Online Recipes

Aside from being a truly American art form, Apple Pie Recipes are one of those little culinary secrets. They produce beautiful and delicious deserts, that are sure to please any true connoisseur, with the cheapest ingredients and stupidly simple technique.

The Crust

The only real challenge in all apple pie recipes is the crust. Although the ingredients are simple, and the directions straight forward, it always takes a few tries to master a good pastry crust recipe. Below is my personal favorite:

Apple Pie Pastry Crust Recipe

In a large bowl, stir together one cup of flour, sugar and salt. With a hand-held pastry blender, cut butter into flour until butter is dime-sized. Add shortening, cut into mixture until dime-sized. Lightly stir in remaining flour and sprinkle with half the water. With a full palm, squeeze flour together against side of bowl. Rub hands together to drop damp flour into mixture. Drops at a time, add just enough water to hold together; the less water the better, dry crumbs on the bottom are good.

But if your not ready to take on the crust just yet, or don’t have the time, a pre-made pastry crust will do just fine.

Once you’ve mastered the art of the pastry crust, everything else is downhill. The variations of apple pie recipes are endless, as many recipes as people that bake them, but the simple fact remains that the technique and ingredients used for each are are strikingly similar with only slight variations. The heart of the pie is its filling. A delicious combination of fresh sweet apples and sugar cooked to perfection that melt in your mouth.

Below I give you a few of my favorite variations on traditional apple pie fillings.

Traditional Apple Pie

Make the pastry dough and refrigerate while you prepare the filling. Cut up apples and sprinkle with lemon juice in a large bowl and set aside. Combine sugar, flour, spices and a dash of salt. mix with apples to coat. Line a 9 inch pie pan with your prepared crust and fill with the apple mixture. Dot with butter. Lay over your top crust and seal very well. Use a knife or tines of a fork to make steam slits on the top crust. Sprinkle the top of the pie with sugar. Bake at 400 F for 45 minutes or until golden brown.

Sweet Apple Pie with Streusel Topping

Filling

Streusel Topping

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Place cookie sheet in oven to heat. In 1-quart saucepan, cook 1/4 cup butter over medium heat, stirring constantly, until melted and lightly browned. Cool completely for about 15 minutes. In a large bowl, beat eggs and 1/2 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in 2 tbsp. flour and 1 tsp. vanilla. Beat in cooled butter. Stir in apples. Pour into crust. In a medium bowl, stir together all streusel ingredients together except butter. With pastry blender, fork or your hands, cut in 1/4 cup butter until mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Sprinkle over apples. Place pie on baking sheet in oven. Bake for 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees and cover crust with strips of foil to prevent browning. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes longer or until apples are tender and crust is golden brown. Cool completely.