Sharing my homemade apple pie recipe today because I’m beyond proud of the way it turned out! Tis the season for eating, drinking and being merry. This time of year besides all of the holiday cheer, I love to share recipes, whether that’s food or drinks. I had the opportunity to team up with ShopRite and Little Fox Kitchen to make an apple pie from scratch.
Now many of you may not know this but my grandmom is the pie queen. She’s been making pies my whole life and they are truly amazing. Seriously though her sweet potato pie is life changing. Of course I had to do her proud with this pie. Myself along with some fellow influencers and the ShopRite team made our pies over Zoom with a chef from Little Fox Kitchen. I’ll put the recipe below but of course I have a story to share first.
Where I first went wrong with the ingredients. The ingredients call for regular butter. Well, I only had “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter”. When we first got on the Zoom call I mentioned this to the chef and he said I should be fine. It would change the dough a bit but should be manageable. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t lol. On top of having Cora in the kitchen with me while I made this pie, as influencers we were also supposed to be creating content about this process.
Needless to say I had my hands full and kept noticing as the chef was going on to the next part of the recipe I was still having trouble with my dough. The dough was the first thing that we made. To make a long story short, I was not able to finish my pie in one day because I ended up throwing away my disaster dough. Note to self: don’t use “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter”. By the way, when I mentioned this to my Grandmom, the pie queen, she said she doesn’t use butter for her dough but rather Crisco. Noted….and I had Crisco in the house because that’s what I use to make my dough for my Snickerdoodles.
Making a pie is no easy feat but this recipe is fool proof (as long as you use regular butter).
INGREDIENTS YOU WILL NEED
• (6) Gala , or Cortland apples
• all-purpose flour (1-2 lb.)
• granulated white sugar ( 1⁄2 lb.)
• cornstarch
• ground cinnamon powder
• Turbinado or Raw sugar
• kosher Salt
• (1) lemon
• pure vanilla extract
• (2) x 227 gram/blocks, or 1 pound unsalted butter
• Whole milk – we will need only 2 Tablespoons
Recipe
For the double crust:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1⁄2 cup unsalted butter, cut in 2- inch pieces (chilled but pliable)
1⁄2 cup ice water
Extra all-purpose flour for dusting, about 1⁄2 cup
1 Tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
Prepare pie dough.
Mix flour, sugar and salt in a medium bowl.
Drop-in butter and toss pieces and coat with flour. Break into 12 nuggets (size of walnuts) and continue to toss.
Using your fingers, scoop and lift handfuls of flour and butter chunks and toss and coat using your fingers. Lightly rub thumbs back and forth across the fingertips- breaking the large chunks of butter into smaller pieces. Continue scooping up flour and butter sweeping your thumbs across the fingertips and only in one direction from little finger to the index finger.
Continue to until you have bits that ranges in sizes – from coarse cornmeal to peas to olives.
Sprinkle the cold water over the mixture, and using a fork, stir and scrape flour to blend. After a few stirs, all the flour should be moistened and a rough dough forming.
Gather dough with hand and shape into a ball. Divide dough into two, with one slightly bigger than the other -this is the bottom crust. Flatten each into a disc. Wrap with plastic wrap and chill for 10- 15 minutes.
Rolling crust and lining the pan.
Brush pie plate with melted butter. Set aside. Dust parchment paper with flour- place the larger dough on top and lightly dust with flour. Roll out to 12-inch-wide circle. Transfer and ease dough to line and fit pie plate. Trim or fold overhang. Roll other disc to about 9-10 inches. Cover the pie crust and top crust with plastic wrap and chill both for 20 minutes.
For the filling:
6 Gala /Cortland apples
1 Tablespoon lemon juice, about half a lemon
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1⁄4 cup sugar
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
1⁄4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon powder
2 Tablespoons cold unsalted
butter, cubed
Prepare filling
Quarter, and then peel apples – trim the core. Slice each quarter crosswise, into 1/4-inch-thick triangles. Place apples into a large saucepan- add the lemon juice, vanilla extract, sugar, cornstarch, salt, and cinnamon, and toss to coat gently. Allow apples to sit and macerate for about 15 minutes. Then cook apples on low heat for about 6 minutes, or until juices thicken. Cool slightly.
Arrange oven rack one level down below the middle. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Assemble and bake pie.
Remove pie plate from fridge. Spoon apple filling and fill pie plate – piling the middle portion higher than the rest. Dot with butter. Take the other remaining pie dough and place over the top of filling. Seal top and bottom crust edges by crimping. Brush top crust with milk. Sprinkle with brown sugar or raw sugar.
Using a small sharp knife, cut a couple of slits in the top crust- this is to vent steam. Set pie plate on a parchment lined cookie or baking sheet. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes initially (if edges are browning too quickly wrap edges with foil) Reduce heat to 375 degrees and bake for 15 minutes more. Allow pie to cool before cutting.
Thanks for reading!