Apple Butter
September 29, 2011
Our apple tree went OFF this year. We’re running around making apple sauce, dried apples, apple crisp, apple crumble, apple pie. . . and apple butter! A dear family friend made the BEST apple butter I’ve ever had. Her recipe requires standing at the stove, stirring your butter for HOURS. I’m not that kinda girl, so I adapted it for the crockpot! Hooray! I use my extra big 6 qt. crock pot, but you could easily cut this down to fit into a standard 3.5 qt. crock pot.
Apple Butter
Yield: About 4 pints
- Enough cored apple chunks to fill your crockpot to the top (leave the skins on, the pectin in them is what helps thicken your butter)
- 1 cup Water
- 1cup Brown Sugar
- Zest and juice of one Lemon
- 1 T ground cinnamon
- 1/2 t ground allspice
- 1/2 t ground cloves
I start my apple butter before noon so the timing works out to let it cook unattended overnight.
Fill your crockpot with chunked up apples with the skins on. Add water, sugar and zest and juice of lemon. Cook in your crock pot on low for 5 hours, then high for 3 more hours. Stir occasionally throughout the day.
Add spices, stir and then cook on low overnight.
In the morning, blend it all down with a stick blender right in the pot (be careful, hot apple butter HURTS if it splashes on you!)
Then, cook on high *uncovered* until you get your butter to desired thickness.
A quick test is to plop a teaspoon of apple butter on a very cold plate (stick it in the freezer for a few minutes). If the butter seems to seep liquid on the bottom, you might want to cook it a bit longer.
Once you’re happy with the consistency, you can either store your apple butter in the fridge or can it.
1/2 pint jars need to be processed for 5 minutes.
Here’s a good primer on canning.
I like to eat apple butter on crackers or toast.
It’s great baked into zucchini bread. Here’s a really yummy recipe.
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