Shut Your Apple Pie Hole
My man-friend came across the long state of Tennessee to visit me here in Knoxville and in honor of his arrival, I decided to heed Betty Crocker's (or was it the Pillsbury Doughboy?) advice that nothin' says lovin' like somethin' from the oven. So, I made an apple pie a la Joy of Cooking's fantastic and simple recipe.Luckily for lazy me, my apple pie is even easier than Joy of Cooking's because of one trick that I normally keep secret: I never make my own crust. I buy the roll-out, Pillsbury ones and they are great. None of the mess or frustration of working with finicky pastry dough. Otherwise, I follow Joy of Cooking's Apple Pie I recipe exactly:
- Place one pie crust round into a 9-inch pie pan (I always use Pyrex) and trim any overhanging dough to 3/4 inch all around (thanks to the wonder of the pre-made pie crust, there shouldn't be much to trim). Keep the remaining pie crust round in the fridge.
- Position a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- Peal, core and slice 1/4 thick 2 1/2 pounds of Golden Delicious apples (5 to 6 medium to large apples). The type of apple you use is CRUCIAL, so don't deviate from Golden Delicious - they retain their texture and don't flood the pie with juice
- Measure 6 cups of the apples and combine them with:
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 2 to 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon strained fresh lemon juice (I use the kind that comes in the plastic lemon in the produce section - works great with no need for straining)
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- Let stand for 15 minutes, stirring several times, so that the apples soften slightly and will better fit into the crust.
- Pour the mixture into the bottom crust and gently level with the back of a spoon. Dot the top with
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
- Brush the overhanging edge of the bottom crust with cold water. Cover with the top crust, then seal the edge, trim, and crimp (with a fork) or flute (with your fingers - I prefer fluting).
- Cut steam vents into the top crust and sprinkle with
- 2 teaspoons sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- Bake the pie for 30 minutes (toward the end of this time, check to see if the edge of the crust is getting too brown - if it is, ring the edge in foil to prevent it from getting any darker). Slip a baking sheet beneath it, reduce the oven temp to 350 degrees, and bake until the fruit feels just tender when a knife is poked through the steam vent and thick juices have begun to bubble through the vents, 30 to 45 minutes more (it took mine 40 minutes this time).
- For the filling to thicken properly, the pie must cool completely on a rack, 3 to 4 hours. If you want to serve the pie warm, place it in a 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes
- The pie can be kept 2 to 3 days on the counter.....if you don't eat it by then, which you will.
The pie turned out so well that we ate it all before I had a chance to take a photo of it. So instead, here's a snapshot of my trusty sous-chef, hard at work.
posted by ATP at 11:57 AM
1 Comments:
ATP - I tried a mini-apple pie last night b/c I had some apples going bad and some pie crust - so really I guess I tried to make dumplings. Little butter, brown sugar, and apples wrapped up in pastry and baked while the ziti was cookin'. Thanks for the inspiration. While mine weren't cute, they tasted good! I'm jealous of your cat.
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