Fall Apple Recipe – Apple Butter

Our friend had an abundance of apples to share from her trees, and she invited us over to pick our fill. We still have quite a bit of apple sauce canned from last fall so I wanted to do something different. I remembered that we hardly made any apple butter last fall (We skipped our annual apple butter festival) so that is the inspiration we needed to make this simple apple recipe.

Apple butter is a great fun fall treat. It’s almost like a spreadable apple pie filling. We love it just on toast, but we have made it into apple butter cinnamon rolls before as well. Serve it on a cheese board or smothering the top of a baked brie cheese!

Making apple butter is very straightforward. You can make it completely to taste and you can can up any extras for your long term storage.

Core and chop apples. Peel them as well, if you do not have a strainer.

Use a mix of sweet ant tart apples for the best flavor.

Add a 1/2 inch of water to the bottom of the pan. Cook apples on low with the lid on for a few hours until soft. You can do this in a roaster pan, crock pot or on the stovetop.

You should be able to easily mash an apple chunk with the back of a spoon.

Put apples through a saucer, strainer or food mill, puree with an immersion blender, or mash with a potato masher.

The product you are left with should be plain apple sauce.

Return apple sauce to a slow cooker or a pot over low heat. Add sugar and spices, vinegar and lemon juice.

Cook for 4-6 hours until spreadable consistency (without excess liquid) is reached–stirring occasionally to keep from scorching.

You may check to see if a mounded spoonful stays mounded when cool. Or see if a spoonful on a plate stays in a mound or if liquid seeps out around the edges. If it does– continue cooking down longer.

Apple butter can be canned for long storage. Pour hot butter into sterile half-pint or pint jars, leaving ¼-inch headspace. Process 5 minutes, adjusting for altitude. Quart jars are processed for 10 minutes and need not be presterilized.

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Spiced Apple Butter

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Apple butter is a great fun fall treat. It's almost like a spreadable apple pie filling. Delicious just on toast. Or serve it on a cheese board or smothering the top of a baked brie cheese!

Ingredients

Mix of apples to make puree -around 5lbs

for each 3 quarts of apple puree***

1 cup sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp allspice

2 dashes ground cloves

2 T apple cider vinegar

2 T lemon juice

Instructions

1

Core and chop apples. Peel as well, if you do not have a strainer.

2

Add a 1/2 inch of water to the bottom of the pan. Cook apples on low with the lid on for a few hours until soft. You can do this in a roaster pan, crock pot or on the stovetop.

3

Put apples through a saucer, puree with an immersion blender, or mash with a potato masher.

4

Return apple sauce to a slow cooker or a pot on low heat. Add sugar and spices, and vinegar and lemon juice.

5

Cook for 4-6 hours until spreadable consistency (without excess liquid) is reached--stirring occasionally to keep from scorching.

Notes

Makes 5-6 pints. Apple butter can be canned for long storage. Pour hot butter into sterile half-pint or pint jars, leaving ¼-inch headspace. Process 5 minutes, adjusting for altitude. Quart jars are processed for 10 minutes and need not be presterilized.

September 18, 2024

Main Dish/ Recipes/ Side Dish/ Uncategorized

Green Beans with Potatoes and Smoked Sausage

I was looking for a main dish green bean recipe to use a lot of home grown green beans. We wanted to do more than have a side serving of buttered green beans with the rest of our meal.

The green beans are doing amazingly this year and we’ve been picking basketful after basketful.

Dice half a medium onion. Heat fat or oil in the bottom of a medium-sized pan (that has a lid) over medium heat. Sauté onions in fat until they begin to soften, about 4 minutes.

Add 2 cloves minced Garlic and 1 smoked sausage cut into 1/2 inch rounds. Cook until sausage rounds begin to get some brown color.

Add 2 cups green beans cut in 2 inch pieces and cook 2 minutes to blister skin.

Add chicken broth and potatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Cover with lid and cook until green beans and potatoes are soft–about 20 minutes.

