What Apples are Best for Applesauce? - Robinette's Apple Haus & Winery (2024)

FAQs

What variety of apples make the best applesauce? ›

Use different apple varieties for a mix of sweet and tart flavors with firm and soft textures. I'm partial to Jonagolds, Fujis, and Golden Delicious. You can peel your apples for a smoother texture, but I prefer the added flavor that intact peels bring.

Gala. A crisp, sweet apple with a mild flavor, Galas have yellow-orange skin with red striping. They're among the best apples for applesauce, salads, eating out-of-hand, and pressing into cider.

The best varieties for canning apples are crisp, not mealy, types. Some of the best apples for canning include Fuji, Braeburn, Jonagold, Granny Smith, Golden Delicious, Pink Lady, Jazz, Honeycrisp, and Cortland.

The mellow sweetness of toasted sugar adds complexity. Apple cider vinegar helps brighten cooked fruit. Using skin-on fruit improves both flavor and color in the finished product. Aromatics like cinnamon, orange peel, and rose water intensify the flavor of the apples.

Its firm flesh makes Paula Red a good fresh eating and cooking apple, especially good for a delicious, naturally pink applesauce and for pie making. It is an early season apple ripening in late August, and like most early apples, Paula Red does not keep for too long.

Stay away from Red Delicious apples when making sauce.

And in case you're wondering, varieties like Honeycrisp, Fuji, and McIntosh are the best apples for applesauce. How long will homemade applesauce last? It'll stay good for four to six days stored in the fridge. You could also can it to make it last longer, but that's a lesson for another day.

Ruby Mac. A mid-season apple, that is a great eating apple and for applesauce.

Apples are considered a high acid food, so it is safe to use the hot water bath method of canning outlined below. Although, if you have the equipment and want a slightly faster way to process apples you can also pressure can applesauce. It's actually one of the few foods you can choose to can using either method.

Are Jonagold apples good for applesauce? ›

This is a good opportunity to do some apple swapping with neighbors! If only one apple is used for applesauce, then a sweet-tart variety is best, such as a Jonagold.

Classically bred and grown in Washington State, the Cosmic Crisp^® apple is a cross of the Enterprise and Honeycrisp varieties. The large, juicy and red apple has a perfectly balanced flavor and firm texture, making it ideal for snacking, cooking, baking, and entertaining.

Which apples bake best? For the best pies, crisps, and other baked treats, apples need to be firm enough to hold their own during the cooking process. We call these apples “baking apples” and to namedrop, they include Braeburn, Cortland, Honey Gold, Jonathan, Fuji, Gala, Granny Smith, Haralson, and Newtown Pippin.

While there is an extremely wide variety of apples, all with varying flavors, the sweetest-tasting apple is fuji, followed by gala, honeycrisp, and Red Delicious apples. These apples are great for snacking and eating as is. Granny Smith, McIntosh, and Pink Lady fall on the tart end of the spectrum.

You can use any variety of apple you enjoy such as Granny Smith, Fuji, or Honeycrisp. Granny Smith are a popular choice for caramel apples because they're tart, which pairs perfectly with sweet buttery caramel.