Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Canning & Freezing Apples & Applesauce

A member of our church has taken over care of a small apple orchard. It has languished for 15 years without care or picking. Gary is cleaning it up, trimming the trees and generousdly offering lots of apples to the church members. There are 5 or 6 varieties including red/golden/yellow delicious, black Arkansas & winesaps.

For years my favorite sidedish has been chunky natural applesauce. I am back on low carb so I was concerned about how I could make small single servings since apples are high in carbs and could only be enjoyed as a now and then treat.

I stumbled onto this Pick Your Own site which is an amazing resource. They have lots of canning recipes for everything from jams & jellies to soups, salsas and more. You can also find basic canning, freezing, and drying instructions. You will also find a complete section on homemade ice cream including .pdf copies of service manuals for many ice cream freezers. Found one at the Goodwill but no directions? You might find the instructions here.

http://www.pickyourown.org/allaboutcanning.htm

http://www.pickyourown.org/applesauce.htm

http://www.pickyourown.org/pdfs/How_to_Make_Homemade_Applesauce.pdf

http://www.pickyourown.org/howtomakefatfreeicecream.htm

There are lots more things on the site including locations for farm mazes, food festivals, Christmas tree farms and more. Check it out.

And the applesauce.........well I found out I could make the applesauce, measure it into small servings in a muffin pan, freeze these for 24 hours then put them into a freezer bag to pull out and thaw one at a time. Another use for these is to keep 1/2 cup size on hand to use when substituting applesauce for oil in low fat recipes.

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