Apple Pie

I know, I know. You missed me! Well ,'tis the season now, so I've gotta get on the ball with my food blogging. This one I made right before Halloween, but apple pie is appropriate for at least two months after that. So here you go.

I used the good old frozen pie crusts, mostly because I didn't make time to figure out whole pie crust bit (nor did I own a pie plate at the time). Pastry is one area where I am totally fine with cutting corners. Plus, I took one of the pies down to our buddies in Brooklyn, and so the fact that the pie came in an alumnium pan they could dispose of without having to ship it back to Rochester seemed make ready-made pie crusts the obvious solution! Of course in reality, I left a bunch of stuff at their apartment that had to be shipped back anyway, but let's not worry with that.

So you take a bunch of apples, Macouns here, probably 8 or so. I still believe in leaving the skin on, but of course the core doesn't party very well, so you want to remove it and the seeds. I don't slice these too finely either. I think apple pies should be hearty fare.

Take your apple slices and mix them with brown sugar and a little flour, until coated. Use your hands for that one. Add in cinnamon, nutmeg, all those fall spices. And just a little lemon juice. Since the hard part was already done in some bakery-factory somewhere, all you have to do is dump the apple mixture into that defrosted pie crust and bake it according to the crust maker's instructions. If you want to do the old Grandma-style double crust, you should have two crusts and the directions there. So you don't need me to hold your hand through that.

Myself, I went for a little streusel topping. First I cooked the apple pie for about half the time, topless, shall we say. During that time, I melted some butter, added oatmeal and brown sugar to it, and then took the pie out and spread it on top. It needs to just get toasty colored and it's good to go. You can cover your pie crust with foil if you have a problem with the crusts burning. I forgot that but my crusts didn't burn. As with everything cooking-related, it's all about the watchful eye...