keep it simple: apples, a splash of water, a little sugar, cinnamon if the table expects it, and patience enough to let the pan do the work. Serve it warm beside sausage or cold from the refrigerator the next day, when children will eat it by the spoon and pretend nobody saw.
Apple sauces and fruit mashes appear throughout early modern Dutch cookery, especially in household books where orchard fruit was preserved, dried, stewed, or turned into moes for everyday meals. The Dutch habit of serving appelmoes beside savoury dishes reflects an older northern European taste for sweet-sour accompaniments with pork, sausage, potatoes, and fried foods, rather than a modern children's-menu invention. Cinnamon became an ordinary Dutch kitchen spice through seventeenth-century trade, which is why even a budget sauce can carry a trace of the VOC spice cupboard.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
tart apples, such as Goudreinette, Jonagold, Elstar, or a mix
Quantity
1 kg
peeled, cored, and chopped
water
Quantity
75 ml
sugar
Quantity
30 g
plus more to taste
ground cinnamon (optional)
Quantity
1 teaspoon
lemon juice (optional)
Quantity
1 teaspoon
salt
Quantity
1 pinch
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| tart apples, such as Goudreinette, Jonagold, Elstar, or a mixpeeled, cored, and chopped | 1 kg |
| water | 75 ml |
| sugarplus more to taste | 30 g |
| ground cinnamon (optional) | 1 teaspoon |
| lemon juice (optional) | 1 teaspoon |
| salt | 1 pinch |
Equipment Needed
- •Medium heavy-bottomed saucepan with lid
- •Potato masher or food mill
- •Peeler and small knife
Instructions
- 1
Prepare the apples
Peel, core, and chop the apples into rough pieces of about two centimetres. Do not fuss over perfect cubes; the best pieces are the ones that give up quickly. If your apples brown while you work, leave them alone. They are going into a pan, not a museum case.
- 2
Start the pan
Put the apples, water, sugar, salt, and cinnamon if using into a medium saucepan. Set it over medium heat and stir once so the sugar touches the fruit. The water is only there to prevent catching at the start; the apples will soon release their own juice, which is where the flavour lives.
If your apples are very sweet, hold back half the sugar until the end. Appelmoes should be sweet-sour, not jam in a side bowl. - 3
Stew until soft
Cover the pan and let the apples cook gently for 12 to 15 minutes, stirring now and then, until the pieces slump when pressed with a spoon. If the bottom looks dry before the apples soften, add another tablespoon of water. Hurry the heat and you brown the fruit; keep it gentle and you get the pale, clean sauce Dutch tables expect.
- 4
Mash smooth
Take the pan off the heat and mash the apples with a potato masher for a loose home texture, or pass them through a food mill for a smoother sauce. Taste now. Add lemon juice if the sauce needs brightness, or a little more sugar if the apples were stern. The right taste is not candy. It should make pork, sausage, or fried potatoes feel lighter.
- 5
Serve or chill
Serve the appelmoes warm beside sausages, schnitzel, or boiled potatoes, or spoon it into a bowl and chill it for later. It thickens as it cools, so stir in a spoonful of water if you want it looser the next day. At the Dutch table, this is often passed in a small bowl, because generosity does not always need a serving platter.
Chef Tips
- •Use Goudreinette if you can find it. Dutch cooks love it for appelmoes because it cooks down willingly and keeps a good tart edge. Elstar or Jonagold will also behave well.
- •Do not use only crisp dessert apples that refuse to collapse. They are fine for lunchboxes, less fine for moes, mash, where softness is the whole point.
- •Cinnamon is common, but not compulsory. Leave it out if the sauce is going beside very delicate meat, or add only a small pinch so the apples still speak first.
- •For a chunkier table version, mash only half the pan and leave the rest in soft pieces. For children, pass it through a sieve or food mill and watch diplomacy happen at dinner.
Advance Preparation
- •Appelmoes keeps 4 days covered in the refrigerator and can be served cold, room temperature, or gently rewarmed.
- •Freeze in small portions for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and stir well before serving, because fruit sauces loosen as they wake up.
- •For a weeknight plate, make it earlier in the day and chill it. The flavour settles, and one less pan asks for your attention at dinner.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 250g)
Calories
150 calories
Total Fat
0 g
Saturated Fat
0 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
0 g
Cholesterol
0 mg
Sodium
70 mg
Total Carbohydrates
40 g
Dietary Fiber
4 g
Sugars
33 g
Protein
1 g
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