Cinnamon Applesauce (no sugar)

Autumn is officially here, and we are loving all the apples in the stores! While it is possible to grow apples in Texas, not many people do. Our family prefers to stock up like crazy when they go on sale ($.68 organic apples? Yes please!)

We are big applesauce fans, especially Abbie. She has a sensitivity to apples that prevents her from eating them raw, but she can gobble up bowls and bowls of applesauce!

This is our favorite recipe for cinnamon applesauce. We keep planning to can it but never have enough left! This recipe is super easy, especially when everyone jumps in to peel and cut. Nobody holds back when it is eating time, let me assure you!  – Mrs. Brown

Cinnamon Applesauce

Ingredients
8 cups thinly sliced, peeled apples (apples vary in size, but you can generally guesstimate about a cup of slices per average sized apple)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup water
(we double this recipe for our 6 quart crockpot)

Directions
1) Rinse, peel, slice and de-core the apples. This is a great way to use up apples that aren’t perfect – just cut out the yucky spots.

2) Put your apples in the crockpot, and add cinnamon and water.

3) Stir the whole shebang until the apples are nicely moist and evenly coated with cinnamon.

4) Cook on high for 4 hours. Here are the apples all soft and delicious…

5) Mash the apples carefully with potato masher. They are hot when you open the lid… if you let them cool you won’t have to be careful, but good luck having enough patience for that! Seriously, if you can withstand that smell to let them cool, please post a comment and tell us!

If you are serious about smooooth applesauce, you can use a food processor or blender, but definitely wait until the applesauce is cool to try that. We prefer the soft chunks in hand-mashed applesauce. Also we are not patient people.

6) Try not to burn your tongue when eating hot applesauce! Heheheh.

Your turn… favorite applesauce addition? Leave it in the comments.