11 Quarts!

Of apple pie filling, that is.  This will make about six deep-dish pies, so some I will give as holiday presents and some I will store in the pantry.  In Fall of 2012 we had just moved and I was so swamped with painting, remodeling and managing contractors that I didn't put any apple pie filling up.  At that point, I still couldn't always remember the new location of the bathroom when I went down the hall, so not canning much should not have been any surprise. Moving a couple of hundred miles away shell-shocks you in ways you don't really understand until you've truly settled in, even if its a happy move. 

But believe me, when July 4 of 2013 rolled around, I missed that pre-cooked apple pie filling that I should have spent Fall of 2012 canning.   Oh did I miss it.  Anyway, this lack of pie filling will not be the case July 4 2014 -- today took care of that.

This year I got to go to an bucolic, organic U-pick apple farm to pick my crop, and truly, these are the best apples I have ever eaten.  They have no wax on them, and their flavor is outrageously sweet and crisp.  

A very a-peeling appliance (sorry)

I got to use the one Pampered Chef product I own, too -- an apple peeler, which saved a lot of time and trouble.  Nonetheless, it still took me most of the day to do this, but I think it was worth a day of manual labor.