Of Apples and Homemade Applesauce

"Surely the apple is the noblest of fruits." -- Henry David Thoreau, Wild Apples

Apples are a mainstay at our house. Only Himself is not a fan. My year-round stand-by is Gala. It's crisp (never mealy -- I detest a mealy apple), sweet with a hint of tart, and pretty to look at, with its rosy yellow skin. In the fall, however, there is an abundance of varieties to be found, and we like to sample the more exotic of the grocers' bounty: Honeycrisp, Cripp's Pink, Jonathan....

I bought a small bag of Jonathan apples at Trader Joe's last week and determined to make applesauce in my Crock Pot. Last night, Tiny Girl and I began to work.

I used my Pampered Chef apple-corer-slicer thingamajig to core and slice 10 apples. Tiny Girl peeled them. We dumped them into my slow cooker and added 3/4 cup sugar, a tablespoon of cinnamon, and a teaspoon of vanilla. I stirred it all up and cooked everything on low overnight. Fast forward to this morning.

Our resulting applesauce smelled heavenly and was a dark red, thanks to the cinnamon. It was also more liquidy than I like, so I drained some of the juice off (and saved it to drink, of course!) After a taste test, we added quite a bit more sugar. Those tart Jonathans didn't mellow -- they cooked up mouth-puckering tart! I then dished up a small bowl for Tiny Girl. Miss Priss declined an offer to taste.

Tiny Girl cautiously sampled a bite, shuddered slightly -- the tartness, you know -- and then ate a bit more. She's the sort of person who really wants to like new things, so she ate her miniscule helping. Then came her pronouncement, which I overheard her make to Miss Priss at the breakfast table:

"Once you get used to the weird taste, it's actually really good."

And there you have it. A true success.