Fall and cooked apples go together perfectly. So, I bought a bunch of organic Honey Crisp Apples and wanted to use up some of them to make apple sauce/baby food and a yummy nearly guiltless dessert for us.
This will show you two simple recipes that I made at the same time. Fresh and delicious. The best thing about making your own food at home is that you know exactly what is in it! No guessing what the ingredients are that you cannot pronounce on the package. Believe me, anything you make homemade is WAY more delicious than store bought!!
Apple Sauce/Baby Food Apple Puree
Ingredients:
Apples
Ground Cinnamon
Directions:
Depending on how much apple sauce or baby food you want to make you can alter the amount of apples you use. I used 5 large apples.
1. Wash Apples
2. Peel Apples
3. Chop Apples
4. Put chopped apples in a steam basket with a small amount of water in the pan. Cover and bring the water to a boil so you can steam the apples.
5. Steam apples for roughly 12 minutes – check the apples, they should be fork tender (*able to poke them easily with a fork)
6. Remove the apples from heat and put the cooked apples into a blender or food processor. Blend the apples until they reach the consistency desired. Add roughly a teaspoon or more (eyeball it – shake some in and taste test it) pulse to distribute the cinnamon evenly.
7. If you are making baby food or simply want to freeze your apple sauce….distribute the apple sauce into ice cube trays and freeze.
8. Once the apple sauce is frozen pop the ice cubes out and store in a freezer ziploc bag. One ice cube is roughly 1 ounce. (if they do not pop out easily simple sit the bottom of the ice cube tray in some cool water for a minute and it will loosen the ice cubes enough to release them).
Since I was doing all of the prep work already with the apples I decided to make some baked apples for dessert. This is an extremely simple way to have something that is delicious and nutritious as a treat.
Baked Apple Dessert
Ingredients:
Apples
Ground Cinnamon
Ground Nutmeg
Ground Cloves
Butter (1 Tbsp per apple)
Honey (optional)
Directions:
1. Slice apple into even size slices. At this point preheat the oven to 350*
2. Lay out sliced apples in a baking pan. I used a 9×9 inch glass baking dish.
3. Cut 1 Tsp (per apple) of butter into small pieces and place on top of apples – spread out evenly around the pan.
This is the butter I like to use – comes from grass-fed cows. I buy it in bulk at Costco
4. Sprinkle cinnamon on top of apples.
5. Add a pinch of nutmeg and a pinch of ground cloves to the dish
6. OPTIONAL *drizzle natural/raw honey on top of the apples
7. Place dish in preheated oven for 15-18 minutes. Half way through toss the apples so that the butter and spices coat the apples fully.
ENJOY!!
Opps….forgot to take a picture before we dove in and gobbled it up. But you get the point – delicious!!!
Our Primal Life 