Preparation time: 45 minutes. The sugar amounts are just guidelines, depending your taste, and on the sweetness of your apples, use less or more. If you use less sugar, you'll likely want to use less lemon juice. The lemon juice brightens the flavor of the apples and balances the sweetness.
Ingredients
3 to 4 lbs of peeled, cored, and quartered apples. (Make sure you use a good cooking apple like Golden Delicious, Granny Smith, Fuji, Jonathan, Mcintosh, or Gravenstein.)
4 strips of lemon peel - use a vegetable peeler to strip 4 lengths
Juice of one lemon, about 3-4 Tbsp
3 inches of cinnamon stick
1/4 cup of dark brown sugar
up to 1/4 cup of white sugar
1 cup of water
1/2 teaspoon of salt
Directions:
1 Put all ingredients into a large pot. Cover. Bring to boil. Lower heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes.
2 Remove from heat. Remove cinnamon sticks and lemon peels. Mash with potato masher.
Ready to serve, either hot or refrigerated. Delicious with vanilla ice cream or vanilla yogurt.
Freezes easily, lasts up to one year in a cold freezer.
Cranberry Applesauce
3 to 4 pounds of peeled, cored, roughly chopped Granny Smith apples (or other good cooking apple such as Golden Delicious, Fuji, Jonathan, Mcintosh, or Gravenstein)
1 1/2 cups to 2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries
2 Tbsp lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup of brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
Directions:
1 Place all of the ingredients in a large (5-quart) pot. Bring to a boil, lower heat to a simmer and cover. Cook 20-30 minutes, or until the apples can easily be mashed.
2 Remove from heat. Mash the apples and cranberries with a potato masher to the consistency you want.
Serve hot as a side to pork or turkey. Or serve hot or cold as a dessert with some vanilla ice cream.
Store in the refrigerator for a couple of weeks. Or freeze for up to a year.
Makes 1 1/2 to 2 quarts.
