Crock Pot Apple Butter

Apple butter has no butter in it. I know, I know. Your mind is blown. You are welcome. Instead it is just a wonderful buttery like substance that comes from cooking down the apples with the right amount of spices and water. And then blending until perfection. It's easy.

This is how you take this:

And turn it into this:

And  yes, even with them being little apples. And even with them having bad spots (or some of them being that bad) you can turn them into delicious apple butter. Listen carefully, kids. (I'm kidding. It's so easy you don't even have to pay attention.)

• Get some minions. Have them core, peel, and cut the apples. I make them into smaller chunks because...well, my apples are small. It's easier that way. Plus, less blending.
• Throw the apples into a huge bowl. 

I used probably 30-35 of these small apples that someone graciously donated my way so I could figure out how to make excellent apple butter. I would imagine that a dozen or dozen and a half "normal" sized apples would suffice.

• The trick is take the amount of mixture I'm about to lay forth and make sure the apples are coated thoroughly. Not sprinkled upon. Coated. That's the trick, folks. They need to look brown and tasty. If you have extra "stuff" leftover after you coat your apples? Cut another. Seriously. Just do it. (If you need more to make them look coated? Make some. You seriously can't mess this up. Throw in a spoon of brown sugar, a pinch of cinnamon and half a pinch of allspice and go!)

2/3 cup brown sugar

2 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 teaspoon allspice

• After you have coated them thoroughly, throw them in the crock pot. Take the bowl you were thinking about licking and don't. Instead add 1 cup of water. Swish around to get every speck of tastiness and then dump it into the crock pot. Stir it around. There should be enough water to at least cover the bottom of the crock pot. The apples do NOT need to all be covered.

• I cook mine on med or med/high until I go to bed and then turn it down to low. In the morning it will look like tarry, sticky (barely juicy) mess, more than likely. If it doesn't? Pop the lid and vent it and cook on high for a bit longer until it does. If you have too much juice (This has only happened to me once) just use a slotted spoon to remove everything else. Or strain it and reserve the juice in case your apple butter needs more liquid (mine didn't but you can never be too careful I suppose.)
  
• I have a ninja food processor. So I just throw it all in there and blend for maybe 20 seconds and it's butter consistency. Use your immersion blender or counter top blender the same way.  

Voila. Seriously. That easy.

Feel free to tell me how wonderful your version was.

I will say I used a Splenda blend on one batch and no one knows the difference. It tastes just the same to me, for sugar content conscious folks.

It is seriously that easy. And while it's good right away? It is even better after you put it into the fridge and let it get cold. It will firm up wonderfully and the spices seem to marry even more. It's fabulous on toast, biscuits, English muffin - pretty much anything.

I was given a ton of zuchinni around the same time and was making mass amounts of zuke bread, too. I had a few people put it on their loaf of zuchinni bread and rave about it, too.