I make a marachino cherry applesauce and it turned out a really pretty, vibrant pink, not a pale wimpy pink. I think it was Linda Lou that had mentioned it. I chopped the cherries fairly fine in my mini food processor and used a jar of juice. Think I only used a small jar of the cherries. You might want to experiment with more cherries. I will the next time. I also added a bit of almond extract. M-m-m, good.

Oh, forgot the third. How about peach applesauce or pear applesauce. Both very good.

L, I'm going to try some apricot/applesauce tomorrow, I'll let you know how it goes!

Annie

I know I mentioned before that I make maraschino applesauce. You used to be able to buy chunky cherry/apple sauce in the stores back in the sixties, and when I couldn't find it anymore, I just started making it. You do know, however, the vibrant red is the dye in the cherries, lol.

I have not made maraschino cherry, but it sounds good. It must have been Calliope.
I use cinnamon red hot candies sometimes. That is a pretty color and taste.

For gifts, I would maybe try adding some booze? Maybe bourbon, or brandy? Or maybe something sweeter, like amaretto or butterscotch liqueur?

Lime. Lime juice, lime rind zest, and just a bit of green food coloring. One of our personal favorites. Perfect served with any pork dishes. We also do it with orange juice and orange rind to have with beef.

Then the cinnamon red hots as Linda Lou mentioned. Or the cranberries sounds good to me too.

Peach and/or apricot also sounds like a good one. You know you can take any type fruit jam and mix it with applesauce for flavor, color, and texture changes?

Dave

Are these safe to can in BWB as you would normally do with applesauce? I really want to try the maraschino cherry one but need to be able to can it.

I apologize, Calliope, for crediting someone else for your post about the marachino cherries added to apples for applesauce. Its really a super combination. I do love the color of it even if it is a dye. :)

Yes, they are all fruit based so high acid. Just process the applesauce for the normal applesauce processing time - 15 mins. for pints. 20 mins. for quarts.

However you may also pressure can if you wish as directions for PC applesauce are also provided in the guidelines - 8 min. for pints, 10 mins. for quarts at 5-6 lbs. (adjust for altitude).

Dave

Maraschino cherries are vile. I wouldn't use them for anything, especially not for preserving by canning. Someone gave me a big jar of them from some mega food store and even my grand kids, who eat everything including dirt, thought they were disgusting. It didn't even go to the compost pile - it went straight to the landfill with all the other plastic.

Fresh natural fruit goes with fresh natural fruit. Perhaps peach in the applesauce would be good, pears have too delicate a flavor and would be lost, while cranberries, blueberries, or figs would tend to make the applesauce crunchy and those additions do not sound very appetizing to me. I think sticking with just adding spices lets the applesauce shine on its own. My fav is to use freshly ground nutmeg and not any cinnamon or other spices. I also use 4 kinds of apples to get all the high and low notes, and the sweet and tangy flavors that makes a mixed applesauce delicious. Of course a little sugar always helps.

Nancy

P.S. Ditto for cinnamon candies - artificial nothing. IMO you'd be better off grinding some cinnamon sticks fresh, or add some drops of pure cinnamon oil if you want strong cinnamon taste without the chemicals.

I have a batch of strawberry applesauce simmering right now, I decided that I really wanted apricot preserves out of the apricots, it's one of my favorites.

The strawberry applesauce is yummy, the grandkids are going to love it, but it's not quite as thick as I like it, I'm letting it simmer a bit to thicken up.

Annie

Maraschino cherries are vile. Ditto for cinnamon candies.

LOL Nan, but next time you input, don't hold back so much. I wouldn't want all my applesauce like that, but it is fun for a change. I have done, and like the cinammon red hot ones as well. But, again, not on a regular basis.

I eat food mostly totally from scratch cooked, and home grown..........right down to our beef, pork, and eggs. But, maraschino cherries are a treat for me, and find their way into my grocery cart with some regularity. Everybody has their vices. ;-)

Geez! Guess I just like "vile" sometimes. Yes, I also cook from scratch and have for many decades. Different strokes for different folks and its fun to go different every so often.

