Adventures in Canning

I had all these wonderful plans.  My husband brought home a bushel of apples, so I was going to finish tweaking around on my Apple Butter Recipe and post a tutorial.

At first, everything was going great.  The apples were peeled.  The spices were added.  The photos had begun.  All was well.

Once the apples had cooked down, I pureed the Apple Butter and gave it a taste.  It wasn't right.  Apparently I had misjudged just how many pounds of apples a bushel really is.  So I added more spices.  And tasted.  And added.  And tasted.  And added..... By now, I had no idea what the recipe was anymore....

Finally, I had what I thought was a passable Apple Butter.  

So I called in my resident taste-testers.  

The verdict?

Too spicy.

WHAT!?!  

Maybe my taste buds have changed since I kicked the sugar habit.  

I really like it spicy now, or something. 

So I added more apples and more sugar 

(yes, this is a sugar recipe -- it's for the rest of the family).

Now the family really liked it, although they said it was "more flavorful" than last year. 

 Hmmm..... I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing....

It was time to can up my contrary Apple Butter.

I had a lot of jars, so I put it in the hot water bath in batches.  

In the very first batch, this happened:

That's right.  The bottom just popped off the jar.  It can happen sometimes, even when you pre-heat your jars, jam and lids.  So now I had a whole pint of apple butter mucking up my water bath.  Sigh...  I just canned anyway.  I figured I could wash my jars later, which I did.

The moral of the story?  

Even if you have canned for years, things happen.  Don't sweat it.  If you're new to canning, don't let the mishaps discourage you.  They happen to all of us -- it doesn't mean you aren't good at canning.

And a bushel of apples yields over 20 pints of Apple Butter.

I'm still working on that perfect Apple Butter recipe, but there are lots of good ones online.  If you'd like to try one, AllRecipes.com has Apple Butter recipes with star ratings and user comments.  So you can see what everybody thinks about it before you add all those spices.

Have fun getting ready for Autumn!

Angela