Home made Apple Sauce + Cider/Juice stuff....

The Concept

So tonight's inaugural dish is something that seemed really easy and would yield a healthy snack. Yeah, I'm trying to eat healthier & easier. I enjoyed eating apple sauce when I was younger, so why not make my own? I figure it can replace candy as it's sweet & quick. I'm also shooting to put some of the juice from the boil into mason jars...hopefully it'll taste good. Maybe add some Everclear for a nice alcohol drink.


Ingredients

4 green Granny Smith Apples

4 Red Delicious Apples

White & Brown Sugar to taste

Cinnamon to taste

water

Sauce Pan w/lid

Big Pan w/lid-it's a very large and very deep pan thing that I've used to make a chicken in...is all metal. I forget what the exact name is. There will be pictures.

Mason jars-I cellar tobacco, so I had some extras (CLEAN ONES) laying around.

The Process

1. Wash, peel, and chop up the apples.

2. Add apples, sugars, cinnamon all into the big pan, fill half full with water. Boil/cook covered. I let mine go for about an hour as I'm trying to get as much of the apple flavor into the water.

3.After an hour, remove from heat. Let cool. Don't want to burn yourself when you're pouring this into a jar.

4. Add additional sugars & cinnamon into the smaller sauce pan & bring to a boil. Transfer the apples to it. This is the pan where you will make the actual apple sauce. I'm cooking mine for another 30mins. I want the apples to be extremely mushy and not require much work to mash them. The whole I have more time than energy. My sleep schedule is 3:30-4AMish until 1:30ishPM. I have time.

5. Drain off as much liquid as you can from the boiled apples into the bigger pan. Yeah, getting as much juice as you can.

6. Mash the apples until they're the consistency that you want for your sauce.

7. Transfer to your preferred container. For immediate/within a week use, I'm using Mason jars with the 2 part lid. I like the wide mouth ones & use whatever size is conveinent for you. I believe mine at 16 oz.

8.For longer term storage/freezing, I'm doing an experiment. I want to save some apple sauce & some of the juice for a longer term. I don't think I could use all of what I have up in a week, so I need to make it last. For the sauce, I'm using freezer bags. They're a bit thicker & are cheap. For the juice, I'm filling mason jars half full to allow for expansion. If they break-I'll let you guys know.

Results

Flavor-It tastes pretty good. I like it. I can see myself reaching for this when I want a snack.

Quantity-I thought it would yield a bit more than it did. I think it yielded about 6-8 cups of sauce.

When I saw how little juice/cider it was going to yield, I opted to bastardize this again. After pouring 1 mason jar of just apple juice/cider stuff, I put the remaining amount into the big pan again. This time I added half a bag of frozen berries. I'm boiling it down again. I'll post the results from that on a different blog.

Overall

This was really easy. Letting the apples boil for so long let me mash them with the big spoon I was using. Time wise-between boiling and peeling it took about 3 hours. Most of the time while it was boiling, I was messing around online & reading. I like cooking stuff where I can do other things around the house while it is doing its' thing.

The hardest part for me was peeling the apples. I'm sorta paranoid about cutting my fingers-if i cut them, I'm out of work or at least in pain. I can't afford to cut my right hand first 2 fingers (I'm a bass player), so I always cut with my right hand. Everything else was easy.


Enjoy!

Photo Link

Welcome!

Welcome!

I decided to start this blog to document some of my experiences cooking. I'm pretty broke, I have a limited pallet, I enjoy cooking, and I want to start cooking more-primarily simple dishes that will taste good, will last a few meals, and are cheap.

I'm pretty broke. I'm looking for an additional or a new job, make minimum wage, and work as a musician for the bulk of my income at the moment. That should be an indicator, "bulk of income" as a musician means-ramen is fair game. I'm looking for meals that will last at least 3 meals and can be frozen.

I'm working within a few set confines: I do not own a microwave, I live by myself-so if it's not a single serving-it has to keep for at least a week, I can't eat heavily spiced foods (medical stuff...IBS blows), and I get impatient.

My limited pallet is a product of a number of things. Recently, I developed IBS. So the spicy, heavily spiced (pepperoni, other awesome processed meats) are no gos for me in most situations. The other thing? I grew up eating meat, potatoes, and breads. Not a heavy emphasis on fruits or vegetables. I'm incorporating more and more of them into my cooking. You will see that in this blog.

Being that I am looking for an additional job due to my current one not providing the kind of hours I need, I have a lot more time where I can cook. Cooking is a lot cheaper than eating McDonald's & Gioradnos...even though I love them both a tremendous amount. Yes, I am the guy that eats a Large Meal from McDonald's while watching Super Size Me and gets hungry. Now, that I have the time to & no excuses-why not? I'm going to learn a lot and share the experience with you.

I'll add pictures and details on the various things that I am trying as I make them or if it's a regular dish, as I have the chance.

Thanks for reading!