Applesauce season

When the first apples of the season – Ida Red and Paula Red, Twenty Ounce, McIntosh, and Ginger Gold – show up in the city markets, it’s time to take out the big pot and make applesauce.

A lovingly recounted description of a family’s applesauce-making ritual describes the buying, peeling, cooking and stirring; the wait for the sauce to cool and the first taste.

Mordicai Gerstein’s paintings are full of the colors and flavors of the season: red apples, orange leaves, blue skies. Here’s a lovely picture book celebrating an American family tradition.