Making applesauce

Mrs ERJ gave me the "go ahead" to have this be a BIG year for applesauce.

She is busy clearing the pantry of canned foods that were not big hits to recover the quart jars. Who would have every guessed that peach-habanero sweet pickles would not be a hit?

I am chasing the apples through the system. I got rolling about noon and expect to have 28 quarts of applesauce cooling on the counter by 8:00 PM.

I would be losing money if I paid myself any kind of minimum wage but this is not about money. My time is free, to me. Skills are perishable. I consider the time I put into making applesauce to be tuition or an investment.

I use an LP fired turkey-fryer to do heavy-lifting of cooking the apples to mush. I do it in the garage to minimize the heat in the house. The turkey fryer is a great convenience but it doesn't do anything a wood fire cannot do if I have the dried, split firewood ready-to-go.

I take that back. A wood fire has to be tended so it requires more labor per unit of output.

Blogging will be light. I am earning my keep, for a change.