Pink Applesauce

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What you need:

• A food mill
• Large stock pot and a canning pot
• canning jars and lids

Ingredients:

• Red skinned, white fleshed apples (1 bushel will yield around 12-14 quarts of applesauce) (Courtland is my favorite!)
• Water

Directions:

1. Wash apples
2. Chop whole apples into 8ths
3. Fill pot with apple pieces. Add about 1-2 cups water in the bottom to prevent scalding.
4. Bring to a boil and stir occasionally until pieces are soft and begin to fall apart
5. Process with food mill, and discard skins, cores, and peels.
6. Pour applesauce into jars with lids, and put into your canning pot
7. Add enough water to cover the top of your jars by about 2”.
8. Bring to a boil and cook 20 minutes
9. Remove jars and let cool.

We love pink applesauce! It’s a yummy treat, a healthy ingredient for baking, and a great baby food as well. The unique pink color is so easy to get, it’s a wonder that not all applesauce is pink!

I learned how to make pink applesauce from the local Mennonite community when I was younger. I still enjoy thinking back on helping with the yearly peach and apple processing, with the occasional salsa canning day here and there. I didn’t know that the applesauce would follow me years and years into my life, but here we are!

I always start with 2-4 bushels of Courtland apples, though you definitely don’t need to start with that much, and any red skinned white fleshed apple like Red delicious, Gala, or Johnathan will do. Just remember that you want RIPE SOFT apples. If they are underripe they won’t make sweet applesauce. You should be able to enjoy the apple fresh if you are going to make it into applesauce. So taste your apples before you start!

Washing your apples is important because you are going to be using the peels. I usually soak my apples for ten minutes in a vinegar-water bath to get them clean. You could also just wash them in water.

It is important to cut up the apples before cooking so that they cook fast and evenly. I prefer to cut the apples into 8ths (1/2, then 1/4ths) because they seem to cook the most evenly that way.

I then add a cup of water or so to the bottom of the pot, this will differ depending on pot size and thickness. My heavy bottomed stock pot needs almost two cups of water, whereas my smaller 4qt pot only needs about 3/4 of a cup.

We now cook the apples, bringing to a boil first then lowering to medium for a good simmer as they cook down. Keep them covered! Stir every few minutes to make sure they aren’t sticking. When they begin to fall apart and the cores are flexible they are ready for the mill.

I LOVE my Weston food mill. (Link!) the mill has lasted years and has multiple screen attachments for different things like pumpkin and berries. I actually use the pumpkin screen for extra chunky applesauce! It also holds a lot at a time, and your hand is never over the steaming hot apples. Also it’s a continuous mill, so you don’t have to empty it or clear it between batches. A simple turn of the handle and out comes beautiful pink Applesauce! (Results may vary)

As you can see, it’s not an even color… yet. So I put a few batches in the bowl, stir it together, and start filling jars (quarts for us!) for some beautiful treats later. Though, what is stopping you from trying a little bit now while it’s hot, or chilling it in the fridge and adding some cinnamon, or even making some yummy apple butter, or all of the above?