Farmer's Markets. Apples. Apple Butter.

Hi Friends-

Since the cooler weather has hit central Missouri, I have seriously been longing for some apples. I was planning a trip to a local apple orchard to go picking, but after a trip to the Farmer's Market a couple of weekends ago I found out that I didn't have to. I lucked out when I met the most adorable farmer selling apples for $0.50/pound.

That's right people; $0.50/pound!! I honestly couldn't believe it either, so needless to say, I bought 15 pounds of Red Delicious apples with the intent of canning some apple butter.

Now, something you should know about me is that I have never canned an item in my life. I feel 100% comfortable in the kitchen when I'm cooking or baking, but when it comes to canning I am clueless. I have many memories of my mom and dad canning garden items and preserving fruits in jams and jellies, but this girl has never tried her hand at canning. It was pretty bold of me to just assume that I could just waltz into the kitchen and be able to can apple butter, but I thought it was worth a shot.

Luckily for me my mom was at our house that weekend, so between her knowledge and good ol' Google, I had a pretty good idea of what I needed to do. I'd heard about using a crock pot to cook the apples, so that was the method I used.

I started out by finding a couple of crock pot recipes that seemed to fit what I was wanting to do. I went back to these two recipes for most of the process:

http://baking.about.com/od/flavoredbutter1/r/applebutter.htm

http://www.thekitchn.com/apples-galore-how-to-make-appl-97454

The first recipe is the one that I followed the most, especially when it came to cooking the apples. The second one was more for guidelines on flavoring the apple butter. 

So, without further ado, I will let you in on how I made my first batch of apple butter.

Apple Butter-Becky Style (catchy, eh?!?)

To start with I dumped all the apples into my kitchen sink and scrubbed them down with hot water. I figured it was safe to say that they wouldn't have pesticides on them, so I just figured getting the dirt off of them would be enough. (Hope you don't mind the iPhone photos, because that's all I had handy for this whole process.)

The recipe I followed and a couple of others that I glanced at said to just core the apples and quarter them, so that is what I did. I cored them, cut out any bad spots and then cut them into 4 pieces and threw them into the crock pot. (Side Note: If I ever make apple butter again, I will probably peel them. I will explain more further down in this post why that is.)

Once I had my crock pot full I still had about 30 apples left in the sink. Since my lovely mother-in-law lives in town I called her up to see if I could borrow hers as well. After a quick drive to her house to pick it up I was back in the kitchen with two 4.5 quart crock pots full to the brim with apples and cider. Now, I have to tell you that I did not measure the apple cider that the first recipe called for. I had so many more apples than the recipe, so I just kind of poured until it looked good. Then I threw on some cinnamon, all-spice and nutmeg (once again without measuring) turned the crock pots on low and left them for the night.

I started the pots around 9:30 pm and when I woke up around 9:00 the next morning they looked like this

And it made my kitchen smell heavenly!

Now came to the not so fun part that I mentioned above. I knew that I didn't want a bunch of apple peels in my butter, but I also didn't have a food mill like the recipe called for. So, I improvised and used a strainer and a spoon to kind of push the apples through. This step took me about an hour and a half to do, so that is why I will probably peel my apples the next time I make butter. I'm still kind of torn though, because I hate the idea of peels in the finished product, but it just seems healthier (if apple butter can even be healthy) to have the peels while the apples are cooking. Plus, I LOVE the dark apple color that you get from the peel. Any thoughts on this? If you've made apple butter before what have you done?

Anyway. Moving on. This next process is when I started following the second recipe. I knew going in that I would just improvise while seasoning the apples, but it was nice to have multiple recipes to base that off of.

I measured the apple mixture back into the crock pots like the first recipe suggested and I had 12 cups in one crock pot and 8 cups in the other. I tasted the apple mixture before adding any sugar and found that my apples were already naturally sweet. So, I added half of the sugar that was suggested in the first recipe. I added 3 cups sugar for the crock that held the 12 cups of apple and 2 cups sugar for the 8 cups of apple. Then I added cinnamon, nutmeg, all-spice, ground cloves and vanilla, all without really measuring.

Then, like the first recipe suggested I cooked it on high for 6 more hours, with the last 3 hours uncovered.

After it was done cooking it looked like this. (this picture was after I had already filled some jars. I forgot to take a pic of it when it was full to the brim.)

Once the cooking was complete came the canning process. The link below helped me out a lot.

http://pubs.ext.vt.edu/348/348-594/348-594.html

I didn't have an actual canning pot, but I did have a really big soup pot, so that is what I used. I also went to Wally World and bought this little canning  pack for about $6.00.

Let me just say that if you do not have these tools then you will need to get them. I would not have been able to do half of what I did without these little tools.

So, following the link above and my slight knowledge, I went to work.

I got the water in my big pot boiling, put in my jars to sterilize them, and left them in for about 5 minutes or so. I also had a smaller pot on another burner for the lids and rings.

Once the jars were sterilized I scooped the apple butter into the jars using the above pictured funnel, put the lids on and set the filled jars aside. Once I had enough to put back into the boiling water I would add them to the water with the handy dandy "jar lifter", pictured above.
(Safety Note: be very careful when doing this step in the process. The water will splash on your hand causing a burn if you do not carefully place the jars in the water; not that I would know that firsthand or anything). I will say that after my initial burn I did not receive anymore. :) Yay for that!

Anyway, once the jars were in the water, I kind of guesstimated on the time to boil them. The above link gave times for jar sizes and that's what I based mine on.

For pints I did 20 minutes. Half-pints were 15 minutes. I also had some quarter pint jars and I just did them for 15 minutes as well.

I was really concerned with them not setting right, but by the end of the night all the lids had popped signaling that they had sealed! HOORAY!!!

All in all I got 5 pints, 7 half pints and 3 quarter pints.

I am thrilled with my apple butter. I have already given five jars away as gifts and look forward to giving more away as the Christmas season gets closer.

Also, the hubs and I opened up a jar the other night to taste it, and let me just say that it was the bomb diggity dog!! Delicious!!

Hope this tutorial helps if you try to make apple butter. If you have any questions, please send me a message and let me know if something doesn't make sense.

Happy canning to you!

Becky