A cooking apple differs from an eating apple in that a cooking apple is normally too tart for most people to tolerate eating raw. Cooking apples also tend to stay intact during the cooking process, making it ideal for apple crumble, apple crisp, or apple pie. With just a little bit of sugar, it turns from a very tart, raw apple, to a sweet and delicious cooked apple. Some of the most common apples to choose from are Granny Smith apples, Gala, Jonagold , Honeycrisp, Braeburn, or Cortland apples. When I cook with apples I usually choose between Granny Smith apples and Honeycrisp because they tend to be more readily available for me, but any of the apples listed will work for this recipe and taste delicious.