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When my children were young, we had apple trees. Two large apple trees. This meant that we got a lot of apples. I remember when it came time to make applesauce being concerned that it would be a difficult process. My then 6-year-old daughter said, “Mom, making apple sauce is easy. You just cook the apples and smash them up and you have applesauce.” She was pretty much right! Making applesauce just isn’t that difficult.
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So, this week, when I found a bag of apples that had been pushed to the corner of the garage and they were all old and kinda wrinkly I didn’t think about throwing them away… I thought, “mmmm… applesauce!” If you have old apples sitting around or just get a great deal at your local supermarket (maybe because they’re getting kinda wrinkly!), you can make your own applesauce. So simple and really delicious!
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What I did last night: I cored and peeled about 10 medium apples (the amount left in the bag). I quartered them and threw them in my slow cooker (I used my 1.5 quart slow cooker) with 1/2 C brown sugar and 1/2 C water. I left it on low for about 7 hours or so and then used my immersion blender to blend it all to applesauce consistency. We like ours quite pureed, but you can leave yours a little chunky if you want. Store in a quart jar. This will keep up to 3 weeks in the fridge (if it lasts that long).
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Here’s the thing about applesauce, though… you can add or take away whatever you want and it will still work. You can pretty much just put apples in the slow cooker with a small amount of water and let them cook all day and blend them up and it’s tasty. You can add other fruit that’s going bad (pears are especially good). You can add a cinnamon stick. You can add white sugar instead of brown sugar – or no sugar at all. You can add vanilla or lemon juice. You can also can just cook it up on the stove, covered on medium heat for about 15-20 minutes (until apples can be easily pureed). The stove top method is especially good if you’re just processing a few apples. Your only limitation is your imagination and it couldn’t be simpler.
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To core and peel, I recommend just using an apple corer and your favorite vegetable peeler. I have a fancy apple peeler/corer/slicer but I honestly think it’s more of a pain than it’s worth.
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Do you make applesauce? What do you put in yours?

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