Apple Sauce

Meijer has their Michigan apples on sale for 69 cents per pound. We've just been buying them to eat, but I've also been wanting to make apple sauce. I bought two pags full of mixed variety apples and decided to make apple sauce today. My favorite way of making apple sauce is using a Victorio Strainer. That's what we used when we made it as kids with my mom. I'm going to have her bring it so my next batches could be made with the strainer. One fun thing about using the strainer is this: you cook the apples with the skin on so it makes the apple flesh turn pink. Once the apples go through the strainer, the skin and seeds are separated from the flesh. You get a nice, light pink apple sauce. It's just pretty.

So I chose different varieties. Next time, I'll probably stick more to Ida Red's. Plus, their flesh can be pink as well. I skinned, cored and chopped up the apples. I put a little bit of water in thI didn't cook my first batch long enough so when I mashed it, it was more chunky than I wanted. I then decided to try using my blender, but one blender batch turned out like baby food (not pictured) - a whole lot more fine than I wanted.

The next batch of apples cooked longer so that when I just used a masher, it came out pretty good. I also didn't drain the water from the apples. I left it in so it wouldn't be dry. Once it cooled down a little, I transferred the apple sauce into zip bags to be put in the freezer. You could add your honey, cinnamon or whatever you like in your apple sauce before putting it in the bag, but we've just always added it as we used each thawed bag.

I saved a little in the pan and added honey and cinnamon and the kids ate it for lunch. They seemed to like it! They like apple sauce, but sometimes you wonder if they'll like the texture of homemade. My next batches will be made with a strainer so the texture will be more like what you buy in the store. But this version is easy and if you had apples to use up, you could make a "quick" batch for that evenings dinner. Homemade food is best and my favorite!

(Picture taken from Amazon.com) This is a Victorio Strainer. It's really amazing how it works! You can use it for making tomato sauce (shown in picture) or other fruits.