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How in the world is today the last day of August already? We’re less than four months away from Christmas and less than three months away from Thanksgiving. This is so bizarre. I know every year I must say this but I can’t believe how fast this year has gone by!
To celebrate that tomorrow is the first day of September, I have these apple butter salted caramel bars for you! We all know that September = apples and apples = apple butter! Now, I have to admit, I have never had apple butter before last year when my manager gave me a jar of their family’s homemade apple butter. The story of how they make it is really intriguing. Lots of love and labor goes into a jar and I’m so lucky that she shared a jar with me. It’s a whole family event they have every year and they wake up bright and early (about 5am) and it’s literally a full day’s work. They all take turns stirring it over an open flame in a large cast iron pot (it reminds me of a witch’s pot) because it needs to be attended to constantly. Then at the end of the day, they individually hand jar each of them and then have it for the year! And lucky folks like me get a jar or two :) I can’t wait until she brings me a jar this year! If you want to catch the entire process from start to finish, here is the video!
These were amazing! I love the gooey center and I will not lie, we put a big scoop of vanilla ice cream on top one night. We microwaved the bar a little bit to get it all warm and gooey in the center and then plopped the vanilla ice cream on top and oh my gosh. It was heavenly. The best Fall dessert! I know, it’s not Fall yet but it’s practically Fall so this is the perfect dessert to make!
Apple Butter Salted Caramel Bars
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups (188 g) all purpose flour
- 1 ½ cups (122 g) rolled oats
- 1 cup (220 g) dark brown sugar
- ¾ cup (170 g) unsalted butter, cut into 7 or 8 chunks/cubes
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 8 ounces (227 g) of homemade apple butter, store-bought is ok
- ⅓ cup (75 g) homemade salted caramel sauce
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 °F (177 °C) and grease a 8x8-inch baking pan. Set aside.
- In a food processor, combine flour, oats, brown sugar, butter, baking soda, salt, and vanilla until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
- Set aside about 1 1/2 cups of the crumb mixture. Pour remaining crumb mixture to the bottom of the prepared pan and spread evenly. Press the crumb mixture down.
- Using an offset spatula, spread the apple butter in an even coat on top of the crumb crust. Then drizzle the salted caramel sauce on top (it doesn't have to be even or perfect. It's thick so it won't cover the whole thing. The idea is to have bites of the salted caramel within the bars.)
- Finally, with the reserved crumb mixture, crumble it on top of the filling.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown. Cool completely before slicing into squares
Looks delicious!??
But what is Apple butter?
It’s like super-flavored applesauce
lovely recipe.. <3 <3 :)
I adore salted caramel anything, bring on the bars!
Yes and yes! Love apples and with caramel, forget about it. Can’t wait to try these bars!
I’m with you…apple everything this time of year! Love the bars!
Ok, these make me ready for fall and new flavors to work with! Definitely starting to miss apples and caramel. These look heavenly and the labor of love that goes into the apple butter makes them even better!
Oh wow! These bars look magical! Just love all the caramel. I am new to your blog but your recipes look incredible! :)
These apple butter bars are making me giddy for fall!
YUM! I am going to have to make a GF version here at home. LOVE!
I’m so ready for all things apple! Love the apple butter salted caramel combo!