The Great Applesauce Making of 2018

This past Friday marked the end of our canning season for 2018.  Before and after Catherine was born I canned peaches, and honestly had forgotten about applesauce.  Somewhere in my mind I knew we were pretty much out of applesauce but I wasn't sure if I wanted to or could manage applesauce this year.  And then my friend sent me a text asking me if I wanted her to get apples for me while she was getting her own.  Of course without a moment of hesitation I automatically responded with "yes!"

Sylvia chopping apples.

When the 5 bushels of apples arrived on Friday reality set in: I needed to juggle homeschool, nursing Catherine, meals, laundry, and making and canning applesauce.  I decided I would just do it as best I could and not stress over anything that didn't get done.  On days when we didn't go anywhere, at all, the day looked sort-of like this: breakfast and feed Catherine, get the girls started on school, do kitchen clean up, maybe start laundry, get the pots and cutting boards set up in the kitchen, get out the apples, and just get started.  Of course this was all peppered with all the normal mom-things of meeting needs and helping little people, so it took a lot longer than it reads!  But I wasn't in this to do it sprint style, I was doing it eat-an-elephant style: one bite at a time.

The reality would be that it was almost always early afternoon that I actually began working on peeling and chopping the apples.  Silas loves fruit so he frequently stopped by for samples.  The girls really wanted to help as well, and I wanted them to help (so they could participate and learn by doing), so often one of the 3 older girls would stand on a stool and chop the prepared apples into chunks and dump them into the large cooking pot.  {Somehow I don't have any pictures of Charity helping me. :(  She helped me for a little while one of the first days.}

It would inevitably be near dinner-time by the time we had a batch of apples peeled, cored and chopped. The apples would cook through the evening and I would stir them every so often to keep them from burning and to get them to the "chunky applesauce" texture that we like.  If things went really well, I was ladleing the applesauce into jars and getting them into the canner about the same time the kids went to bed.  If I go the jars into the canner close to bed-time, I could go to bed myself at a decent (aka, before midnight) hour.

We repeated that general scenario for many days.  There were some days that applesauce just didn't happen at all.  One day it was all I could do to get the apples in the pot to cook, so I put them on low heat overnight and they were perfectly cooked and ready to can the next morning.  One day I thought I had more flat canning lids but I didn't.  I canned what I had lids for and ordered lids from Amazon. (I love Amazon in this season of life!)

Sylvia and I thought this apple didn't want to be turned into applesauce. :)

I had one day "off" while we waited on lids and that day was consumed by cooking and taking food to a fundraiser in which our family was participating.  That was a Saturday and the lids arrived Sunday.  Daniel helped me Sunday afternoon and we got a big pot of apples cooking in a shorter amount of time.  It was really nice to have his help and we got to spend that time together talking.

At one point, Susannah was beside me chopping apples and ALL the other kids wanted to be in the kitchen. It felt a wee bit crowded sometimes!!

Once I had plenty of lids, I was ready to have it finished.  I needed to have the canning done so I could get back to all the day-to-day things that were majorly sliding... like my own laundry, and cooking dinners.  We were eating "fast" food most days for dinner, which is handy, but gets old quickly.  I kept powering through working as quickly as I could and we used paper dishes to cut down on dirty dishes and to save kitchen clean-up time.

On Thursday I decided I was just going to go into power-mode and my #1 focus (aside from keeping the kids alive and fed) was going to be applesauce.  I peeled and chopped and chopped and peeled, cooked and stirred, and stirred and cooked.   I think I did a double batch that Thursday, and Sylvia helped me intermittently with chopping the apples.

On Friday the light was at the end of the tunnel and I thought that if I pushed really hard I could finish.  Susannah wanted to be my main helper, so she quickly finished her school for the day and joined me at the kitchen counter.  I would peel and core the apples and she would chop.  If she behind I would help her chop and then she would work at peeling an apple while I chopped for a bit.

Susannah taking a turn peeling apples.

At one point we had finished the bowl full of apples and I stopped to feed Catherine.  All on her own, Susannah got another load of apples and began peeling them.  I was completely exhausted and ended up dozing while Catherine nursed and burped.  When I mustered up my reserve to get back to the kitchen, Susannah had peeled a whole bunch of apples!  I was really grateful for her willingness to work ahead, and for all of her help that day!  It definitely made a difference in how quickly we finished.  When the last apple was chopped up and put into the cooking pot, I gave a big cheer.  Susannah thought I was a little really silly, but it was worth it!

She took her work seriously.

 I think I pulled the last jars from the canner sometime between dinner and bedtime, and as soon as the kids were in bed I crashed into my own bed. The next day it was an amazing feeling to know I didn't need to work on apples.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy making and canning applesauce and love homemade applesauce, it was just a LOT of work and meant that a LOT of other things were put on hold.  When all the jars were put onto the pantry shelves, I counted up that we had canned 63 quarts.  It's nice to have our very favorite applesauce stored up to enjoy this winter. :)

Farewell, Canning Season, we'll see you next year... probably.

These are the canning lids I purchased:

Regular mouth



Wide mouth  (I don't have as many wide-mouth jars as I have regular mouth, but wide-mouth is a lot easier to wash and get clean in the dishwasher!)



This is NOT the same pot that I have, but if you are looking to purchase a quality pot that you can use for both canning and cooking, I believe this one would be a good one.  It has a thicker bottom and is made from a higher-quality of Stainless Steel.  {Note that you would also need a canning rack to keep the jars from sitting directly on the bottom of the pot.  You can use a layer of extra canning rings in a pinch, but I find that over time the rings can leave rust stains on the pot.  I have linked to a canning rack below.}




I do not have this specific canning rack but my mom has one like this and it works very well. :)

**As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases at no additional cost to you.**

I was not paid to write this post.