Fall Fever: Crockpot Apple Sauce

Fall is definitely one of my favorite times of the year.  I love the smells of fall and winter - apples, pumpkins, cinnamon spice, sugar cookie.  I also love weather where it is appropriate for shorts and long sleeves!  (Unfortunately Fall 2012 will not be seeing THIS preggy butt in shorts.)


Everywhere you go, you are bombarded with the scrumptious smells of the season.  You walk into any shopping store or even grocery store and somehow those smarty pants marketing people attack your sniffer with scents that make me NEEEEED to buy appley pumpkiny spicey goodness.

Well you marketing smarty pantses, way to earn your paycheck because I totally walked in to Giant Eagle and HAD TO HAVE a bag of Macintosh Apples.  The Mac apples normally aren't my fave just to bite into and nosh on for a snack, but I love them for applesauce and pies.  They're awesome because they're crunchy, a little sweet and also a little sour.  It's like a crispy cross between a red delish and a granny smith. Mmmm...

Now you guys know that I'm FAR from legit when it comes to cheffing or any form of culinary training.  I tend to make up my own rules in the kitchen and often times find myself taking the lazy lady's way out...but I KNOW applesauce is easy and the fact that it can be made in a crockpot makes it totally up my Bowlin Alley.

So check out how freaking easy this is:

What You Need

• 8 Medium Apples (I used 20 small Macintosh, just fill your crock)
• 1 tsp of lemon juice
• 1 tsp of ground cinnamon (you can add a little more if you want...just don't go overboard)
• 5 tsps of brown sugar (not packed)

What To Do

• Peel and dice the apples.  You know what? You can leave the skins on if you're feeling lazy. It doesn't change the taste, but it just has those papery skinny chunks if you leave them on. Not the end of the world if you're cutting a corner.
• Toss everything in the crock - chopped apples, lemon juice, cinnamon, brown sugar.
• Set the crock to low and let it just smell up your house for the next 6 hours! 

Talk about killing two birds with one stone!  Totally smelled up the house with this recipe.  And it was a great smelled up the house!!  

Yeah I'm a cheater when it comes to "canning"...I didn't really can this stuff.  When you can stuff you disinfect and seal the container air tight...my "method" shown to the left is called Looks-Better-In-A-Ball-Jar-Than-In-A-Tupperware.  

It's not officially canned.  But doesn't this totally make you wanna get your Fall on????  Don't worry. It totally got my leaves falling, because I've got more fall goodness to come!!!

Since I've been on a roll my past few posts reminiscing about funny things of childhood -- Sister Amanda used to call applesauce, SappleSops.  So go grab yourself some Sapples and get your Sops on!