Slow Cooker Strawberry Butter – lower sugar

This strawberry butter started out as an experiment.  I have read lots of recipes for apple butter made in the slow cooker.  And, then there are all of those jams on the market that have no sugar.  So, I wondered what would happen if I cooked strawberries in the slow cooker until they were the consistency of jam or fruit butter.  Would it be sweet?  Well, it wasn’t really sweet enough, so I added a half a cup of sugar, and it was just right.  I will say that it isn’t super sweet, so you could add more if you want, but it is definitely sweet enough for me.  I was kind of let down about having to add the sugar, but next to the seven or eight cups found in many recipes with this amount of fruit, I think I still did pretty good.  The next questions was, would it be good?  The answer to that is a definite yes!  The cooked down fruit gives you a wonderfully rich strawberry flavor that you just don’t find in traditional methods.

This recipe is really so simple that it almost isn’t a recipe, but I will write it up like one.  Really, just wash and hull your berries, and put them in your slow cooker (I also halved mine.)  Cook them on high covered for about two hours.  Add sugar to taste, and cook on high another two hours – this time uncovered.  Refrigerate and enjoy any way you would normally would fruit butter or jam.  Actually, now that I think of it, leaving it hot as a topping would be good too.  And tomorrow, if all goes well, I will have a recipe using the strawberry butter to share with you.

I am sure this butter would be easy enough to can, but it only makes a couple of cups, so I didn’t because I plan to use it quickly.  Hope you enjoy!

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Slow Cooker Strawberry Butter – lower sugar

Prep 15 mins

Cook 4 hours

Total 4 hours, 15 mins

Author Michelle Hilton

Ingredients

• 2 quarts strawberries, washed, hulled, and halved
• sugar to taste (I used 1/2 cup.)

Instructions

1. Put strawberries into a slow cooker. Cook on high approximately 2 hours.
2. With a spoon, break the berries apart if they are still intact.
3. Stir in sugar.
4. Cook on high another 2 hours, stirring occasionally.
5. Refrigerate

This recipe was shared on In and Out of the Kitchen with Feeding Big.