Glorious Apple Pie

Here is the apple pie that I promised you. This was my other labor of love that I made on behalf of my sister for the weekend. Unfortunately, I wasn't there to taste it, but my sister insists that it was amazing and that my brother-in-law had a slice every day until it was finished. Not to toot my own horn, but I kind of figured it would be delicious and I'll tell you why. First of all, the pie dough that I used was a pleasure to work with and a nibble that I took told me that it was indeed very good. For those interested, I used the King Arthur Flour guaranteed pie crust recipe. I think that one is here to stay. (Initially, I had added too little water, making it hard to roll. So I took the liberty of breaking up all the dough in a small bowl and adjusting with water. It worked like a charm!) As for the filling, I used Granny Smith apples and added, without a recipe, apple juice, sugar, vanilla, salt, flour, lemon juice, and cinnamon. I tasted of course to make sure it had enough of all the above. After I filled the pie shell with the apples, I reduced the left over liquid to an apple butter consistency and spooned it over the apples. I know I'm not the first person to do this, but I thought it was brilliant, as did my sister, and I'm sure it was this flavor element that took it over the top. It was a quick and easy way to add another dimension-- another trick I'll be sure to repeat over and over. After that, I pieced some margarine (I was doing parve baking here) over the top, covered it with the remaining dough, made some slashes, egged it and popped it into the oven until it was golden brown and beautiful. Making pies is a little labor intensive, but the result is so worth it. There's something about them that just makes me so... happy!

The flour, salt, margarine and shortening blended.

The water has been added. The pastry is holding itself together when pinched, demonstrating that it's almost ready.
Here's the pastry ready to be rounded and chilled.
The Granny Smith's sliced and ready for dressing!
The apples seasoned with apple juice, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, sugar, flour and lemon juice.
The pie pastry neately fitted into its plate.
The apples resting comfortably in its shell.
The reduced liquid..mmmm, this tasted delicious...I licked it right off the spoon!

The pie topped with cinnamon-y goodness and some margarine.

Covered and egged!
Baked to beautiful perfection.
Happy pie baking!!