Savory Applesauce

The hardest part about making homemade applesauce is peeling & coring the apples. Aside from that, its very easy, and worth the annoying prep. I started making this Savory Applesauce about 8 years ago. Now I almost never buy premade store bought applesauce. When planning to make it to serve it as a side dish, I follow the recipe as-is. However if I'm using it for baking purposes, I cut the sugar in half and omit the savory herb from it.

Savory Applesauce
Ingredients
10 medium Apples - Organic Granny Smith Preferably, but you can use pretty much any type of apple
1 Cup Sugar
1 Cup Water
2/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon dried savory herb
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

Directions
Peel & core apples. Slice apples into 8 slices for each apple, then chop all 8 slices in half. Put into 8 quart stock pot with all other ingredients, mix to combine. Heat on medium high to bring to a boil. Reduce to medium and continue boiling for 20 minutes. Remove from heat. If you prefer chunky style applesauce, light mash apples with a potato masher by hand. If you like smooth applesauce, you can either use an immersion blender to puree the apple chunks or allow sauce to cool 15 minutes, then puree in blender in batches, using the pulse button (do not continuously blend or your sauce will turn into a baby food style puree).

This recipe makes just over 3 quarts of applesauce. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. If your not planning to use it all within a week, you can store it in the freezer for 6-8 months. Just make sure the applesauce is completely cool before freezing. When making applesauce for baking (i often substitute applesauce for oil, butter & eggs), reduce amount of sugar to 1/2 a cup, omit the dried savory as well. When storing for baking I will usually separate the sauce into smaller 1/2 cup containers before freezing so when I need to use it, I just pull out the amount I need rather then defrosting a full quart sized contained. If you know how to can, you can store the applesauce in mason jars in your pantry rather then in the freezer - I have no idea how to can myself, otherwise I'd do this rather then having it take up so much space in my freezer.

You can substitute the lemon juice with additional water or any flavor juice or nectar to give your sauce a different flavor.