Maybe you need to add a little more flour?

It's very important to use enough oil and make sure it's really hot to get that wonderful, crispy texture.

I've been thinking flour might help, but I can't imagine that making enough difference. My fritters were as soft as cake (well, except for the pieces of apple). I used a combo of all purpose and whole wheat.

And I fried in a big cast iron dutch oven, tons of oil, quite hot and not overloaded. I can make doughnuts and other fired things with no problem, but not fritters.

I'll try more flour (small batches so I can adjust as I go. And mimipadv, can you suggest a temperature? I usually just wing it, and the recipe just says "hot oil," but maybe that will help.

Thanks, ya'll!

I'm no expert here, and I haven't made the kind of apple fritters you're talking about (though they were my favorite thing for study breaks in college). What I know from frying other things, however, is that what both Linda and Mimipadv said are what leads to that kind of hard exterior: Very hot oil and a fairly dry exterior. The latter could be more flour or less liquid, or, if it's firm enough to make a ball of your dough (rather than pouring like a batter), you could dust or roll it in flour before it goes in. The other thing, is that those hard fritters are very well done and the edges are dried . Perhaps you just need to cook them longer?

For oil temperature, I'd go as high as 400° with a high smoke point oil, figuring to cook at 375°, but Mimipadv probably has better suggestions. The doughnuts, etc., don't want to be that hot for the same reason--the hardness on the outside. :) For most golden brown frying, I aim for 375° to cook at 350°.

You might also try smaller pieces of apple in the fritters...less wet stuff to make the fritters soft.

It's the middle of the night and there aren't many ways of procrastinating, so I went looking. Again, I'm no expert, so I don't know by reading if this is a good recipe, but the pictures look closest to that doughnut shop apple fritter, so I thought you might like to look at it. The Kitchn apple fritter. The only thing is they don't quite look dark enough or hard enough, but go in at 360°.

This one from Chowhound is lumpy outside in a way I'm not used to. Good pictures of the preparation. They do 350° and it has a dark, hard-looking, exterior.

So maybe it really is the cooktime?

Wondering if the softness vs. firmness is due to more vs. less liquid/moisture?

Thank you all! With such god. logical feedback, I think I'm starting to see the light. Lindac is likely right about the size of the apple chunks and probably the amount of apple. Mine were pretty big; I was going for that rounded chunkiness I like.

And listening to plllog and reading those great-sounding recipes, I'm sure my recipe uses much more liquid than I need. My recipe also called for making the fritters big, as much as I could keep on the spoon. That means that, in the hot oil, the outside will burn before the inside is done. (That second recipe looks like exactly what I'm after!)

And the big surprise: My recipe doesn't use yeast. In fact, I've tried a few different recipes, and none of them use yeast. For doughnuts, yes, but not fritters. I can hardly wait to try them again!

Thank you all again!