I had the surprise opportunity yesterday to make Apple Pie. My friend had bought a new deep frier for the bird and was completely wrapped up in the bird cooking.
Basic Pie Crust
Makes enough dough for one 8 inch double-crust pie
This recipe is based on JOY’ of Cooking’s Pie Dough. The main difference is that I use half shortening and half unsalted butter. I find that using more butter yields a more flavorful crust. Treat the dough right, you won’t lose any of the famed flakiness that shortening imparts, once it forms a ball stop messing with it and roll it out.
Combine using a fork in a medium bowl:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
Add and cut in, using two knives, until the mixture looks like cornmeal and the mixture looks mostly consistent:
1/3 cup plus 1 tablesoon unsalted butter, well-chilled
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon shortening
Add by the tablespoon, stirring with a fork or your fingers (I use my fingers so i can feel the texture of the dough), until the dough comes together in a shaggy, but not dry or crumbly, mass:
About 4 tablespoons ice water
Divide the dough in half, handling it as little as possible, and shape each half into a disc about 1 inch thick.
I then used a
Large Silicone Pastry Mat with Measurements and Conversion Charts, Non-Stick Non-Slip, Fondant Mat for Rolling Dough
Madoc had a 9″ glass pie pan. So I rolled the dough out to 10″ circles. Not enough dough for a folded over crust but no biggy. With this matt you don’t have to add flour or anything to your already made perfect pie crust.
Apple filling.
I was handed 5 large Red Delicious Apples. I skinned them and sliced them as evenly as I could. The slices were between 1/16 – 1/8 of an inch thick. Set them aside.
Into a bowl:
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnimon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
Mixed all the coating ingredients together.
I added the apples and tossed them with my fingers gently until coated and carefully loaded them into the pie pan lined with the bottom pie crust. Gently rolled the second pie crust circle over the top of the pie and picked the crust with a fork.
Preheated the oven to 450 degrees.
10 minutes at 450 degrees
Then drop the temp down to 350 degrees and bake another 35 minutes.
It was delish.