I bought a peck of “bumped” apples from my local orchard ($1.99!) to use for all my fall cooking. I’ve made a huge batch of crockpot apple sauce, an apple cake, and a big pan of apple crisp dessert. And the apples are still not dwindling. Any ideas on what I can do that uses a LOT of apples before they start going bad? Pie is on the menu for Sunday dinner, so no need for that suggestion. Thanks!
While you’re making a pie for tonight, you can also make a bunch of pie to freeze. We used to do this with peaches in my household when I was growing up. Make a giant batch of pie filling. Line however many pie plates you have with an oversized piece of foil, fill with pie filling, and freeze. Now wrap the foil around the top of the filling, lift out of the pie plate, and stack in freezer.
It’s a lot easier to bake a pie for any old occasion when all you have to do is make the crust. For peach pies, we had good success with just plopping the frozen pie center into the fresh crust and baking from frozen.
Applesauce, applesauce, applesauce.
Canned/frozen, canned/frozen, canned/frozen.
If you keep boiling the applesauce, you will eventually get apple butter. (Flavor to taste with cinnamon). It’s fairly easy to can or freeze, too. I’m not sure if you can do it in the crockpot, though.
I have a receipe for apple butter if you want it. You can make chutney too,
Apple pie filling can also be canned – you can find many recipes on the internet.
You can also make fruit leather from apple sauce. This is good for when you’ve made lots of applesauce, but are sick of it.
Cover a cookie sheet with plastic wrap. Spread a thin layer (1/4") of apple sauce over the plastic wrap. Put in oven set to “warm” and crack the door with a wooden spoon for air circulation. Check every so often – its done when it no longer feels squishy to the touch and has lost its wet sheen – more of “leather look.” Usually takes 1-2 hours. Take out of oven, cool, peel off plastic, and cut in strips for eating. Keeps a long long time in an airtight container.
Other fruit like strawberries & raspberries can be cooked in to the applesauce for various flavors. Oftentimes I buy the bag of frozen “mixed berries,” sort the berries and make a batch of each berry type that’s in the bag (usually strawberry, raspberry, blueberry and blackberry)
You can also sprinkle cinnamon or ginger on the surface of plain apple for flavor.
After doing all the above and if you have lots left why not try making some wine?
You can make apple butter in a crockpot; my mother did back in the day. Just cook it longer than you would applesauce, till it’s dark brown and well reduced.
I am thinking of hard cider. Maybe too much work, but ambrosia.
You can cut the apples up into cubes, toss with some lemon juice to prevent browning, add some walnuts, grapes, celery, and a mix of sour cream and mayonaise (two parts mayo to one part sour cream) to make a really tasty Waldorf salad.
I’d love this recipe if you don’t mind sharing!
When I was a teenager my family lived on a small hobby farm in northern California and we had a couple of apple trees. My mom always made and canned applesauce with part of the apples, and made apple pies for the freezer out of the rest. Really, if you’re going to the trouble of making one apple pie this weekend, it’s very little more trouble to make several instead. Mom always used those foil pie pans – she’d make the pies just as if she was going to bake them, then double-wrap the unbaked pies in saran wrap, then in foil. She spread them out separately to flash freeze them, then once they were had, she could stack them. To bake a frozen pie, just let it defrost, then bake as you would a freshly made one.
Apple butter’s the easiest thing ever if that’s what you’re asking.
Start with 6 cups of apple sauce.
Add 1/2 cup white or brown sugar, 1 tsp of cinnamon, 1/8 tsp cloves, 1/8 tsp allspice.
Bring to a boil while stirring.
Simmer on low heat uncovered 4-5 hours, stirring whenever it occurs to you. (I said it was easy, not fast, harhar)
The butter is “done” when a dab dropped on a plate no longer has a rim of water around its edge.
It will cook down to around 2 cups of apple butter. Keeps several months in the fridge, or can be canned (process 10 minutes.)
This is an oven baked apple butter.
pre-heat oven to 325°F
Peel apples and cut into small pieces. On top of the stove, put apples and enough hot water to cover in a heavy pan, cook until tender.
Put through a sieve, or puree in food processor.
Measure pulp, add 3/4 cup sugar for every cup of pulp.
For each gallon of pulp add 1/2 tsps ground cloves, and 2 tsps cinnamon. Adjust to taste.
Place the sweetened, spiced pulp into an oven safe container.
Bake, stirring every 15 to 20 minutes, until thick. Remember to stir, or it will scorch.
To test thickness, put a dap on a plate, let it set for a few minutes. If it doesn’t separate, that is, you don’t see any water around it, it’s done.
While it’s baking, sterilize enough canning jars to hold the butter. Put hot butter in to hot jars, using new lids. (old rings are ok, as long as they have no rust.)
Leave 1/4 " head space in the jars. Put a new lid and screw the ring on tightly.
When all the jars are filled, place them on a rack, up-right in a boiling water bath covering by at least 1 1/2 to 2 inches of water. Process for 10 minutes.
Check each lid by pressing the center of the lid. If it pops, or moves, change the lid and reprocess. The lids should look slightly concave, so the center of the lid is “sucked” in.
After the jars are cool, store them in a cool, dark place. They can be held for years.
Oh, be sure to label the jars, so 2 years from now you’ll know its apple butter, and not paint stripper. 
Here’s a nice Chutney too
1 1/2 cups raisins
3 cups diced apple 1 cup chopped onion
1 cup vinegar
1 cup sugar
1 6oz can tomato paste
3/4 cup water
1/2 tsps alt
1/4 tsp each of Cayenne, black pepper, and ginger
Put every thing into a heavy saucepan, bring to a boil, then reduce heat to simmer for 1 hour.
Makes one qt.
Jar and process, as above.
I have a couple other chutneys too.
Caramel apples!! Mmmm!!! You can give them for trick or treat.