On the Road to Domestic Goddess- part II

So last year I wrote about my goal to become a domestic goddess. Though my sewing still only consists of sewing a straight line I am making huge strides when it comes to canning. This year we put up 27 quarts of peaches, 18 pints and 12 quarts of salsa, 15 quarts of stewed tomatoes, and 24 quarts of applesauce.

Applesauce was the new addition this year. We hadn't made it before and I thought it would be good to have some on hand with four kids. Having never made it before I was unaware of how time consuming it could be . We were saved from a lot of work by a very nice lady in my water aerobics class. I happened to mention in passing that we were going to be making applesauce and Jan offered me her Foley Mill. She dropped it off, showed us how to use it, and saved us so much time.

I got up early and bought two boxes of apples from the Farmer's Market and then that afternoon we started on the project. It was a family project with some of the kids sorting the apples and pulling the steams, while the others were washing them and getting them ready to be cut. The kids worked really hard and were great helpers.

Christian operating the mill with some help from Laine.
Eve pulling the steams and putting the apples in the water.

There are times I am very grateful we have two kitchens, this was one of them. While the prep work went on upstairs the actually canning went on downstairs. That was really helpful when I accidentally broke two jars and Christian and to come and help sweep it up.

The apple sauce turned out perfect and it is rather healthy with little sugar and spiced perfectly. I think it is something that we will repeat next year.