I went on the food network and saw plum applesauce and strawberry applesauce and both looked ruby red. They must have added food coloring. My strawberry applesauce was pale peach at best. My blueberry applesauce turns out a little bluish grey. I doubt I'll be able to find plums, and if I did, it would be the skin that would have all the color, so I dunno. I might try the jam thing. Or maybe I'll go for flavor. I just made some applesauce tonight and it is BROWN. Cause I used a lot of spices and some brown sugar. Not very sexy looking but yum.
I dunno, some people make really colorful applesauce. You know I think they cheat with food coloring!
:)

Sorry, I guess I got just a little carried away.

Perhaps one could use beet juice for red coloring?

Nancy

I have made the apricot applesauce and it is wonderful!! Everyone who tried it liked it. I don't see why you couldn't use dried apricots. They would just soak up some of the liquid for you. However the color was maybe just a little more peachy than regular applesauce.

HTH

Carly

L, my strawberry applesauce was more plum than it was red, I used a LOT of strawberries. I should have added food color, but I didn't really care about the color, the grandkids are gonna scarf the stuff up so fast they won't notice!

Calliope, I LIKE maraschino cherries and my kids used to fight over them. My brother will just sit and eat a jar, I don't go that far, LOL. I have to admit, though, that Readinglady sent me a jar of her homemade maraschinos and they were a different fruit altogether, they were amazing!

Annie

Maraschino cherries are indeed a strange foodlike substance! :) I like them but only in small doses. I have eaten the pre-processed ones off the tree, hardly any taste but I think that's the idea of the breeding. What a strange concept. Now I'm curious, homeade maraschinos? All the flavor and maybe none of the neon red? That would be interesting.
In my dream yard I have room to plant a small cherry orchard. That and plums are the two fruits that the markets don't do justice to regarding the many flavor varieties possible to grow. I guess there are some kick butt homegrown peach varieties too, but peaches would scare me, they seem so touchy. I've actually heard that apples are the real challenge here in the NE if you want to attempt anything remotely organic.

We used to melt packages of red hots (candy) in the hot applesauce. Gave it the red color & cinnamon flavor. You can still find the red hots at places like drug stores, not Walmart.

Well, I could eat a whole jar of maraschinos pretty easily. I love them in my lemonade in summer.

Nan, I was laughing when I responded to your post. You are quite entitled to your opinions about what foods are vile and what are not. I think beets are vile, so I won't be using them for dye any time soon.

Really the whole concept behind maraschinos are pretty hideous, if you know what all is done to them to make them what they are. I agree with you on that. But, I love them anyway.

I have made homemade maraschino cherries before. They are softer, but really good. The syrup is good to add to Sprite as a drink. Yes, you still use a whole bottle of red food color and bottles of almond extract. I tried both real and artificial almond extract. I liked the fake better, to be honest.
You would not want to add beets to your applesauce since beets are low acid. I would not suggest it.
Extracts are good ways to flavor things. If you are not against using them, so are packs of dried Koolaid.

OH my gosh, thanks for that last tid-bit. I may try that. Oh, btw Linda Lou, I made a run of your cereal bars last week with apricot preserves. Two thumbs up. Everyone else liked them too, so they got pilfered out of the fridge where I'd wrapped each one in waxed paper to use for b'fasts for me.

So, the next batch, I'm adding some grape nuts and doing it with homemade red raspberry jam. Thanks for sharing.

Linda Lou - Oh! I forgot about beets being low acid in canned foods! You are right that it, and other low acid foods, should NOT be used in BWB canning. I was just trying to think of an alternative to artificial stuff.

I make my own natural food coloring for cake frosting though, as shown in the link below. It is quite fun, non-toxic too if you choose your ingredients wisely and don't get carried away so much that you alter the flavor of your frosting.
Nancy

Here is a link that might be useful: Make your own food coloring for cake frosting

I am glad you like the cereal bars ! I should bake some more up. The weather is cool and so windy. I am staying indoors. Baking those would be a great way to spend a blustery day.
Natural things would be great for cake icings, though.

I am fascinated with all the ideas for flavored applesauce. Can I use frozen fruit and then boiling-water bath the applesauce? I still have apples to process but all the other fruits in my area are done for the year. I have a ton of strawberries in the freezer. Just wanted to be sure the applesauce is safe. How about the ones with added liquor (maybe a butterscotch Schnapps). Would those with alcohol be OK to BWB?

I have added whole cranberries to applesauce, and the "polka dot" effect was quite pretty in the jars.

I think maraschino cherries are "vile" too, but then, I have a secret penchant for Chef Boyardee's Beefaroni...so who am I to judge? LOL!

