Slow Cooker Apple Butter

We interrupt this regularly scheduled update with a recipe for you to try. It's fall out there, you wouldn't know that today with the surprise inch of snow on the ground, but that usually means apples. Lots and lots of apples. We have one lonely apple tree on our property that does produce a couple of apples, but unfortunately, the raccoons seem to get them each year. We do, however, have lots of neighbors and friends with apples, and LOTS of orchards nearby. Mmm, apple pies, apple sauce, and cinnamon-spicy apple butter. Yum!

As I mentioned before, I posted on Facebook that I had some apple butter simmering in the slow cooker, and I had a request for the recipe. I tried to sit down and write it out and quickly realized I didn't know how many apples I used or the names for the different tools I used, so I thought I'd make some more and do some measuring and picture taking this time.

First thing we had to do was get some more apples. We decided to visit one of the local orchards. We had a 1/2 bushel of apples in less than 30 minutes and less than $15. It was fun traipsing through the orchard and chatting with the owners about apples and stuff.

 

Did you know 2 pecks equal 1/2 bushel? I didn't. I didn't even know how much a peck was, but now I do. Each of these bags holds 1 peck (maybe a little more, but they were pretty generous. :o).

 

Start by washing the apples and then coring and slicing. I use this peeler, corer, slicer thingy. Again, I don't know it's real name, that's just what we call it. My peeling blade is dull now and doesn't do a great job of peeling, so I just core and slice. You can save yourself a step later if you peel them now though. 

This is the crock pot that I use. I'm still not sure what size it is, but you can see it's pretty big. I just core and slice until my pot is full. When I say full, I mean as full as I can possibly get it and still put the lid on. We used all but 10 apples from one of our bags, so that was about 20 apples, I think.

To the apples add 2 cups sugar, 3 t cinnamon, 1 t cloves and 1/4 t salt. If you feel your apples are a bit dry, you can add 1/4 cup apple cider or juice (or even water) if you need to. I usually find that that isn't necessary. Then put the lid on and let the crock pot do the work. Cook on high for 3 hours.

After 3 hours, the apples should look like this and smell simply divine. :o) Now turn the crock pot down to low and let it cook for 12-13 hours. I usually try and start my apple butter in the afternoon so I can let this part go overnight. 

In the morning, you will wake up to this yummy, warm, cinnamony, spicy delicousness. As you can see, the apples cook down quite a bit. If you have already peeled your apples, you can simply take a whisk and give this a good stir to break up any lumps and smooth it out. Then freeze or can in a boiling water canner.

Since I didn't peel mine ahead of time, I ran the sauce through my "apple sauce thingy". Not sure of it's name, but this is what we use to puree cooked apples and make applesauce with. It's pretty easy to use--chunky apple butter goes in the top, smooth apple butter comes out the chute, and your peels come out the far tube. Michelle's favorite job is pulling the peels out of the tube. The hardest part of this thing is taking it apart when you're done and cleaning it. 

Much better, nice and smooth with no peeling strings in it. :o) I also like to taste mine now to see if it needs any additional sugar or spices. Who are we kidding? I taste this at least once an hour throughout the cooking time that I'm awake. Kind of surprised I don't sneak into the kitchen in the middle of the night for a taste. :o) We used Fireside apples this time, and we definitely noticed a more sour note to the sauce than the last batch.

I prefer to can my butter rather than freeze it as I like to send it to family and friends for Christmas. There are lots of tutorials online for canning so I won't go into details on that, but I did process these in a boiling water canner with 1/4 headroom for 10 minutes.

I guess that about does it. Hope you give this a try and let me know what you think. I think I'm going to go see if there's any apple pie left. :o)

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!