Salad Lunch with Homemade Applesauce and Recipe

We love the fall in our house.  The windows are open, cool air is flowing through the house and the smell of fall fills every room.  We have so much fun going to the pumpkin patch, hiking through park and picking up the multi-colored leaves that are amazingly gorgeous.  We also like that there are tons of great apples in season.  This is why I'm sharing one of our favorite recipes with you.  See below.

Our main entree is a "big salad".  This was Molly's request after dance tonight so it made my decision really easy.  Our base is butter lettuce and we topped it with cucumbers, peppers, olives, turkey pepperoni and a Babybel cheese.  We added a little bit of Italian dressing for Molly and Ranch for Bean on our Easy Lunchboxes Mini Dippers.

Our fruit side is our homemade Baked Applesauce.  YUM!

Finally, our dairy/dessert is vanilla yogurt with some cute little flower sprinkles in it.

Baked Applesauce

7-8 large apples peeled, cored and cut into chunks
a sprinkle of cinnamon

*yep, that's it.

Preheat your oven to 350° F.

Wash and peel your apples.

Core your apples.  (I find it easiest to cut the apple in quarters and then core the apple by cutting the center out on a slant.)

Cut your apples into chunks.

Place the apple chunks on a parchment paper lined baking sheet and sprinkle with cinnamon.  We like Saigon Cinnamon.  Use as much or as little as you'd like.

Bake at 350° for 45-50 minutes or until tender enough to mash.

While still warm, use a potato masher to smash them into sauce. (great stress relief!) Or put into a food processor if you prefer smoother applesauce.  We like it chunky like apple pie.

That's it.  Store in an air tight container in the refrigerator.  It's great cold or warm.  My favorite way is warm with a little scoop of vanilla ice cream.