Month: September 2011

Old-Fashioned Apple Sauce Recipe

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Saturday, September 2, 1911: Had to pick apples today. Almost a whole wagon load it was. Was rather hard on my hands for they were just about as sore as I cared to have them by the time I got through with the dreaded thing.Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

Whew, a wagon load is a lot of apples. Early varieties aren’t generally very good for long-term storage. Maybe they made cider or sold some of them.  Perhaps Grandma used a few of the apples to made apple sauce.

Here’s how I make apple sauce:

Apple Sauce

Cut any bad sections from the apples, then quarter and core. Do not peel (The peels of red-skinned apples give the sauce a nice pinkish color).

Place the quartered apples in a medium sauce pan. Use as many apples as needed to fill pan about two-thirds full. Add a small amount of water to keep apples from scorching.Place on medium heat. Stir occasionally.  If needed, add additional water. Reduce heat after it begins to boil.  Cook until apples are soft and mushy (about 15 minutes).

Press the cooked apples through a sieve or strainer. I use a Foley Mill—though they would not have existed a hundred years ago. (Foley Mills were invented in 1933.)If desired, stir cinnamon and sugar into the sauce. For each cup of apple sauce, I usually use about 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and (depending upon how tart the apples were) approximately 1/8 – 1/4 cup sugar. Chill and serve.

Exhausted! Started Fall Housecleaning

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Friday, September 1, 1911:

Glorious skies of balmy September,

Tells us of approaching fall

With its leaves of varied colors,

And it’s flowers for large and small.

Celebrated the first day of this month by starting to clean house. We cleaned the sitting room today, and it was an all day job. I’m so tired from exerting myself.

Old Carpet Beater

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

Yuck—it sounds like a lot of work. Grandma, her sister Ruth, and her mother were probably starting to do the fall housecleaning.  A hundred years ago houses got a deep cleaning twice a year—in the spring and in the fall.

Furniture would be moved so that carpets could be rolled up and then taken outside to be beaten, every corner and cranny would have been swept, floors would have  been waxed, the wooden furniture would have  been polished, the windows washed, etc., etc., etc.

No wonder Grandma was exhausted. Just making this list is making me tired.

(See  previous post for more information about the poems on the first day of each month.)