Dessert Before Dinner: Homemade Apple Butter

My husband Brandon and I ditched all that Black Friday shopping this year, for a lovely, peaceful, STUNNING hike up in Big Bear. The weather was GORGEOUS! A crisp 60 degrees, but still sunny. I really think that is my ideal weather (most of the year anyways). We went on about a 5 mile hike up Cougar Canyon trail, stopped at the top, had a little snack and wine and then headed back down.

It was about 3 in the afternoon when we completed our hike, and I knew I didn’t want to head back home to OC just yet. I knew that Oak Glen was just at the bottom of the mountain, so we ended up stopping there for a bit on the way back. Let me tell you, Oak Glen was a perfect FALL wonderland. I’m not exaggerating at all when I say that!

Lookie here:

Isn’t it perfect? Ahhhhh. It made up for all that un-fall-like weather we got here in the OC.

We even stopped at a super cute old fashioned coffee shop and had coffees and a yummy apple bread sundae.

It was picture perfect and I didn’t really want to leave. But we had to.

Brandon suggested we should pick up some apples on our way out of the quaint little town head back home and make some homemade apple pies.

Which is exactly what we did. Except we didn’t just make one apple pie. Who knew that 9 pounds of apples would make 2 apple pies (a traditional, and a dutch apple) 4 large apple turnovers, and a ginormous crock pot full of apple butter.

Brandon helped me peel, core and cut up all the apples. It was super fun being in the kitchen with him! And let me mention to you we have 5 different varieties of apples, handpicked for us by one of the employees at the little apple stand we stopped at. He knew exactly what apples would work perfectly in an apple pie! The apples included pippins, rome beauties, old fashioned, granny smiths and golden apples. Here is the wonderful recipe I used for my homemade crockpot apple butter and it was delish! I could eat it by the spoonful, yum.

Ingredients:

Apples, peeled, cored, and cut into large sections. (enough to fill your Crockpot to the top)
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
1 tbsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp vanilla
2 tsp lemon juice

Directions:

Fill Crockpot with prepared apples.
In separate bowl combine and stir, granulated sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt.
Pour sugar and spice mixture over apples.
Turn Crockpot onto low and cook apples for 10 hours. After first 1-2 hours gently stir in the sugar mixture to coat the apples.
After 10 hours take lid off and stir. Your mixture will be very dark and cooked down by about half the capacity of your Crockpot.
Stir in lemon juice, and vanilla.
Taste your apple butter for sweetness. You can adjust accordingly to your taste by adding more sugar if needed.
At the end of the cooking time, use an emulsion blender to smooth the apple butter.
Spoon into clean mason jars, and cover tightly with jar lid and ring. You should eventually hear that ‘pop’ (approx 1/2 hour after jarred) that tells you that the mason jars are sealed and airtight! Be sure to leave room at the top of the jar if you are planning on freezing.