Maylee at Beyond Gumbo 
Our fun activity of pick-it-yourself apples at the New York apple orchard resulted in bringing home about 30 pounds of apples. That is alot of fresh sliced apple snacks. Plus these varieties of apples (Empire, Golden Delicious and Ida Red) are very tart. I’m not a person to waste anything and so that sent me searching for recipes to use all these apples. 
By chance I located a very unique recipe for homemade applesauce. The recipe turned out to be very easy. There is no peeling or slicing the apples. The apples are simply baked in the oven first, then peeled. Best of all, the applesauce tastes much better than store bought applesauce.
The homemade version is aromatic and chunky — actually tastes like apples. It still had plenty of tartness and is just a little sweetness. It makes a great snack, dessert or a side dish for breakfast! We all need to eat alot of fruit; this is an easy way to get a serving in your diet.
The recipe for Homemade Applesauce is adapted from a old Martha Stewart Living Magazine issue (November 2007). I never throw these old magazines away, especially the holiday issues, and occasionally skim through them. They have great recipes and photographs–for vegetables, soups and desserts and outdoor gardens.
The applesauce recipe is a baked applesauce. However, the “Martha Stewart” recipe is complicated and requires use of a food mill. Hum, wouldn’t you end up with apple juice using a food mill? Quite by accident, I found a much simpler way to make the applesauce. I discovered that if you pre-sliced the apples, then the apple pulp literally falls off the apple core and after baking the apples and the peel falls off, too. 
The rest was easy. Sort out any remaining peels, mash the remaining pulp and add the syrup in the pan to the apples. That’s the applesauce.
To partially slice the apples, I used an apple corer and sliced almost all the way through the apple, but left the apple intact. I heated a syrup made of water, brown sugar, lemon juice, margarine and a pinch of salt on the stove and poured this over the apples and then baked the apples.
After baking and cooling the apples slightly and is was easy to pull the core off. They just slid off along with the peels.
I combined the apple pulp with the syrup in the pan. If you desire, add cinnamon and nutmeg. Easy and delicious homemade applesauce.
Easy Homemade Applesauce
Ingredients
- 12 apples (approx 4 – 5 lb), use a variety of tart and aromatic such as Granny Smith, Gala, McIntosh, Fuji, Empire, Empire, Golden Delicious
- 1 cup water
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup margarine
- 1 Tbsp lemon juice
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp nutmeg (optional)
Method and Steps
- Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees.
- Rinse apples, cut out any bad spots or blemishes. Using an apple slicer, slice the apples almost all the way through the apple, but leave the apple intact. Place the apples in 9 x 13″ baking pan.
- In small saucepan, add water, brown sugar, margarine, lemon juice and salt. Heat until the brown sugar is dissolved and the margarine is melted. Pour over the apples.
- Bake in pre-heated oven for 30 – 40 minutes until the apples are very soft.
- Remove from oven and cool slightly.
- Using a tongs or fork, carefully pull up on the apple core. The apple core and peel should slip off the apple chunks.
- Scoop the apple chunks into a bowl sorting out the apple peels. Mash most of the apple chunks. Add the syrup left in the baking pan to the applesauce.
- If desired, add cinnamon and nutmeg.
- Serve the applesauce warm, at room temperature or chilled. Refrigerate leftovers and use within 5 days.
