August 31, 2010

Apple butter!

So one of my favorite foods in possibly the whole entire world is apple butter. For some reason, I had always thought it would be terribly time consuming and complicated to make. Then one day a couple of years ago I found myself with 2 bags of apples going soft and yucky. I figured they were going bad anyway, so why not do an experiment, so I peeled 'em up, whacked them up some and threw them in my crock pot. Many hours and some spices later, I had apple butter!  And it was good! Hooray! This might not be the 'right' way to make apple butter, or the way your grandma made it or whatever, but this is the way that works for me, and quite frankly, as long as I am happy with the results, I don't think the 'right' and 'wrong' ways mean shit. So without further ado, here is my "recipe" for apple butter.

Get you a bunch of apples. I usually just get a bag of whatever I can get. As far as I can tell, anything will work. I've used everything except green ones, but that is because I don't like the green ones. Peel them, core them and chop them into roughly equal pieces. I peel mine for one very simple reason. I don't have a food mill, and the idea of picking out apple peel at the end just seems like more work than peeling. So I peel.  Throw all your chopped apples in the crock pot. Mine is usually pretty full. They are going to cook down. They are going to cook down A LOT. I set it on low and walk away. Check them every now and then. You want to be able to squish them easily with a fork. This has taken me anywhere from 6 hours to 12 hours. Seems to have something to do with the water content of the apples. When they are all nice and squishy grab your potato masher and smush them all up. Throw in your sugar, starting at about 1/4 c.  I suppose if you wanted to use fake sugar you could, but I never have. I don't keep the stuff around. Then dump in some cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, and a pinch of ginger. I usually go about 1 tsp of each. Cook for an hour or so, then taste it. Add more spices, or more sugar if you don't think it's sweet enough. Cook until it tastes right. Sorry, I know that's vague, but that's how it works.

When it's done, I let it cool a bit, then put it in some tupperware and either freeze it or stick it in the fridge. If you want to be adventurous and can it, be my guest.

I think I might attempt doing this with pumpkin this fall. Pumpkin butter sounds really good to me. I imagine you could also use the same method for peaches, or pears.

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