Homemade Applesauce

This fall I caught a wild bug and went and bought an entire bushel of apples. That's FOURTY-TWO POUNDS! I think I bought Cortland...use a firm, slightly tart variety in any case.

Besides apple pie, apple dumplings, apple coffee cake and apple butter, I made some really fantastic applesauce.

Pull out your bathroom scale, unless of course you have a "kitchen scale"...really though if you do, you need to "wing it" a bit more. Place a large bowl onto the scale and fill it with apples until you reach about 8-9 pounds.

After you peeled them, cored them, and left them in large chunks (maybe only quarter your apples if they are small - eighths if they are big), place the apples in a large pot with:

-The peel of one lemon (cut about 8 wide strips down the lemon - leaving some of the white on the fruit - a vegetable peeler works good)
-The juice of 2 lemons
-A healthy bit of cinnamon
-1/2 cup dark brown sugar
-1/2 cup white sugar
-2 cup water
-1 teaspoon of salt

Cover the pot and bring mixture to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for about 30 minutes. You'll know it's ready if the apples are starting to break up. You'll actually want to carefully sample a bit to make sure your sugar is right. Depending on the apples you might want a bit more. Remove from heat and remove the lemon peels. Mash to desired consistency with a potato masher.

This will make about 3 quarts of applesauce. I made two batches, ate a bunch, and ended up with 4 quarts in the freezer. If you have it stored in an actual deep freeze it is supposed to keep up to a year!

Dessert. It's the new dinner.

This morning we made Tropical Yogurt Ice. We've been waiting all week for the mangoes to ripen, and today they were calling us.

Cut up 2 bananas and 2 mangoes and place in blender. Add 2 cups of plain yogurt, 3 tablespoons of powdered sugar, and juice from half a lemon. Blend up good and place in a shallow container that has a tight fitting lid. Place in freezer. After three hours stir it up to break up the ice crystals, and return to freezer. After another three hours stir again and return to freezer until ready to eat. You will need to let it sit out for a bit to scoop it easy and enjoy!

Before we left this morning, I asked my sous chef to pick out something to make for dinner. He picked a chocolate cake recipe. I asked him to add the sprinkles, and silly me, didn't pay much attention. We got sprinkles alright!

Little Chocolate Cake

2 squares (1 oz each) unsweetened chocolate
1/2 cup boiling water
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup shortening
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup sour milk (place 1 tsp white vinegar in your measuring cup and fill with milk)

Stir the chocolate (chop it into smaller pieces first) and hot water until blended. Cool mixture. Add in sugar shortening egg and vanilla - mix well. Combine the flour, baking soda and salt. Gradually add to the chocolate - alternating with the milk. Pour into a greased 8" square baking pan. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. Cool and top with frosting:

In a saucepan, mix 1 1/2 cups sugar, 1/3 cup milk, 2 squares (1 oz each) unsweetened chocolate (melted) 2 tablespoons shortening, 1 tablespoon light corn syrup, and 1/4 teaspoon salt.

Over medium heat, and stirring constantly, bring mixture to a boil and boil for 1 1/2 minutes. Remove from heat and place the pan into a larger pan or bowl of ice water. Mix for 1 minute. Add 2 tablespoons butter or margarine and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract. Continue mixing for up to 10 minutes.

The frosting will become very gooey - almost caramel like. I don't normally go to such lengths for frosting but this one is worth it!

Put the cake together with the Tropical Yogurt Ice and you have a match made in heaven!

(We did actually consume a real dinner, which even involved salad, so it completely justifies consuming a plateful of goods!)

The chef says, "It's fifty-thousand and nine thousand thumbs up!"

Peach Popsicles

The snow melts and we hit 50 so that warranted popsicle weather somehow. We made our own, and I can't see us ever buying them again!

Place 3 peaches in a medium size bowl and cover with boiling water. After about 30 seconds remove them and dip them into cold water. At this point the skins should slide right off. Peel and remove the pits and chop into pieces.

Place the peaches along with 1 1/4 cups orange juice and 2 tablespoons powdered sugar into the blender and blend until smooth.

Into popsicle molds or disposable cups, place a spoonful of fruit cocktail. Pour the popsicle mix over until about half full and then add another spoonful of fruit. Finish filling the cups. Add popsicle sticks and freeze overnight!

A quote from the chef himself - "They are very good and we made them on Tuesday. This is 5 stars!"

Cost was about $2.00 for 4 regular size popsicles and 3 plastic cup oversized popsicles. Not bad. When peaches are in season this will be very cheap to make! The chef seems to like them better than store bought too!

Dealing With Fruit Cravings in a Snow Storm

In an attempt to re-create the new Dunkin' Donuts Waffle Breakfast Sandwich this weekend, I decided that wasn't what I wanted. I wanted fruit topping on my waffles. I was looking at some random odds and ends of frozen fruit and came across this idea...

Mix 2 cups frozen berries, 2 Tablespoons sugar, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch. Microwave for about 2 minutes. Mix it up and cook another 2 minutes, or until mixture looks like fruit topping.

Fresh fruit is hard to find sometimes...not so much hard to find, but hard to find GOOD fresh fruit, particularly in the depths of winter. Frozen fruit can be spendy, but if you buy when it's on sale, you can find a lot of uses for it - namely the fruit topping, and also smoothies.

Second use for the fruit topping was also discovered tonight. I buy big cartons of plain yogurt to keep around for random cooking purposes. It's also usually cheaper than the smaller single serve varieties, and mini-me eats through yogurt like there's no tomorrow. We like to put about half a cup of plain yogurt, a couple spoonfuls of honey, and a sprinkle of cinnamon together. It makes good fruit dip, or you can mix in some of that fruit topping for a much improved version of the single serve fruit yogurts. Smiley faces made with the fruit topping score extra yummy points.

Third use for fruit topping would be to just grab a spoon and eat it. It seems like it would also be good on toast, though maybe slightly too runny?