Minecraft wiki entry for Things_not_to_do, associated text: The player should not use golden apples to breed horses, as golden apples are hard to obtain. Instead, using golden carrots to breed horses consumes less gold as a golden carrot costs 8 gold nuggets while a golden apple costs 8 gold ingots. The player should avoid using enchanted golden apples on horses even more since they are uncraftable and can only be found in loot chests.