The Day 'We' Made Apple Pie

Today, I made an apple pie, with the 'assistance' of my three year-old. I know. Brave.

My neighbour had kindly passed on to us a bag of apples and so had my mother-in-law, so I was keen to use them in some way before they turned brown. Admittedly, I didn't make as big a dent in the pile as I'd hoped, but it was a start. I may make jam with the rest.

I chose to follow a basic double-crust pie recipe which mainly exists in my head, but is loosely based on a number of recipes I've picked up from perusing the jumble of books that reside on my dresser.

I like to add cinnamon to my apples as it's a classic combination that never disappoints and helps give the apple flavour a lift, but ground ginger or mixed spice works just as well.

My Ingredients

Pastry:

350g/12oz plain flour

Pinch of salt
198g/7oz butter, cut into small pieces

About 6 tbsp of cold water

Milk or beaten egg, for glazing

Filling:

750g/1lb 10oz cooking apples, peeled, cored and sliced

115g/3oz brown or caster sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

What I Did

To make the pastry, I sift the flour into a large mixing bowl with the salt, add the butter and rub it in with my fingers until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Then I SLOWLY add the water, bit by bit, until it comes together as a dough. I say 'slowly' because sometimes I don't need all of it. And once the water's in, it's in, and there's no taking it out again. 

Mummy tip: Don't let your toddler near the flour - or this happens:

The experts will tell you to wrap the dough in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for 20-30 minutes. However, I find this makes absolutely no difference in affecting my dough's capacity to be rolled out, so I don't bother. This is probably why my pie ends up looking like it does.

I like to cook my apples with the sugar in the microwave before they go into the pie, as it pretty much halves the traditional cooking time. It takes about 3 minutes in my low power microwave, but I have to put them in the fridge afterwards to help them cool, otherwise the heat would melt my pastry.

When the apples are cool and the ground cinnamon is combined, I can focus on rolling out my pastry. I ALWAYS, unintentionally, roll it out too big and end up with multiple off-cuts. Re-rolling the dough can ruin it though so I just use them to make decorations for the top. I dab around the edges with water before putting the top on, to make it stick, then use my jazzy gizmo to crimp and trim around the edges. It was originally S's nana's and I like the idea of little things like this being kept in the family.

Mummy tip: Beware of toddlers bashing your pie repeatedly with a spatula and slashing it like a SODDING PSYCHO


Once I've cut two slits in the top, added my decorations, and brushed the whole thing with milk, I sling it into a preheated oven at 190oC/365oF for half an hour, praying that it will turn out OK.

And it normally does. OK, it's not going to win Bake Off but it gets gobbled down regardless and who could ask for more than that?