Recipe #1 Apple Butter Recipe

The Austin House Apple Butter Recipe

This is the same recipe that Mary Lynn developed to make her most delicious award winning apple butters. The recipe I gave you in the first blog came from this. Later on we will make a batch the other way using fresh apples. We will cover the Apple Butter Recipe that begins; Pick a bushel of Apples.

For right now, start with 3 or 4 jars of Unsweetened Apple Sauce. Just a little bit easier. Also the equipment you need for this recipe is small compared to the other recipe. For all our canning recipes you will need either a pressure cooker or a canning pot (a large pot that you boil the jars with at least 2 inches of water above the tops. This makes them seal).

Let's get started.

A 5-6 quart Crock-Pot, the size makes a difference in quantity you can cook. Make sure you know the size of your crock-pot. We will use the crock-pot in many of our recipes, it is a valuable tool in home canning. When you are cooking in your crock-pot, it  needs to be over half full.

12 cups of apples (Unsweetened Apple Sauce)

9 cups cane sugar (I will always say cane sugar, as it works best for canning)

1/3 cup cider vinegar

3 tablespoons ground cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoons ground allspice

3/4 teaspoon ground cloves

Mix all ingredients thoroughly before pouring into crock-pot. Cook 6 - 8 hours (varies by crock-pot)
Stir occasionally. If at the end of cooking time it seems too runny, cook 1 hour longer with the lid off.

Ladle into washed, rinsed and dried 8 ounce canning jars. Fill to within 1/2 inch from the top. This is to make sure you have an air gap between the dome and your product. Clean the rim off with a damp paper towel before you put the dome and ring on. Do this so that you get a good seal. Put on the domes that have been boiled. Then place the rings on and finger tighten, do not over tighten.

Place jars in boiling water bath with at least 2 inches of water above the jars. Boil for 10 minutes. Carefully remove the jars and set someplace where they will be allowed to cool undisturbed. Allow to cool til the next day. Then check to see if all the jars sealed. You can test by pushing down on the dome, nothing happens if it is sealed. Unsealed jars will pop back up. You have to take these jars and remove the rings and domes and replace them with a new cleaned, drained dome and reprocess.

Now the jars are ready to eat or give as gifts. A gift of something  you have made by yourself is very different from a gift that you just stopped by the store and bought. A hand-made gift is a treasure from the past.

If you have children, let them help with the cooking. If you have the same luck my Grandmother did, someday you can read their blog about how they made this with their Mother or Grandmother or whoever. Those types of memories never go away. They just get better with each telling.

The next blog will cover the tools you will need to do home canning. There will be more things needed as we progress to different types of canning.

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