The original fruit by the metre*

*small canadian joke

Have you seen that very scary bright red shiny plastic-looking stuff that's supposed to be good for you called fruit by the foot or fruit roll-ups? To which are added sugars, flavours and dyes but is marketed as if it were capital-H healthy? Woo, so it's high in vitamin C - I ask you what's not high in vitamin C these days? If you live and eat in north america, you'd have to work pretty hard to get less than your rda of vitamin C. If vitamin C is a food's biggest claim, then perhaps it's not worth the money. And to repeat myself, I try to buy food not made by machines.

When I was a girl, my mum baked a lot and one of our treats was when she peeled apples. We'd gather round begging for peels and hoping for the longest unbroken string, enjoying succulent flavours and the often-crunchy freshness. We'd marvel at mum's dexterity with the peeler; something almost impossible for our small and untrained hands.

As I got older and learned to work a peeler, I took pride in each apple peeled in a single string. Now my kids watch in amazement and fight over the peels.

Fresh apple peels have it all - nutritious, delicious, ephemeral, seasonal. They are beautiful and varied, fun to play with and easy to eat, and best of all you can eat the wrapping.