What do you do when you get to many Granny Smith apples in your Bountiful Baskets weekly produce share? Why you make applesauce of course…

My family isn’t overly fond of eating Granny Smith apples raw. We love them baked and even sauteed with brown sugar and cinnamon but not really raw. This week I got quite a few of them in my produce co op share and I decided that I would make applesauce with them. My husband and daughter both enjoy applesauce so I knew they wouldn’t go to waste.

I don’t really have a recipe that I follow, and I am not really a cook who loves to measure. So this applesauce is extremely simple and I basically just toss it all together.

First I gather all the apples that I want to use, this week it was every Granny Smith  that I received this week (approximately 14 I think). I grab my favorite small crock pot ( a cuisinart 3.5 quart crock pot, it has a digital timer), a cutting board and my paring knife.

Next I start peeling. I don’t use any fancy tools for peeling apples. I use the same method that my Grandmother taught me to do when I was a young girl in small town Michigan. She would say “Kimmie Ann, you don’t need anything fancy just a good sharp knive and be careful not to cut yourself”. So that is the method I have always used.

Once they are all peeled I quarter each apple and lay each wedge on their side and slide off the core.

Once they are cored I chop them all in to pieces. It doesn’t really matter how small you cut them, they are going to cook just fine in the crock pot.

Once they are all chopped and in the crock pot I toss them with about a tablespoon of lemon juice. Sorry this week I didn’t get fresh lemons in my produce basket so I had to use bottled. Not as good, but will work just fine.

Then I pour in maybe a 1/2 to 3/4 cup of water and stir.

I cover the crock pot and turn it on low for 6 hours. I do stir it maybe half way through to make sure nothing is sticking to the side of the crock pot.

Once the 6 hours has finished I take my potato masher and start mashing the apples. My family likes the sauce to be a bit chunky and not totally smooth so a potato masher works perfectly for me. At this point you can taste it and see if it is sweet enough for you. My family tends to like it a bit on the tart side, so I don’t add any sweetener to it. You could add pure maple syrup, honey, organic sugar or plain white sugar to it. It will still be quite warm so if you do use sugar it will dissolve into the sauce without any problem.

Then I ladle it into a quart mason jar and store it in the refrigerator. It will keep a couple of weeks. I never worry about it spoiling since they always eat it long before we would have to worry about it.