I posted this picture to Instagram and facebook last week and many of you requested the recipe and process for how I make homemade applesauce and then make homemade crockpot apple butter too.
So here is phase 1 – making homemade crockpot applesauce! Seriously this is extremely easy and only takes a few minutes. Your crockpot does all the work for you! And you can personalize it your taste – if you like intense, spiced applesauce you can make that, if you like plain applesauce, you can make it like that.
I usually use a variety of apples. If you are planning on making apple butter from your applesauce a variety of apples really helps the taste. If you are just making applesauce you can use one variety of apples or mix them. For this batch I used mostly Honeycrisp, with some Granny Smith and Golden Delicious mixed in.
Wash and core the apples. I don’t peel the apples but just use a corer/slicer like this….
And fill up my crockpot with apple slices.
Then add your spices. This is totally up to you on how intense you want your applesauce. I typically just sprinkle it on but if I had to determine amounts I would say 2 tsp. cinnamon, 1 tsp. cloves, 1 tsp. apple pie spice or pumpkin pie spice. I also added 1/2 cup of water and a 1 TBSP. of lemon juice. You can also add sugar if you want – no more than 1/2 cup. Once the apples cook down they were will be sweet just by themselves so I don’t add any sugar to mine.
Let cook on high 3-4 hours or 6-8 hours on low.
Then you need to puree your cooked apples. You can either mash them by hand using a potato masher, transfer them to a blender, mix them with a hand mixer, or I love to use this immersion blender.
Blend or mash them to your desired consistency. If you like your applesauce chunky, then don’t blend it all the way.
If you are wanting to make apple butter from your applesauce, I would suggest blending your applesauce until smooth.
Enjoy your homemade applesauce – it is wonderful warm!
You can continue to cook this down to make apple butter – I will try to blog that recipe and method in a future post.
Yum! I use my crock pot to make applesauce, but I use my apple peeler / corer / slicer first. It really is amazing how simple and delicious crock pot is.
Your applesauce sounds delicious. I make mine in a similar way, but haven’t tried it in the crock pot before. I will need to do that. Also, I like all the spices you add. I will have to give that a try as well. Thanks for the idea!
Trying to find your recipe for the crock pot apple butter you speak of in this page…..?
I tried this recipe today and it was amazing! I even added a few strawberries and kiwi’s that were coming to the end of their shelf life to add more flavor. I wish I had the immersion blender! Mine were a bit chunky, but delicious none the less. This was a very easy recipe. I passed it onto some of my friends!
so glad you enjoyed it! And yummy! didn’t think about adding other fruits.
Do you seriously not even peel them? I have never heard Of that! How do you not have peel chunks?
I also make mine in my çrockpôt. The first time l tried making it without peeling the apples, l was a little leary. But the peels pretty much all dissolved. I happened to have a lot of quart size bags of blueberries in my freezer so l threw a bag in with the apples. It made the applesauce purple but it sure was delicious!