Crab Apple Applesauce Recipe

Crab Apple Sauce is sweet, tart, delicious, and reminds me of my childhood. My parents have lives in an old farmhouse for over fifty years. It’s nearly 200 years old now. They have a beautiful, large crab apple tree in their yard. It was large when I was a child and that was a long time ago. I remember picking crab apples from the lower branches and biting in to the sour goodness.

That tree is still there. My kids go to Grandma and Grandpa’s house and do the same today. I have to wonder how many kids over the years have eaten from that tree. Were there children there before me?

If you like Crab Apple Sauce, you might enjoy How to Make Crab Apple Butter and How to Make Crab Apple Jelly.

Easy Homemade Applesauce Recipe

Affiliate Disclosure!contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase through an affiliate link, I will make a commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for supportingusand keeping our website going.

Wash and quarter your crab apples. Place them in a large sauce pan, add 1 cup of water or apple cider to start the cooking process, and heat to simmering. Cook until crab apples are softened, stirring them often to keep them from sticking to the pan.

Run crab apples through a food mill or sieve and return the apple pulp to your sauce pan. I added ¼ cup of pure cane sugar per cup of apple pulp (1 cup of pure cane sugar per quart of crab apple pulp). If you like tart apple sauce, skip the sugar.

Reviving Old Crab Apple Recipes

Slowly, simmer the mixture until it is your desired thickness, stirring occasionally to prevent scorching. Enjoy it now…or can it for later.

Ladle your crab apple sauce into hot prepared canning jars to within ½ inch of the rim of the jar. Wipe the rim of your jar with a clean, damp cloth. Place your lids onto your jars, making sure the rubber seal meets the jar rim. Screw on the metal ring/band firmly.

Use a jar lifter to place your crab apple sauce in the metal canning rack in a boiling water bath. Process pints and quarts in the boiling water bath for 20minutes (times indicated for 1, 000 feet above sea level).

Slow Cooker Cinnamon Apple Sauce

When the time is complete turn off the heat, remove the canner lid, and allow the canner to cool for 5 to 10 minutes. Remove your jars of crab apple sauce from the canner; place them on a cooling rack or dry kitchen towel two inches apart to cool. Some of the bands may seem loose at this point, do not re-tighten them.

After 12 hours, check to see if the jars have sealed, the center of the lid should be concaved and not able to flex. Remove the metal bands/rings; carefully try to pull the lid off with your finger tips to check the seal again. Place any unsealed jars in the refrigerator and use as soon as possible or reprocess starting over with new jars and lids.

Allow sealed jars to cool for 24 hours. Wash the jars (especially the threads) and label them with contents and date. Store your crab apple sauce in a cool, dry place away from light.

Ultimate Crab Apple Guide: Harvesting, Preserving + No Peel No Core Crab Apple Recipe Ideas

Crab Apple Sauce is sweet, tart, delicious, and reminds me of my childhood. My parents have lives in an old farmhouse for over fifty years. It’s nearly 200 years old now. They have a beautiful, large crab apple tree in their yard.We picked five gallons of crabapples the other night. Now I’m busy turning them into tasty things. Like this crabapple sauce. Isn’t the color gorgeous? And the house smelled so good when I was making it. If you have a crabapple tree that you’ve been eyeing, you have to make this recipe at least once. It’s a lot of work – I’m not going to lie – but the end result is pretty spectacular.

Quarter them; then, remove the stems and blossom ends. Leave the skins. They’re full of vitamins and will give you that gorgeous color. This step takes a while, and may even earn you a blister or two. (just keepin’ it real). My husband and I worked together, but it still took a while.

If you leave the cores, you can use the juice left in the pot after cooking your crabapples to make crabapple jelly. So, you’ll get two products out of one batch of apples, and you’ll have less prep work to do. A win-win. Just know that if you decide to go this route, you’ll need a food mill to remove all the seeds later on. If you don’t own a food mill, go ahead and remove the cores from your crabapples now.

