Cinnamon Apple Pie

I had a request earlier this afternoon for an apple pie recipe.  I gladly agreed to make one and post it, because I have this BIG box of apples sitting in my kitchen just begging to be used.

I'm sure my husband's co workers will be thrilled to find out that they're having apple pie for breakfast tomorrow, lol!  My kids will be equally thrilled when they see the mini apple crescents I made for them out of the left over pie dough.  Even if you've never made pie dough from scratch, this recipe is very simple!  You can do it, I'll even show you how ;)  Follow me, we'll do this together...

Grab your sea salt, all purpose flour, butter, and fill a cup with iced water.  

Grab 1/2 c. of butter (1 stick of butter) and cut it up into piece.  Make sure that your butter is chilled, the colder the butter, the better.  

Toss 1 1/2 c. all purpose flour, and 1/4 tsp. sea salt into a mixing bowl.  

Start mixing your flour and salt, 1 piece at a time start mixing in your cold butter.  

Mix your ingredients until it resembles loose sand.  

Measure your ice cold water that's been sitting in the cup into 1/4 c.  Don't put any ice into the measuring cup.  Slowly add your water into your mixing bowl, 1 tsp. at a time.  Mix your dough until it forms a ball.  Immediately stop mixing, place in plastic wrap, and allow to chill in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 hours.  Overworking your dough will cause your crust to be hard once you bake it, and putting too much water will cause a chain reaction of having to add more flour, water, flour...you get the picture.

I made 2 balls of dough, because I wanted to also place lattice on top of my pie.  If you want  to make more then 1 ball of dough, I would recommend repeating the steps above instead of doubling the recipe. While doubling recipes is a great and easy way to multiply the amount of food you make, baking is an exact science.  Pies are straight forward and easy to make, but they are also very easy to mess up.  

Once your dough is ready to go, place a sheet of wax paper down on your counter.  A sweet lil' tip for keeping your wax paper from sliding all over the place while your rolling out your dough, is to sprinkle a few drops of water underneath the wax paper.  The water will keep the paper on the counter.  Sprinkle a dusting of flour on your wax paper, and place your dough on the flour.  Lightly sprinkle flour on the top of your dough and begin to roll out your dough.  Quickly roll in a 1/4 in. flat circle.  

Once you have your pie crust all rolled out, gently place it in the pie pan.  If you're only using 1 pie crust, fold the areas of the dough that are hanging over the sides of the pie pan, and fold the dough under itself.  Place your pie pan in the refrigerator to chill while you move onto prepping your apples.

Moving onto our pie filling, grab 8 Fuji apples, wash, peel, and core them.  

Cut your apples into small pieces and set aside.

Meanwhile preheat your oven for 425 degrees F.  Next, melt 1/2 c. butter in a sauce pan over low heat.  

When your butter is completely melted turn heat to medium, place 3 tbsp. all purpose flour into your sauce pan, and mix to make a paste.  

Pour in 1/4 c. water, 1/2 tsp. nutmeg, 1/2 c. white sugar, and 1/2 c. brown sugar.  Bring to a boil, and then reduce to lowest heat setting to simmer.

While your sauce is simmering, place your apples in the pie crust.  

If you're going to use a 2nd crust to make lattice do that step while your sauce is simmering.  Once the sauce has simmered for 5 minutes (stir occasionally), gently pour sauce over the entire pie.  Brush an egg wash (1 egg beaten and applied with a pastry brush) over the edges of your crust.  Place your pie in the oven for 35 minutes, placing a loose foil tent over the pie during the last 10 minutes to avoid overly cooked crust edges.

Sprinkle with cinnamon, and allow to cool for 1 hour.  Well, you did it!  Good job!  Now go eat that beautiful pie with your family, friends, or give it away to someone you love =)

Pie Crust Ingredients:

1 1/2 C. All purpose flour

1/4 tsp. salt

1/4 c. ice water

1/2 c. butter

Apple Pie Filling Ingredients:

Pie crust

8 Fuji apples 

1/2 c. unsalted butter

3 tbsp. all purpose flour

1/4 c. water

1/2 c. white sugar

1/2 c. packed brown sugar

1 tbsp. cinnamon 

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

Egg Wash:

1 egg

Apple Leather

As many of you know, we went apple picking yesterday.  As a result, my house is now bursting with apples.  My intention in gathering so many apples was to make applesauce, then can it.  My girls LOVE applesauce, and can easily go through a jar in 3 days.  I would much rather can it then run to the store every 3 days for a $3 jar of the stuff.  Additionally, I had hopes and dreams to make apple pie, apple fritters, apple bread, apple butter, and apple preserves.  Today I made apple leather and apple fritters.  The leather takes 11 hours overall, so it's definitely something you'll want to plan to make on a day when you will be home all day.  You can pop it in the oven and let it cook overnight as well.  Like the majority of kids on the planet, my kids LOVE fruit roll ups, however I do not like what many of them are made of.  I'm a picky mom, and I don't allow high fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, artificial anything, and definitely no preservatives.  I thought what better way to give my kids the opportunity to have the yummy fruit roll ups without feeding them the yuckiness, then to make them myself.  So here we go-------------------->

To start, gather approximately 30 apples.  You can cut this in half if you don't want to make this much.  The amount of apples you use will not affect the recipe at all.

 Peel and core your apples.

Take them off and place them in a large bowl.

Once all of your apples are peeled and cored, place them in a large pot.  Run water over the apples until the water covers the top layer of apples.  Cook the apples on medium heat for 15 minutes, or until they're soft enough to mash.  Depending on the size of your pot, you may have to cook your apples in several batches.  While your apples are cooking, set your oven at 170 degrees F.

Once the apples are done cooking, drain the water from your pot.  Transfer the apples into your blender or food processor, and puree until the apples are thoroughly blended.  Add nutmeg, cinnamon, and 2-3 tbsp local honey to taste.  Give it a good blend one last time to mix all of the spices and sugar.

Grab a baking sheet and place a sheet of sturdy, microwaveable plastic wrap down.  Pour the apple puree onto the baking sheet, and spread to about an 1/8 to 1/4 inch thickness.  Make sure that none of the plastic falls over the puree, this could cause it to not dry out.

Place your baking sheet in the oven at 170 degrees F for 11 hours. 

Once your Apple Leather is done, let it cool before you try to peel it off of the plastic wrap.  You'll know it's ready when it peels off easily.  You can wrap the leather up in the plastic wrap it was cooked in, then place it in an airtight container to store.  

Since I just started my Apple Leather at 11am, I don't have a picture of a finished product, but will post it this evening as soon as it comes out of the oven.  You can make fruit leather with any of your favorite fruits.  That's a wrap =)

Recipe Ingredients:

30 Apples of your choice

Cinnamon to taste

Nutmeg to taste

2-3 tbsp. local honey

30 apples makes 2 large baking sheets, and 1 small sheet.  

4 cups of fruit = 1 baking sheet of fruit leather.

Alternatives to cooking in the oven for 11 hours:

Dehydrator

Lay fruit out on a tray, place outside on a hot, sunny day, and tent with cheese cloth.  The fruit will dehydrate over the course of the day.