I've been eating a lot of apples this fall. I just can't seem to get my fill of them. I've been eating them fresh and baked into all sorts of things.
I hope you're not tired of reading about my apple baking adventures, because I'm not done writing about them.
A few weeks ago when the weather finally turned, there was a big bowl of apples in my chilly kitchen just calling my name, begging me to whip them into a pie. OK, so maybe the apples weren't begging, maybe it was my brain craving a slice of apple pie after mentioning in this column that my Granny Tommie almost always had one on hand when I'd visit her. The point is, I was craving my Granny Tommie's apple pie. Unfortunately, I don't have her apple pie recipe. Our family cookbook includes more than a dozen pie recipes, none of them apple.
So I was on my own. I wouldn't say this one tastes exactly like hers, but it is delicious. And I think she'd approve.
I think it's perfect on its own, but a scoop of vanilla ice cream certainly wouldn't hurt.
Brown Sugar Apple Pie
½ cup (1 stick) butter, divided use
½ cup granulated sugar, divided use
Pastry for 1 double-crust, 9-inch pie (homemade or refrigerated)
2 ¼ to 2 ½ pounds apples (I used a combination of Granny Smith and SweeTango)
1 lemon
¼ cup firmly packed light brown sugar
¼ cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Pinch salt
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon coarse sugar
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly coat a deep, 9-inch pie plate with butter and sprinkle lightly with sugar.
Roll out and transfer half of the pastry to the prepared pie plate. Trim dough even with edge of pie plate. Set aside.
Peel, core and thinly slice the apples. Place apple slices in a large mixing bowl, squeeze the lemon juice over the apple slices and toss to coat. Add the remaining granulated sugar, the brown sugar, flour, cinnamon and a pinch of salt and mix well. Pile apples into the unbaked pie crust. Cut the remaining butter into pats and dot apples with butter.
Roll out remaining pastry and cut into 1- to 1 ½-inch-wide strips. Arrange dough strips in a lattice over the apples. Fold and crimp edges to seal. Brush top lightly with milk and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
Bake 1 hour or until filling is bubbly and crust is golden brown. Cool completely on wire rack.
Makes 1 pie.
Food on 11/06/2019