Roasted Apple Sauce

Once your crabapples are prepped, dump them into a large pot, and add one cup of water for each pound of crabapples. Bring the pot to a boil. Then, turn it down to a simmer.

Then, drain the water (be sure to save it if you’re making crabapple jelly), and run your crabapples through a food mill to turn them into sauce. If you don’t have a food mill, you can accomplish the same thing with an immersion blender or a food processor (provided you removed the cores earlier).

Sample your crabapplesauce, and add sugar to taste. Crabapples are more tart than regular apples, so you’ll probably want a little sugar, even if you’re used to eating your applesauce unsweetened.

Instant Pot Applesauce

Enjoy your sauce warm; refrigerate it; freeze it; or jar it up, and process it in a waterbath canner – 15 minutes for pints; 20 minutes for quarts.

Quarter the crabapples. Remove the stems and blossom ends, but leave the skins. If you have a food mill, you can leave the cores, too. If you don’t, go ahead and core the crabapples.

Drain the pot (retain the juice, if you plan to make crabapple jelly). Then, run the crabapples through a food mill to turn them into sauce. You can also use an immersion blender or food processor.

Minute Pink Applesauce Recipe • The View From Great Island

Taste your crabapple sauce, and add sugar to taste. Crabapples are pretty tart, so you’ll probably want to add sugar, even if you’re used to eating unsweetened applesauce.

Refrigerate your crabapple sauce, if you plan to use it soon. Otherwise freeze it, or process it in a water-bath canner — 15 minutes for pints; 20 minutes for quarts.If you’ve ever bitten into a raw crabapple, you may have found the texture mealy and a little off-putting. Smaller fruit (less than an inch in diameter) often has a grainy texture, but because cooking gets rid of the textural issue, you can use any size fruit in this crabapple sauce recipe.

Be sure to taste a fruit before you harvest a boatload from a single tree. Flavor varies from almost sweet to crazy sour, and underripe crabapples can be unpleasantly astringent. If you’re lucky enough to find bright red fruit, the color will carry over into the sauce, making it especially nice.

What To Do With Crab Apples

I’ve seen recipes that say to quarter each crabapple and remove both ends of the fruit. I can’t imagine why anyone would do all this extra work. Simply wash the fruit and cut out any obviously bad spots.

Note: I make crabapple sauce in a crockpot because it’s so easy! I love starting a batch in the morning before work, then coming home to a crabapple-scented kitchen. You can also make this recipe in a pot on the stove, but it requires a little more attention. You may also need more water with the stovetop method.

In a crockpot, combine eight cups of crabapples with one cup of water, and turn it on low. Check back in 4-8 hours.

All Natural Sugar Free Applesauce Recipe

To make this on the stove, combine the water and crabapples in a large pot and bring to a boil. Cover, and reduce the heat to maintain a low simmer. Let it simmer for 30 to 60 minutes, checking regularly and adding more water if necessary. Cook until the crabapples are very soft.

Once the fruit has thoroughly softened, remove it from the heat (either crockpot or stove) and let it cool slightly. Run the crabapples through a food mill to remove the seeds and stems. If the resulting sauce is chunkier than you like, run it through your food mill one more time. If you don’t have a food mill, use a potato masher to mash the fruit, then pass the pulp through a strainer to catch the seeds and stems. (Then go buy yourself a food mill because it’s a great labor-saving device which you will use often!)

Transfer the sauce to a skillet and taste. It will be MUCH more sour than regular applesauce. Add a cup of sugar and stir it into the applesauce over low heat, then taste again. How you plan to use your applesauce will determine how sweet you’ll make it. To serve with sausage, porkchops, or sauerbraten, you may want to stop here. If you’re going to serve it as dessert, or to kids as an after school snack, increase the sugar in quarter cup increments until you reach the desired sweetness

Southern Forager: Wild Blackberry Crab Apple Sauce