Slow Cooker Apple Peach Sauce for Full GAPS

Slow cooker apple peach sauce brings ripe peach flavor into a soft apple-based fruit sauce. The apples are cored, the peaches are pitted, and the skins stay on both fruits. They cook with half a cup of water until the flesh collapses, then cool before blending into a spoonable Full GAPS snack.

There is no honey or sugar in this batch. Sweetness comes from the fruit, so ripe peaches and the apples you choose make a noticeable difference. The finished color can be pale gold, pinkish or more peach-colored, with fine flecks of peel after blending.

Jump to the Recipe

I do most of my cooking in the morning before second-shift work, with homeschooling in the same part of the day. A longer cooking time is easier to plan around when the hands-on jobs are clear. For this sauce, the work is washing, coring and pitting first, then cooling and blending later. Having raw fruit chunks already portioned would save me another round of cutting on a crowded weekday.

Choose Ripe Peaches

Have five to ten pounds of apples and two to five pounds of ripe peaches available. The cut fruit fills the cooker about three-quarters full, below its maximum line. These ranges give you fruit to prepare; they do not mean every last piece has to fit in one pot.

Look for sound peaches with a fresh peach aroma. Ripe peaches give to a gentle touch. A red blush alone does not establish ripeness: Utah State University’s peach guide explains that the background color is more useful than the red surface color.

Firm peaches can ripen at room temperature before preparation. Once ripe, use them or refrigerate them until you are ready to cook. Choose fruit with good flesh, and leave moldy or decaying peaches out of the batch.

Freestone peaches make pitting easier because the flesh separates from the pit. Clingstone peaches hold onto it more tightly. Both types can be prepared, but the clingstone fruit may need you to cut the flesh away instead of expecting two clean halves to twist apart.

Core The Apples And Remove Every Peach Pit

Wash the whole fruits under running water. Remove apple stems, seeds and tough cores with a knife or apple corer, then cut the apples into bite-sized chunks. Roughly eight pieces per apple is a starting point, with smaller pieces for a very large apple.

Cut the peaches, remove their pits and cut the flesh into similar chunks. Leave the peach skins on for this version. Check the cut pieces before they go into the bowl so there are no hard pit fragments mixed with the soft fruit.

A peach pit is different from an apple core. Do not try to run the peach through an apple corer or leave the stone for the blender to deal with later. The cooking pot holds fruit flesh and skins, without the stems, seeds, cores or pits.

Mix the prepared apple and peach pieces before filling the cooker. This distributes the fruits through the load. Set extra prepared fruit aside for another batch or freeze it rather than pressing it into an already full pot.

How To Make Apple Peach Sauce

1. Load The Cooker And Add Water

Fill the cooking pot about three-quarters full with the mixed chunks, staying below the marked maximum, then add one-half cup filtered water. The fruit releases more liquid during cooking, so it does not need to be covered with water.

I use the Ninja Foodi FD401 on Slow Cook LO. Fit its pressure lid with the valve in the VENT position and select the slow-cook time. This is the vented slow-cook function, not a pressure-cooking cycle.

2. Cook Until The Apple And Peach Collapse

Cook covered on low for six to ten hours, allowing around eight hours for planning. Check the fruit toward the earlier end of the range. Fruit variety, piece size and a fresh or frozen start affect the actual time.

Press an apple piece and a peach piece with a wooden spoon or silicone spatula. Both should collapse easily without a firm middle. The peaches can become soft before a firmer apple variety, so check more than the softest piece on top.

The cooked fruit should smell like warm apples and peaches. Skins may remain visible as soft strips before blending, and the color can deepen during the long cook. A particular orange shade is not the endpoint; fully soft fruit is.

3. Cool Before Blending

Turn off cooking and Keep Warm once the fruit is soft. Divide the mixture into shallow, heat-safe containers for prompt cooling. An ice bath around the containers, with occasional stirring, can help the heat leave without adding more water to the sauce.

Cool the fruit to room temperature before using the Ninja BN801. Its manufacturer says not to blend hot liquids. If you are leaving the blending until later, refrigerate the shallow portions promptly, within two hours, and blend them cold.

