Apple Butter

Meet Apple Butter. So easy and delish! I bought too many apples on my last trip to the grocery store, and I’ve been out of town most of last week and leave again on Monday for a business trip. Instead of letting these fruits go to waste, I’m going to try my hand at apple butter. I have to admit, I’m not sure I’ve ever had apple butter, but type those two words into foodblogsearch.com and other bloggers talk about the stuff like it’s the healthy version of nutella. I had no idea until I started my research that apple butter has no butter in it actually, it’s used as butter and is sometimes as smooth as butter – if you make it that way, some people like theirs chunky. They are slathering it on English muffins, toast and even eating it right out of the jar. I trust these folks, they usually know what they are talking about. So here we go.

I have 4 medium granny smith apples, one small granny smith apple and a random pear. There was much discussion regarding we leave the peel on or take it off. Most recipes I came across used peeled and cored apples, but I like this one that suggest grating the peel first before coring the apple. And any recipe that suggest I use my micro zester wins my heart. I love this kitchen tool.

The first thing I do is rinse the fruit really well. Then ZEST away, right into my slow cooker. Yes, there are various methods to cook the apple butter, stove top, oven and microwave even, but I love to use my slowcooker – well, not this exact one per say, but I’ve registered for the mac daddy of all slow cookers online and I can’t wait to get it.

After the skin is zested I use my apple slicer to core and slice each fruit, then cut each slice in half again. Smaller pieces = faster cooking.

I'm not a fan of the peel on pears, so I peeled this first, then diced the pear into on einch squares.

Next add

1 T lemon juice

¼ cup brown sugar

1 packet sweetener or sugar to taste (truvia)

1 T ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

You could also add:
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/8 teaspoon ground mace
¼ cup apple cider
1 tablespoon brandy

Instead I added:
¼ t ground ginger (in place of the spices I didn’t have)
4 whole allspice, ground (in place of the spices I didn’t have)
¼ cup water (instead of apple cider which I didn’t have)

Give it a stir, add the lid and let it cook down for 5-10 hours (there was much discrepancy on how long this takes.) I go back and check every hour and give it a stir so it cooks evenly. I cooked mine for 6 hours on low, covered, stirring every hour. Then I used my hand blender and mixed it all up, left the lid off and let it cook for another hour.

Pure and simple. Apple Butter.