I found my new favorite way to keep apples from turning brown! My mom introduced me to this technique a few days ago. She uses it all the time when packing school lunches for my younger sisters, and they love it. It’s called “True Lemon” (crystallized lemon). She found it in the spice section of the grocery store–it’s pretty much lemon juice substitute in powder form. And it has all natural ingredients so I feel OK about using it. Ingredients: citric acid, lemon oil, lemon juice, vitamin C, and maltodextrin (maltodextrin is a natural sweetener derived from starch. I’m not too concerned about it). The bottle was about $4 but it’ll last a long time, so I think it’s worth it.
Just sprinkle some on and it keeps it nice and white until you’re ready to eat! So much easier and less messy than trying to squeeze lemon juice all over them 🙂 The longer you wait to eat the apple, the more the flavor soaks into the actual apple. My sisters described as “lemonadey.”
Note: If you don’t like lemon juice on apples, this may not be something you’ll enjoy. I love it! But it does give it a bit of a zing 🙂
I’m excited to try crystallized lemon on other things – it says you can use it in baking, on seafood and meat, and as a lemon juice substitute. I want to try it in place of lemon pepper and see how it goes.