How do I make apple sauce for pork?
Which apples collapse and which hold their shape, how much sugar it actually needs, and how to make and freeze a batch when the tree is producing more than you can eat.
- Difficulty
- beginner
- Time
- 20 min
- Read
- 3 min
Short answer
Bramleys, peeled, cored and chopped, with a splash of water, a knob of butter and only a little sugar, simmered with the lid on for ten minutes until they collapse. Beat smooth or leave chunky. Taste before adding sugar — it should be sharp, not sweet.
Apple sauce for pork is a sharp condiment, not a pudding. Its job is to cut the fat, and a sauce sweetened like a compote does not do that. The only real decision is the apple: cooking apples collapse to a purée and eating apples do not, and using the wrong one is why some apple sauce comes out as chunks in liquid.
What you'll need
- Bramley or other cooking apples
- Butter
- Sugar (optional)
- Lemon (optional)
- Cloves or cinnamon (optional)
Step by step
- Use cooking apples, ideally Bramleys.Bramleys have high acidity and a cell structure that collapses completely on cooking, which is exactly what apple sauce needs. Eating apples such as Gala or Braeburn stay in pieces and taste bland. Some older varieties — Grenadier, Howgate Wonder — also break down well.
- Peel, core and chop roughly.Chunks of two or three centimetres. They are going to collapse, so precision is wasted. Drop them into water with a squeeze of lemon if you are prepping ahead, to stop them browning.
- Cook them with very little liquid, covered.Two tablespoons of water in the pan with a knob of butter, lid on, over a low-medium heat. Apples release a great deal of their own liquid; adding more gives you a watery sauce that then has to be reduced.
- Simmer for eight to twelve minutes until they collapse.Stir once or twice. They go from chunks to a foaming mass quite suddenly. Watch the base — apple catches easily and a scorched batch is bitter.
- Taste, then sweeten cautiously.A tablespoon of sugar for four large Bramleys is a reasonable starting point and many people use less. Add it at the end, a little at a time. The sauce should still be noticeably sharp when it goes with the pork.
- Beat it smooth or leave it textured.A wooden spoon and thirty seconds of beating gives a smooth sauce. Leaving it as it falls gives a rustic one. Both are correct; smooth is more usual with roast pork.
- Finish with butter and, if you like, a spice.A knob of butter beaten in at the end gives gloss and richness. A clove, a small piece of cinnamon or a strip of lemon zest cooked with the apples is traditional — remove whole spices before serving.
Tips
- It freezes perfectly and is one of the best things to do with a glut of cooking apples. Freeze in portions in an ice-cube tray or small tubs, unsweetened, and sweeten on thawing.
- Made without sugar it keeps about five days in the fridge; with sugar, a little longer. It also cans and bottles well if you have the equipment.
- For pork, keep it sharp. For a pudding or for serving with yoghurt, sweeten it more and add cinnamon.
- A tablespoon of cider or calvados stirred in at the end is very good with roast pork and belly.
- If it is watery, take the lid off and simmer for a few minutes. If it is too thick, a splash of water — it thickens as it cools.
Questions people ask
Can I use eating apples?
You can, but you will get a different sauce. Eating apples hold their shape and are much sweeter and less acidic, so the result is chunky, sweet, and does not cut the richness of pork in the way a Bramley sauce does. If eating apples are what you have, chop them small, cook them longer, add a good squeeze of lemon for acidity, and add no sugar at all.
How much sugar does apple sauce need?
Far less than most recipes suggest. Start with a tablespoon for a kilo of Bramleys, taste, and add more only if it is genuinely puckering. Remember it is going next to fatty roast pork, where sharpness is the whole point. Sauce made for a pudding or for children can be sweeter, and it is easier to add sugar at the end than to take it out.