Apple Butter — The Diva Dish

I have always been in love with fall.

The leaves changing color and the weather getting cooler.

Along with tons of apples, squash, and pumpkin!

And cute sweaters and boots that I will never be able to afford.. :)

Unfortunately I live in a city where there really isn't seasons. The leaves might change colors, and the weather might require a sweater in the evening, but today when I looked at my car thermometer it read 97 degrees.

I know I'm crazy not to enjoy a summer vacation all year long, but I've lived in both extremes.

Really hot and really cold, and I can officially say that a little bit of both would be perfect. :-)

So for now, we do what we can and play in dog bowls filled with ice...

White trash activity? Maybe...

And instead of cider we drink milkshakes.

(Recipe soon!)

We also like to unhinge our jaws and eat huge honeycrisp apples...

And eat apple pie with our hands...

The same hands used to play in the dog bowl with...

Delicious AND nutritious!

Oh, and I may have gone a tad bit "Fall" crazy, and bought an 8 pound bag of honey crisp apples, but I had one thing on my mind...

Apple Butter!

Ever since the amazing Angela from Oh She Glows made it, I couldn't stop thinking about it! I fell in LOVE with Pumpkin Butter last year, and knew that apple butter would be just...dare I say..if not MORE amazing..!!

Let me just say this...it was!

Slow Cooker Apple Butter

*This is one of my favorite seasonal dishes to date! So sweet and delicious, and no one would guess that it isn't sugar heavy like other apple butter recipes!

This could also, I assume, be made over stove top.*

Makes about 7 cups

Ingredients:

6 pounds apples(I used honey crisp)

1/3 C. 100% pure maple syrup

1/3 C. sucanat or brown sugar

1/2 C. apple cider

1 TB. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1/4 tsp. ground cloves

Directions:

1. Wash, peel, and dice your apples and place in the crock pot. Add all other ingredients and mix until combined.

2. Turn crock pot on to high heat for one hour, then after that hour turn to low for....16-22 hours!! (I know this sounds crazy friends, but I promise you it's worth the wait. I did this in about 19 hours.)

3. Continually stir and mix every so often. Here is what it looked like after 6 hours:

4. Here is what it looked like at 19 hours:

5. From here, you can still cook the apple butter longer until its condensed completely, but we had to leave the house for a while, and I didn't want the crock pot on the whole time we were gone. So at this point, I pureed it in my blender to give it the smooth butter consistency.

Before blending:

After blending:

6. It took me about 3 minutes to blend until smooth and creamy, but other blenders might take longer/faster. This also depends on your consistency preference.

7. For storing your apple butter, you have different options. You can either can it,(instructions on canning found HERE), or you can store it in the refrigerator. I'm not really sure how long it would last in the refrigerator, but I am assuming a few weeks. Of coarse...If you take one bite of this, it probably won't last very long...