Baby Food: Applesauce

Who doesn't like apples, right?

And, applesauce is so versatile, it makes a great option for baby food.

There is a simple way to whip up a quick one or two batch serving, but this is how you would make apple sauce in bulk. For this particular set of photos, I had about 30# of apples and it took a stock pot and dutch oven to cook them all down in. My end result was 3 pints and 3 quarts canned. And about six 4oz jars to go fresh, into the fridge, for the little man.

Since I have a food mill, I was able to just roughly dice up the apples. I HATE peeling apples in mass quantity. After two seasons of doing so, I got smart and splurged the $25 for a food mill :) And, bonus, when you cook the apples with the skin on, they sauce is a nice, rosy color! (If the skins are red, of course!)

You will want to add enough liquid to the bottom of your pot just to keep the apples from burning and you heat & cook them down. For the liquid, you have options! Exciting, right? You can use water or jazz it up a tad and use apple juice or apple cider. I use cider if I have it. If not, I just use plain 'ol water.

Cook them down over medium to medium-high heat. The amount of apples you are cooking will make the cook time vary. Mine took approx. 25 minutes.

This is what they looked like cooked down. One you can pierce the pieces with a fork, you're good.

Then, take the apple 'slop' out of the pot and into your food mill and churn away until you have this b.e.a.u.tiful sauce pictured below. All the while, your skins, seeds and core stay in the food mill for easy disposal! YAHOO!

Now, you can water bath can this if you add in about 2 tbsp of lemon juice. Or, store fresh in the fridge for a week or so. Or, freeze it if you have the freezer space.

For baby, you have some other options to make it fun so it isn't just always applesauce! Try mixing something else in with it! Pureed banana's or blueberries. Or, my latest, pumpkin! Yes, that is correct. I took some of my baby pumpkin puree, prior to adding spices, and then added a 'tinch' of vanilla, some cinnamon, and mixed it in with the applesauce.

This post has been linked up to Pennywise Platter Thursday at The Nourishing Gourmet
and Monday Mania at The Healthy Home Economist
and Fat Tuesday at Real Food Forager