Happy Autumn!

Autumn is officially here, and I don't just mean since Friday. The nights are cool and I've put away my shorts and tank tops for the season. There are pumpkins, gourds and squash everywhere (well, not in my garden) and the apple trees are ready to be picked.

I dug out my apple picker yesterday and picked as many apples as I could reach from one of the apple trees. We have three apple trees- Red Delicious, Granny Smith, and one that I have no idea- I think it's a Macintosh, but I don't really know. I picked a five gallon bucket-full of unknown apples and the Red Delicious aren't quite ready. I don't care much about those, though, because I hate Red Delicious. Hate them. The skins are thick and tasteless and the apples are too sweet. Give me a tart apple any day. My Granny Smith tree has never given me many apples and the ones it does are small and gnarly. I've read that Granny Smith apple trees need to pollinate with other Granny Smith trees, so maybe I'll plant another one next spring.

I made applesauce today- a modest 21 pints. I bought a foodmill this year and was reading and apple sauce recipe that suggested using a foodmill for really creamy sauce. I don't really care if my applesauce is smooth or chunky, but since I had just bought the foodmill I was excited to give it a try. The other reason the foodmill is nice is that I didn't have to peel the apples, only core them. I have an apple peeler/corer machine, but the peeling isn't entirely accurate and it always leaves peels on the top and bottom of the apples which isn't exactly wasteful as the cows love apple peels, but I miss out on a lot of apple. I used my apple peeler/corer machine minus the peeler part to core the apples. Then I just put them in a stock pot and boiled them until they were mushy, put them through the food mill and, voila!, creamy applesauce. The cows are missing out on a lot of apple trimmings, but they got the cores and apple mush that was left over.

This year the applesauce might just be the best I have ever made. It's creamy with a little spice to it (cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and allspice) and a bit of tartness. I don't like my applesauce overly sweet, so I don't add much sugar. I had a great time canning today- the first time since making dandelion and violet jelly- and I didn't realize how much I missed doing it as I didn't have any tomatoes to can. Since I only have one pumpkin growing in the garden this might have been my last canning day until next spring.