Applesauce

Just as the vegetable garden is slowing down, the orchard kicks into high gear.  What to do with all the apples!  We have 6 apple trees, all fairly young.  The production wasn't stellar this year, probably things were a bit cool at the critical pollination time.  That said, however, we still have more apples than we can eat fresh.  I made a few apple crisps, and we've eaten lots.  There are still quite a few apples to deal with.  The obvious solution is applesauce which is good all on its own or used in baking - such as applesauce cake.  Check out the links for the recipes.

I had already bottled applesauce made of Gravenstein apples and had some more made up waiting to be bottled.  Today I used some Liberty apples.  The Liberty apple is a delicious tart apple for eating fresh.  It's small compared to other apples, but has dense, crisp white flesh housed in a pretty red skin.  That red skin lends a lovely blush to the applesauce.

Since I'm using my latest kitchen tool, a food mill, to process the applesauce, preparing the apples is a snap.  I quarter them, take out the seeds and chop off the dried blossom end - purely for esthetics - chop them and into the pot they go.  No need to peel or core.

I added a little water to the pot, just to keep the apples from burning, popped the lid on and simmered them slowly, stirring from time to time.  I found with the Liberty apples that I needed to add a bit of water several times.  The Gravenstein apples are much juicier and didn't need further water added.  You just have to keep an eye on them while they're cooking and judge for yourself if you need to add water.

When the apples were cooked down, I spooned them into the food mill.  This one is made by Oxo and the design is excellent.  It goes together and comes apart easily and the legs, which fold up for storage, fit over a range of bowl sizes.  It comes with 3 sieve attachments - I used the medium one.

In a minute or two, I had a bowl of thick tasty applesauce.  As both Gravenstein and Liberty apples have their own sweetness, there was no need to add sugar.  I reheated the applesauce so that I could bottle it in 1-cup jars, the perfect amount for applesauce cake.  I jarred both the Liberty applesauce made today and that of Gravenstein apples which I'd made yesterday.

It's easy to tell which is Liberty and which is Gravenstein!

The final step was processing the jars in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.  I now have 7 more jars of applesauce to add to the 6 I did last week.  That should be more than enough for our household.