Smoked sausage can be replaced with bacon. If doing so, you can cook bacon and onions together with no additional oil.
Any variety of potatoes may be used, even russet, but small waxy potatoes will hold their shape better.

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Green Beans with Potatoes and Smoked Sausage

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By Jeanette Merrill – Serves: 8

Prep Time: 40 minutes

A classic southern side dish hearty enough for the main course

Ingredients

Fat/Oil

1/2 medium Onion, diced

2 cloves Garlic, minced

1 Smoked Sausage, cut into 1/2 inch rounds

2 cups green beans, cut in 2 inch pieces

3 cups gold potatoes, washed, cut into 1 inch pieces

Instructions

1

Heat fat in the bottom of a medium-sized pan (that has a lid) over medium heat.

2

Sauté onions in fat until they begin to soften, about 4 minutes.

3

Add Garlic and smoked sausage. Cook until sausage rounds begin to get some brown color.

4

Add green beans and cook 2 minutes to blister skin.

5

Add chicken broth and potatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Cover with lid and cook until green beans and potatoes are soft--about 20 minutes.

Notes

Smoked sausage can be substituted with bacon. If doing so, cook bacon and onions together with no additional oil. Any variety of potatoes may be used, but small waxy potatoes will hold their shape better.

July 23, 2024

Dessert/ Recipes/ Uncategorized

Mulberry Crumble Bars

Mulberries are a surprise luxury that many people overlook.

Don’t be too distracted with the birds making a mess of the mulberries in your yard to realize that they are a wonderful resource for jams and delicious baked goods like these mulberry crumble bars.

When mulberries are ripe they will fall easily into your hand as you grab them. Many people harvest mulberries by laying a sheet out on the ground and shaking the branches of the tree to let the ripe berries fall.

Unlike thimble-shaped raspberries, mulberries retain their small stem. You do not need to worry about removing the stem, you can eat it just like you can eat the seeds of mulberries and raspberries.

If you prefer, you can use a food mill to remove the seeds and stems, but you will need significantly more berries.

Crumble bars are a favorite treat we like to make with raspberries, but mulberries are a great berry to use in crumb bars instead when they are in abundance.

Begin by macerating the mulberries. This means mixing them with sugar to bring out some of the juices. We will also add corn starch and flour to thicken the juices as they cook.

If you have previously made some, you can substitute this set of ingredients with mulberry jam.

Next, make the crumble base by cutting the butter into the dry ingredients with a pastry cutter.

Press two-thirds of the crumble mixture into the base of a 9×13 pan. set the remaining one-third aside.

Spread out the berry mixture over the bottom crust. Crumble the remaining dry mixture over the top. Bake, cool, and enjoy!

I grew up in the southwest and was not familiar with mulberry trees, but my husband knew them and we would forage for them.

Our new farm has a number of large mulberry trees, but there are also small sprouted trees all over our property. we have moved a bunch to make a windbreak. So we will be in the mulberries for a long time into our farm’s future!

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Mulberry Crumble Bars

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Dessert

By Jeanette Merrill

Prep Time: 20 minutes – Cooking Time: 40 minutes – Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients

Mulberry Filling

3 Cups fresh mulberries

2 T granulated sugar

2 tablespoons flour

1 tablespoon cornstarch

juice of one lemon

Crumble Layer

3 cups flour

1 1/2 cups melted butter

3 cups rolled oats

1 1/2 cups brown sugar (loosely packed)

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

Instructions

1

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2

Place mulberries in a medium bowl, mix berries with sugar, flour, cornstarch, and lemon juice. Set aside.

3

Mix the flour, butter, oats, sugar, baking powder, and salt together into a crumbly mixture. Press two thirds of the crumble into the bottom of a 9×13 pan lined with parchment paper.

4

Pour the mulberries and accumulated juices over the bottom crust. Spread into a single layer. Sprinkle the top with remaining crumble mixture. Bake for 40 minutes.

5

Cool before slicing into bars.

Notes

Store up to one week in airtight container. Mulberries may be replaced with raspberries or any berry combination.

March 11, 2024