The Surprising Spice You Should Be Adding To Store-Bought Applesauce To Kick It Up A Notch

If you still associate applesauce exclusively with childhood faves, you might not have fully explored all of its adult applications and flavor amplifications just yet. Applesauce has terrific merits as an oil substitute when baking, it is the pork chop's enduring ideal companion, and it makes any latke preparation just a little bit more comforting. And you can jazz it up whether you're using it as a side dish, or enjoying applesauce alone. We aren't just talking about the good old cinnamon mix-in. The popular fruit purée is also great with a hotter kick.

Cayenne pepper, which you should already have in your spice cabinet, is tops with applesauce. Its subtly sweet smokiness and mild tingle works with applesauce varieties all along the tart to sugary spectrum. On the former end, cayenne pepper can actually take the edge off a sauce's more puckering quality. On the latter, it cuts through the treacly, dessert-like quality. And a few crimson shakes also add a bit of aesthetic appeal, should you want your midday snack to look a little more picturesque for social media.

Even for those of us who seek out foods that rank high on the Scoville scale at the grocery store and scan for chili pepper illustrations on restaurant menus, introducing that very heat to any old item can sometimes be challenging. The hot sauce that's already in your pantry might seem like the easy, convenient solution to practically everything, but it doesn't perform perfectly in softer things like applesauce that hover dangerously close to unintended liquid territory. Dried cayenne pepper, instead, adds pizzazz without the extra moisture like you'd get from something like a healthy dose of texture-diluting sriracha.

Cayenne pepper is ideal due to its dynamic notes, but your favorite dried pepper will perform similarly when you're being careful not to water down your applesauce. Whole botanicals can also bring some heat, as well as their own texture. Sliced jalapeños would work wonderfully, provided you keep some seeds, and you can always scale up to serrano or habanero peppers from there.