One of my favorite things in life is apple butter on top of a buttery piece of toast in the morning. Yum!!! I also love the excitement of when the grocery store here gets their big shipment of apples in, and I always get a bunch of my favorite Honey Crisp apples. Those, as well as a few other kinds make up this recipe of apple butter, but feel free to stick with just your favorite or go all out like I did.*
The rich gold color comes from the length of time you let this slow cook. I did mine for 8 hours, but I easily could’ve let this go all night in a crock pot if I had one big enough.
You can either make this recipe and freeze it or can it. I canned mine and I’m not going to get too descriptive in the canning instructions because I’m going to assume you know what you’re doing. If not, see my Strawberry Apricot Jam recipe for further detail or of course just ask me in the comment section.
*I used a mix of mostly Honey Crisp, Golden Delicious, Sweet & Crunchy, and a girl in my MOPS group gave me some from her tree at home that looked like McIntosh to me, but she wasn’t sure what kind they are.
Ingredients:
- 10 pounds of apples cored, peeled, and sliced thin (I highly recommend purchasing one of these VICTORIO VKP1010 Apple and Potato Peeler, Suction Base
because it will make your prep time practically nil and it’s amazing!)
- 1 c apple cider
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1 tsp ground cloves
- 2 c white sugar
- 1 c brown sugar
- A 12 Q pot or 12 Q crock pot
- A hand blender like this one Proctor-Silex 59738A Hand Blender
1. First lets prep those apples! But first, let’s spike some cider to get us in the mood 😉 Ok, now then…
2. Toss all your apples into your giant pot.
3. Now dump in your spices, sugar, and cider and bring to a boil. *If you’re doing this in a crock pot you can just turn on low and come stir it in a few hours. Let it boil for a minute or so, then turn down to a simmer. Cover mostly with a lid but allow a small space to remain to let some of the steam out.
4. Now you’re going to let this slow cook for a minimum of six hours (I did mine eight but could’ve gone longer like I said before) but keep coming back to give it a stir every now and then.
5. Once it’s the color you want, get out your hand blender and go to town on these puppies!
6. Now you can either divide this out and freeze it, or can it like I did with a ten minute water bath. Again, check my recipe above for water bath times where you are if you aren’t sure. This made 14 1/2 pint jars.
7. Now go get a big honkin’ slab of butter and put it on some bread, toast it up, and then lather it up with some golden apple butter. Delicious!