If you want some delicious homemade applesauce gather yourself some apples at a good deal. I price matched these at walmart for 3lbs for a dollar. Get a little workspace ready. (I like to do my peeling and cutting on our little coffee table chest because then i can watch TV while doing it and it makes the time go faster.) My approach was to peel as many apples as would fit on the cutting board then use my handy apple corer/slicer to easily cut the apples and get them into the big pot, add some lemon juice to prevent browning and repeat until you pot is full to the brim (see below). I could fill one pot with about 13lbs of apples and those 13lbs made exactly 6 jars each batch.
Now you're ready to get these on the stove. I added 2 cups of water to prevent sticking to the bottom of the pot. Let these work on the stove until they reduce and are soft and mushy. It took me 20 minutes or so to get them to the right point. When they're ready to be mashed they'll look like this. (below)
Now you're ready to mash or blend these apples into applesauce. I have a stick blender that i used. It's convenient because i didn't have to worry about transferring apples back and forth between a blender or food processor. If you don't mind a coarse applesauce then a potato masher will work fine too.
After the apples are to your liking add sugar and cinnamon to your liking. You don't have to add sugar at all, i added 1 cup for this entire pot and it was to my liking. And we like cinnamon applesauce so i added a bunch of that too.
Now you're ready to put your sauce in the jars and process them. Ladle hot applesauce into clean hot jars (soak them in hot water while you're apples are reducing and you're set). Leave a generous 1/2 inch head space (area between where the applesauce ends and the lid begins). Clean the rims of the jars and place the lids and rings on tightly.
Place the prepared jars into a canner or large pot, cover with water, bring to a boil and let boil 20 minutes. Turn off the heat, remove the jars after standing for 5 minutes. Let stand until all jars have sealed (when the middle of the lid is down not up). Mark your lids with month and year and get ready to enjoy for months to come. I also love to give canned goodies as thank you gifts or Christmas gifts.
Entire process about 2 hours per batch.
Ta Da! In the past couple days i made 18 jars of applesauce. When all was said and done each jar cost less then a dollar to make and some of my time. We already had the jars and lids so all i had to buy was apples. If you have to buy jars the first time your cost will be slightly higher but then you'll have jars for the future so it's an investment. And you can find jars at your local thrift store for very cheap. You're also likely to find them at garage sales. We have dozens of jars thanks to friends who have scouted them for us!