You can add other fruits to applesauce because it is high acid. Not sure if EVERY fruit is acid enough, (maybe not mangos?) but the ones I add are pears, blueberries, cranberries and strawberries. I would like to experiment with some apricots, which may happen since I have some soaking in brandy and lemon thyme right now and I'll have to do something with them once they have steeped long enough. So far my favorite has been strawberry applesauce. I used frozen berries to make it. Below is a link to the recipe I used, which came off the FoodNetwork Web site. I think I doubled the number of strawberries I added, and didn't use water. It didn't look like the picture though, it wasn't red, it was pale peach color.

According to the Ball Blue Book of Canning, the processing time for applesauce is 20 min. in a boiling water bath.

Here is a link that might be useful: Applesauce with strawberries, courtesy of Dave Lieberman

This all sounds too yummy! I'm not a big fan of the marachino cherries but reading this makes me want some to add to my soft drinks and lemonade! I really want to add them to applesauce. I have a few bags of frozen applesauce that I purposely left plain in case I wanted to cook with it. I'm thinking of pulling them out and making some of these flavored applesauces you guys are talking about. Lori

lpinkmountain,

I like apple-cranberry-sauce myself, but it is on the tart side. I usually don't add sugar to my applesauce but DH prefers that one when I make it with a little added honey.

The apple-raspberry mix doesn't seem to come out as red or even pink as one might like, so you may want food colouring if you're looking for a combo-colour look! Hmm--- anyone tried with black raspberries?

Apple-plum is rather nice, and more deeply coloured.

Dave,

Love the idea of the lime. If you add food colouring, does it come out green? My applesauce often has a pink tinge to begin with if I cook it with skins & put thru the food mill; I imagine for this purpose I'd want to peel first so the sauce was a more neutral colour or I might get a nasty brown look....

trh701,
You bet, you can mix frozen other fruits with apples to make a mixed sauce! Quite safe. Just process in a water bath (or pressure canner if you prefer) as you would for regular appleasuce.

Nancedar,

LOL! I'm with you on the marachinos, though I don't know I could have been so amusingly vehement. And if someone gave me some I'd definitely put 'em in the compost --- good to get SOME use out of 'em!

But as has been said, we all have our vices. I confess that, along with home-canned produce, home-made pickles, and home-cooked sauces, my pantry houses... Kraft Dinner!

Z (please don't take my Harvest Forum card away!) ;-)

Zabby, it's OK. I post on Cooking and they let me stay, even when I admitted that Ashley will sit on the couch and eat a can of cream of mushroom soup RIGHT OUT OF THE CAN. No diluting it, no heating it, just the way it is. I shudder, but she likes it. She doesn't eat Kraft Dinner but she loves Velveeta Shells and Cheese, and prefers Prego or Regu to homemade spaghetti sauce too. (grin)

Now, the applesauce. That strawberry applesauce is very "rich" and not very thick, and Bud will eat it but Makayla and Ashley won't. I have only five pints but I'm wondering what else I could use thin, sweet applesauce for. Any suggestions besides pancake topping?

Annie

lpinkmountain - I use blue elderberry juice to color things blue, add more juice and to get purple, add a bunch to get black. Elderberries also combine with blueberries and a hint of lime for some great jelly.

Josh you are so lucky to have access to elderberries. Great in pies too!

Linda Lou. I made your breakfast bars, too. I spread half with apricot and the rest of it with strawberry - rhubarb preserves. Both were very good and yes, I wrapped in parchment paper and froze them.

jude

Ah-hah! time. To make some fruit more red (without the high pH problem, duh, of my ignorant beet suggestion above post, or use of artificial colors and flavors of the vile stuff) - how about using Prickly Pear Cactus fruit? I have permanently stained fingernails from harvesting this fruit - it is vehemently pink-purple so it has to be a good colorizer and being a fruit must have a low pH? Maybe 3 point-something? How will I ever find that info? This tasty fruit grows all over our country but no one sees it as fruit/food. I had a customer ask me to make some jelly from it and, though it tasted like "fruit", it had an unidentifiable flavor (kiwi, watermelon?) yet she raved about it. Maybe she was from the Southwest where fruit is scarce in the desert? But the color - whoo-ee!!! Think I'll try some in the applesauce and give y'all an update.

Nancy