Thick Rich Apple Butter

I now LOVE thick rich apple butter. A couple of weeks ago on Facebook I said this in a post: Trying my hand at making apple butter. I’ve never made this before. It will cook for 24-36 hours. If it tastes bad, at least my house will smell like heaven. Why did I decide to make apple butter? Well, despite the blight that came to many Colorado apple trees this year, causing leaves to wither and dry, the apples were fine. In fact, it has been an bumper apple crop all over town. I have friends begging me to adopt their apples. But, I have a tree of my own. It was dropping apples like manna from heaven, leaving many to rot on the ground.

I don’t like wasting food so I worked hard to harvest them, using my new apple picker (wondering why I had waited so long to get one of these great tools). I did end up at a friend’s home grabbing another variety off her tree as well. I washed, peeled and froze a gazillion apples. I gave some away. But I still had apples left in my kitchen sink.

When I decided to try making thick rich apple butter I found several recipes on the web, combining three of them into one.  Then I wrote my Facebook post about my trial, one that I thought might end in error. So I said, “If it tastes bad at least my house will smell like heaven.” Several Colorado Backyard Garden members replied with encouragement saying things like, “How can apple butter be bad?” Obviously many of you knew better than I did (one reason I started this site is so I might learn from all of you — I’m selfish that way.) In case you are wondering, my house did smell like heaven. And….drum roll please…

Apple butter can’t be bad!

BUT…in some cases, I think it can be better so you’ll have to keep reading on what I think makes it better…so read on.