(Mass Appeal) – Fall in New England means apple picking! And what better way to use the fruits of your labor, than to make a delicious apple sauce. Here to share her recipe is our Diva of Deliciousness, Tinky Weisblat!
Recipe Title: Windfall Applesauce
Description: This tasty, healthy treat makes fall last all year long.
Course: Side or Dessert
Cuisine: American
Yield: About 1 pint
Difficulty Level: Pretty Easy
Preparation Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time (minutes): 20 to 45 minutes or even longer
Ingredients:
enough apples to make 6 generous cups of cut-up apples (preferably more than 1 variety)
1 cinnamon stick
1 pinch salt (optional but good)
1/4 cup sweet apple cider, plus additional cider as needed
maple syrup to taste, depending on the tartness of your apples; 1 to 2 tablespoons should suffice (optional but good)
Cooking Directions:
Wash the apples and quarter them (actually, Tinky tends to cut them into eighths if they are at all big). Remove any bad spots, but don’t worry about cutting out the core and seeds if you have a food mill.
Place the apple pieces, the cinnamon stick, the salt, and the cider in a 4-quart pot. Bring the mixture to a simmer over low heat, covered, and simmer it until the apples soften, checking frequently to see whether you need to add more cider to keep the sauce from burning. The cooking time will depend on the type and age of your apples and how many of them you are using. A 6-cup batch may take as little as 20 minutes, but a larger, firmer batch can take up to an hour.
Let the apples cool for a few minutes; then run them through a food mill. Discard the skin and seeds (excellent pig food or compost!), and place the sauce in a saucepan. Add maple syrup to taste, and heat until the syrup dissolves, stirring to keep the syrup from burning.
If you want to can your sauce, reheat it to the boiling point, ladle it into sterilized pint jars, and process the jars in a boiling-water bath for 20 minutes.
The yield will depend on your apples. Six generous cups of apple pieces provide about 1 pint of sauce. Feel free to multiply this recipe if your apple harvest is copious.