It's Apple Butter Time!

Actually, anytime you can buy apples is apple butter time. Which is the same as saying that anytime is apple butter time. But this weekend I decided it was apple butter time for me. I've never made apple butter before, but had read so much about making it in the slow cooker that I wanted to give it a try.

I bought just over 3 pounds of honeycrisp apples as the local farmer's market. To that I added four apples that had been in our refrigerator's crisper a little longer than optimum. They hadn't gone bad, but they weren't crisp anymore, which is how I like my apples. I'm guessing it all added up to about 4 1/2 pounds (a couple of those crisper apples were pretty big).

After washing them and removing all those silly little labels, I cut them up and tossed them in my biggest pot - cores, skins and all.

I added two cups of apple juice. The juice I used was unfiltered, so it was more like apple cider.

I brought everything to a boil and boiled for about half an hour, stirring occasionally, until the apples were soft.

This is why I didn't have to peel or core; my Victorio strainer. I just recently bought this thing, and I love it already. All the cooked apple glop went into the strainer, and I started cranking.

Applesauce came out of the strainer part.

The parts that weren't applesauce plopped into another bowl. This stuff went into the compost.

I measured the applesauce into my slow cooker; I got 8 cups. I added brown sugar, cinnamon and cloves and started it on low. I think my slow cooker must be slower than most, because after 12 hours on low (with the lid propped open a little for 10 of those hours), it still wasn't cooked down enough. So I cranked it up to high for about 4 hours or so. Even then, I was getting a little bit of liquid separation when I put a spoonful on a chilled plate (like they show here), but it was really thick and held its shape well, so I decided it was done enough. Also, I was pretty much out of time if I still wanted to can it. (I just noticed that site says nothing about a chilled plate; I was sure I saw that somewhere. But maybe I was testing wrong. Oops.)

Doesn't that look dark and rich?

I ladled the finished apple butter into pint jars. I forgot to take pics at this point, but I did remember to taste a little bit of the butter remaining in the pot after filling the jars. It was super yummy; very pronounced apple flavor. Much better than any apple butter I have bought!

After processing in a water bath for 15 minutes, I had three lovely jars of apple butter. I figure there is about a pound and a half of apples in each jar. Two of those jars will be gifts, but I am definitely keeping one for me!

Here's the recipe in a more useable form:

Apple Butter
makes 3 pints

4-5 lbs apples, cut up (Peel and core if you don't have a strainer designed to remove peels, etc.)
2 cups apple juice or cider

Combine in large pot and boil for about 30 minutes, until apples are soft. Process through strainer or food mill to make applesauce.

8 cups applesauce
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves

Stir together in slow cooker. Cook for a couple of hours with lid closed, then prop open lid with a chopstick or wooden spoon. Amount of time is going to vary depending on your slow cooker. I recommend trying 8 hours on low. If that isn't doing the job, set it on high, but keep an eye on it.

Once apple butter is done, you can freeze it, or can it. To can, process for 15 minutes in a water bath canner. These folks have some good instructions on water bath canning if you aren't familiar with it.