Apple sauce

Apple sauce, the kids love the stuff, that includes little Alex. A great snack, but also my not so secret ingredient for making granola.
The Dutch call it appelmoes, they love it like Americans love their ketchup, those with less matured tastebuds tend to drown their food with it. I say baby food... Or the Australian way, with roast pork.

Autumn is the perfect season to pick up some fresh and cheap apples. I've just bought a full shopping bag at the markets for $3, they might not be washed and waxed like most apples you buy, I say hooray.

There are many different takes on how to make apple sauce, most recipes start with peeling and coring the apples, waste of time if you ask me...
Then they continue with adding sugar and a lot of other things. Why bother, apples are sweet and tasty enough on their own.
I make mine like my mom used to make it, and probably like her mum did. Quick and simple.

My take: wash the apples, quarter them and put them in a pot with a dash of water, put on high heat until it starts to boil, then resume on medium heat until soft, use a lid or you'll end up with caramelised apples.
Depending on your type of apple and batch size this should only take 15 minutes.

The trick here is running it through a food mill, it will take out the peel, core and stalks while pureeing the apples. My food mill  is only small (and cheap), works just fine, unless you have to go through a trailer load of apples.
If you don't have a food mill (yet), try pushing it through a sieve.
I've used red delicious apples, hence the reddish colour.

Oh wait, since I'm labelling it under Dutch recipes: sprinkle with some cinnamon before serving.

This recipe is great if you want to preserve some for later. For a step by step guide for canning, use this link.