Description
This adaptable watermelon rind fruit sauce is our favourite way to save that rind! Try our strawberry sauce, our applesauce, OR get creative!
Ingredients
Kathryn’s Pick – Watermelon Strawberry Sauce
- 3–5 cups white watermelon rind (from 1 small seedless watermelon)*
- 1 lemon juiced (or 3 tbsp concentrated lemon juice)
- 1/3 cup cane sugar (more or less to taste)
- 1 1/2 cup diced strawberries*
- optional: 1 tbsp chia seeds
- optional: 1 tbsp arrowroot starch (dissolved in 2 tsp water before adding)
Bryan’s Pick – Watermelon Rind Applesauce
- 3–5 cups white watermelon rind (from 1 small seedless watermelon)*
- 1 apple (peeled, cored and diced)*
- 3 tbsp lemon juice (or 1 lemon juiced)
- 1/3 cup cane sugar (more or less to taste)
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tbsp maple syrup
*Fresh Ingredients you need that are not part of our pantry and freezer tips.
Instructions
- To prepare the watermelon; remove the outer green peel, then slice the white rind away from the sweet fruit. Dice the strips of rind as small as you can for the quickest cooking time. If you’re making the fruit sauce from frozen watermelon rind see the notes below!
- Combine diced watermelon rind, lemon juice, and sugar in a medium pot (if making the apple sauce, add the diced apple now). Bring to a boil. Lower heat to a gentler boil, cover, and boil for 20-25 minutes stirring periodically until the watermelon pieces are translucent.
- If making the strawberry sauce add 1 ½ cup strawberries and cook with the lid on for an additional 10 minutes to soften the strawberries.
- Carefully test a piece of watermelon and make sure it’s quite tender. When tender and translucent, remove the pot from the heat and either carefully blend with an immersion blender. Or allow the mixture to cool and transfer to a stand blender.
- Blend the mixture until it forms a smooth sauce.
- For the applesauce, stir in the cinnamon and maple syrup if desired. For the strawberry sauce either enjoy as is OR return it to the pot, warm it back up, and add in chia seeds and/or optional arrowroot starch to thicken the consistency. Cook for 3-5 additional minutes.
- Allow your watermelon rind sauce to cool and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Best enjoyed within the first week!
Notes
If you have a larger watermelon, adjust the recipe to suit how much rind you have OR freeze some of the rind so you can make more sauce when you need a top up! You can follow the recipe as is when using frozen watermelon rind OR defrost the rind in the pot before adding any additional ingredients and discard about 1/2 of the water released.
Use the watermelon flesh for our Spicy “Tuna” Watermelon Poke Bowl!
If you’re using frozen watermelon rind you can add the frozen pieces to your pot and heat them to defrost. You can pour out that first bit of water that is released. Then add the lemon juice and sugar. You can also simmer the watermelon rind with the pot lid off so that more water is encouraged to evaporate. I have tried making this from frozen and not dumping the initial water released from the frozen watermelon pieces; the sauce still worked well but the flavour was slightly watered down. Let me know in the comments if you give this a try!
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 35 minutes
- Category: Thrifty How-Tos
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: American