November 26th, 2007 - Apples, apples, apples!
Saturday, I spent about 10 hours making apple cider and applesauce, and canning the results. Yes, TEN HOURS! Aack. I love the results and it’s definitely worth it, but it’s hard when the outcome is only
- 6 canned quarts of cider, plus 2 quarts drunk last night, plus a few other cups drunk Saturday
- 1/4c apple cider syrup (which might be jelly; I cooked it a wee bit too long I think?)
- 7 pints canned applesauce
- 2 quarts? applesauce in the freezer for apple crisp to be made this coming Saturday
- 1 cup applesauce from the burned area on the bottom of the kettle (did the same thing last year, so this time I wrote myself a note on how avoid doing this)
The funniest part is that I ate all of one piece of an apple while cutting them up, ate maybe 1/4c of the burned applesauce for lunch yesterday, and had only ONE sip of the cider last night.
Oh, and for a couple hours work Sunday morning, I also have 3 3/4-pint jars of apple butter.
I used 97 apples, keeping the last one out so that I didn’t have to cut it by hand. It was too large for the new apple slicer. What a time saver that new gadget it (cuts the core out and makes 6 slices at once)! I tried to make notes about timing. The more I do this–this was only the second time I have–the more able I am to time things better. For instance, I had no idea how long it took to boil the canning kettle, but now I know it takes 40 minutes. And I wrote that down. Maybe next year, it will take only 9.5 hours. (Oh, I should note I took about an hour off for lunch, which meant I had to reheat the juice and sauce longer before canning them. The break was a really good idea, however!)
Total cost for the apples: About $16. Supplies: Had everything on hand already except wide mouth bands/lids (I have some cool 3-cup jars that have handles and I thought it would be fine to put some cider in them; but they are in between wide mouth and regular, as I found out when I tried to put the first lid on) which were about $2 and ground cloves for the apple butter which was $9.99! (The cheapo brand was sold out. I think I should have waited. The recipe took only 3/8ths tsp.)