I use the All Day Apple Butter recipe from the allrecipes.com web site, but I use about half the sugar.

Here's a link to a recipe. -Grainlady

Here is a link that might be useful: National Center for Home Food Preservation

You'll want to wait until fall, and make it from your local apples. Much cheaper and far more flavorful.

Here is a recipe of my own invention that actually won me a ribbon at the country fair!

Apple Butter
Makes at least 12 half pint (1 cup) canning jars

5 to 10 pounds apples

Wash apples, cut in quarters, removing stem and blossom ends and cook in 2 cups apple cider or water until completely soft. Put through a food mill to remove the skins and seeds and obtain the pulp. Measure the pulp into a large heavy pot. For each cup of pulp, add:

1/2 cup sugar

For each 10 cups of pulp, add:

2 to 2 1/2 t. cinnamon
1/2 to 1 t. cloves
1/2 t. allspice

The larger measurements for the spices will make a spicier apple butter.

Cook the sweetened and spiced pulp at low temperature several hours (3 or more) stirring frequently. To test: put a spoonful of the mixture on a cold plate and wait a few minutes. The mixture should be thick, clear, and not separate with a watery border around the test amount.

Put into hot sterilized half pint jars. Wipe edges of jar to remove any spills. Dip lids in boiling water, place on jars and seal with rings.

*** It would be a good idea to process the jars in a boiling water bath for about ten minutes. Place jars in a large pot - preferably with a trivet underneath - cover with boiling water 1-inch above the top of the jar, and boil for 10 minutes. Carefully remove jars from hot pot and set on towels to cool. I always cover the cooling jars with a towel to prevent drafts. Lids will seal with a "ping" as the jars cool.

When completely cool, label and date jars and store in a dark cool cabinet or pantry.

Any jars that don't seal should be stored in the refrigerator and consumed first.

Notes:
I always put my jars thru the dishwasher to sterilize them just before the apple butter is finished. Then they are still hot when I fill the jars.

Also, check out the Harvest Forum and try a search.

Deanna

Here is a link that might be useful: Harvest Forum

This is Annie's recipe and it is wonderful!

GRANDMA'S OLD FASHIONED APPLE BUTTER

6 lbs apples, quartered
2 quarts sweet cider
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves

Cook apples in cider until tender and press through sieve or food mill. Measure 3 quarts apple pulp. Cook pulp until thick enough to round up in a spoon. As it thickens stir frequently. Add sugar an spices and cook slowing until thick, stirring frequently, about 1 hour. Pour into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space. Process 10 minutes in BWB.

Makes about 5 pints

Now, for technique. I don't cook apple butter on the stove, stirring and sticking and dodging those little apple butter volcanos that explode onto your forearms when the butter gets thick. I dump the whole mess into a large enameled roaster and put it in the oven at about 350, stirring every hour or so until it's thick enough. The house smells wonderful, I can do other things, and the apple butter gets as thick as you like it, depending on how long you cook it.

Diana,

I have used Annie's recipe, and it is fabulous. Only thing I changed was I peeled and cored the apples first, because I don't have a food mill. I also, before Kathy (gardengrl) came along, was canning-challenged, and I did not process the apple butter I made in a BWB, I just jarred it and refrigerated what we'd eat immediately, then froze the rest. We can't find cider here unless it's fall, don't grow apples locally, and I don't know if apple juice is a reasonable substitute (well, this IS Central Florida:-) But I'll definitely make it again and this time I'm going to put it in jars and process it so I can keep it around longer.

It is heavenly stuff!
DONNA

It is better to process it. Butters are lower in sugar than preserves so there isn't as much of a preservative effect coming from the sweetener.

Also, many people make apple butter from bruised windfall apples, which have a higher pH (are less acid).

The same is true of applesauce. If using windfalls, it's a good idea to add a bit of lemon juice to compensate for the higher pH.

Carol

I do mine in the crock pot. I start it at night, let it cook all evening and in the morning I put into jars. Can't get much easier than that!

APPLE BUTTER (CROCK POT)

6 pounds apples, peeled, cored and finely chopped
3 cups sugar
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon allspice
¼ teaspoon salt

Place the apples in a slow cooker. In a medium bowl mix the sugar, spices and salt. Pour the mixture over the apples in the slow cooker and mix well (or mix all in a large bowl and add to slow cooker).

Cover and cook on high for 1 hour.

Reduce heat to low and cook 9 to 11 hours, stirring occasionally, until the mixture is thickened and quite brown. Stir with a whisk or immersion blender, if desired, to increase smoothness.

Spoon the mixture into sterile containers and process for jam preservation. Alternatively, may freeze.

Try to find cider if you can. Apple juice just doesn't give you the same tang. Cortland or MacIntosh are the apple varieties I have used with success. Could also probably use jonathans or empire apples. A mix is also nice. But you want the tart apples.

Julie,

You don't need to add any liquid, i.e., water or apple cider, to your crock pot method?

I agree with Lpink, tart apples seem to work best, though mine didn't break down as easily. It was ok though, because a few small chunks in the apple butter here and there were a plus as far as I was concerned:-)
DONNA

A little cider or apple juice added helps with the pureeing. Can actually use water too. Apple butter is just way cooked down applesauce. Cider when cooked down ads a concentrated flavor. Any water added at the start gets evaporated when making it in the oven or an open kettle. However, with the crockpot variety, you don't loose any water, but you don't have much to start with, just what's in the apples. That's why I imagine it would be a little chunkier, just because it is harder to puree at the start.

Donna, I don't add any liquid. The condensation that forms with the crock pot seems to be enough.

Yes, so sorry if I was confusing. You don't want to add water or any other liquid to a crockpot recipe. If you add water to a crockpot recipe it will be too watery since water doesn't evaporate out of a closed crockpot. If for some reason your apple butter turns out too runny, you can finish it off in the oven since the new crockpot liners work there too. Apple butter is so dead easy!!

I made my first batch at a fall festival I was organizing. I had a barrel of drops and we were doing apple peeler demonstrations right next to the open fire cooking demonstrations. The kids went crazy over the peeler. We had no actual desire to make apple butter but I kept throwing the peeled apples into a big open kettle on the fire, and by the end of the day I had more apple butter than I knew what to do with. It tasted a little smokey though, lol!