4. Blend The Fruit And Softened Skins

Set up the empty full-size BN801 pitcher with its stacked blade assembly before adding food. Add cooled fruit and its cooking liquid in batches below the maximum liquid line. Secure the lid and keep the pour-spout cap closed while blending.

Blend until the skins are broken into fine flecks and the sauce is evenly spoonable. Stop before checking or scraping the pitcher. The result may have tiny colored specks, but it should not contain large peel curls or firm pieces.

Transfer the batches according to the manufacturer’s blade-handling instructions, then stir them together. The sauce should fall softly from a spoon. A juicy peach batch can be looser than an apple-only sauce, so look at the consistency before adding anything extra.

Where Apple Peach Sauce Fits In GAPS

This is a Full GAPS fruit recipe after apples, peaches and their skins fit the foods you have introduced. Dr. Natasha’s 2020 food list includes apples and peaches. Early cooked-fruit guidance starts with peeled, deseeded fruit, which is a different preparation from leaving the peels in.

Intro Stage 5 names peeled, cored cooking apples stewed soft and mashed with ghee or the appropriate introduced animal fat. This apple-and-peach sauce keeps the skins and has no added fat, so it does not replace that earlier apple preparation.

Full GAPS generally puts fruit in the smaller snack part of the day, between meals. Serve a small fruit portion rather than turning the sauce into the main meal or assuming a sweet batch belongs alongside meat.

The apples, peaches and water have no dairy, egg or nut ingredients. This recipe does not fit No-Plant GAPS, and a fruit sauce should not be assumed to fit a ketogenic GAPS menu. There is no extra sweetener in the formula to leave out.

Freeze The Fruit Before Cooking

You can wash, core and pit the fruit, cut it into chunks and freeze it for up to about four months before cooking. Mix the apples and peaches, pack in freezer-suitable containers or bags, and mark the combination and date.

Keep the portion size practical for your cooker. A huge solid block is harder to fit under the fill limit than loose chunks. Use the same half cup of water per load, cook from frozen and allow toward the longer end of the six-to-ten-hour range.

Some cut surfaces may brown during preparation or storage. The finished sauce is not expected to stay the color of freshly cut fruit. This recipe does not add a lemon bath, syrup or commercial fruit-preserving mixture.

Store And Serve The Finished Sauce

The batch makes approximately two quarts, with actual yield depending on the loaded fruit and how it cooks down. Measure after blending if you want exact portions for the freezer. Leave expansion room in freezer-suitable containers.

Refrigerate promptly at 40°F or below and use within three to four days, or freeze portions. Thaw in the refrigerator and stir before serving. Serve cool, or warm gently on the stove after blending if that is the texture and temperature you prefer.

The separate plain peel-on applesauce keeps the fruit flavor entirely apple-based. Apple pear sauce is another mixed-fruit choice with its own pear quantities.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I Have To Peel The Peaches?

Leave the peach and apple peels on for this version. Remove the apple cores and peach pits before cooking, then blend the softened skins after the mixture has cooled.

Which Peaches Are Easiest To Pit?

Freestone peaches release their pits more easily. With clingstone fruit, cut the flesh away carefully. Either way, check the prepared pieces and keep every pit out of the cooking and blending stages.

Can I Blend The Sauce While It Is Hot?

Cool the fruit before using the Ninja BN801. Its manufacturer says not to blend hot liquids. Use the full-size pitcher within its fill limit, with the lid and pour-spout cap closed.

How Do I Make Twice As Much?

The card doubles to ten to twenty pounds of apples, four to ten pounds of peaches and one cup of water across two cooker loads. Use half a cup of water per load, keep the same fill limit and plan successive runs if you have one cooker.

Recommended Equipment

Use the Ninja Foodi FD401 on Slow Cook LO with its lid vented, then the Ninja BN801 full-size pitcher for cooled blending. A knife, optional apple corer, cutting board, wooden spoon or silicone spatula, measuring cup and shallow containers complete the setup.

The upcoming Jar & Freezer Labels will help keep “apple peach” easy to distinguish from plain applesauce or raw frozen fruit. Find upcoming resources in the WFLI shop. Mark the fruit, preparation date and portion amount before the containers go into the freezer.