Some thoughts on baking apple pies

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you celebrating it today in the US or elsewhere!

My first cooking task of the day was to bake an apple pie, something I’ve been doing for many years. There are many recipes for the pie and the pie dough, and this entry is not one for either, but rather a few comments and recommendations.

Dough

• Making the pie dough is not my favorite part of the process but I’ve learned to relax about it as I’ve gotten older.
• A mixture of butter and shortening in the dough works well in a ratio of 3 or 4 to 1. I’ve never used lard but I hear it is even better than the shortening. Keep all the “fats” in the freezer until you are ready to use them.
• Use unsalted butter if you have it, but if you use salted butter reduce the amount of salt added to the flour for the dough.
• I bought some pie birds this year, not so much because I have a problem with “empty dome syndrome” where the filling reduces while the top pie crust bakes as a dome with air under it, but because I think they are fun and cool to use. Artfully placed slits cut in the top crust work well. If you have a child, spell out his or name in the slits.
• Per Alton Brown of the Food Network, I substituted very cold apple jack for water in the dough. The pie is not done yet, but I can confirm that the dough is much easier to work with and much less gloppy.
• Though I’ve used wax paper for years, I’ve decided it is more trouble than it is worth. Today I just used flour on the counter top and it worked just fine. Making sure you sprinkle both sides of the dough and move it to ensure it is not sticking to the countertop.
• I prefer using a maple rolling dowel rather than a wood or marble rolling pin.
• If I have extra rolled dough after constructing the pie, I put the pieces on a baking sheet, sprinkle with a sugar and cinnamon mixture, and bake until lightly brown. My kids love these.

Filling

• Try using apple jack or apple cider instead of water.
• If you put raisins in your pie, soak them in apple jack for 10 minutes. Alternatively, use some brandy.
• After peeling the apples, I use an apple slicer and corer to get uniform slice sizes. I then cut these the long way to make slightly thinner slices. Make sure you get all the peel off the slices.
• Consider substituting light brown sugar for one-third of the sugar in the filling.
• The recipe I used today called for 6 large apples. I used 4 varieties but generally the more the better. I would not recommend using all Granny Smith, but one or two lend a nice tartness and crunch to the filling. You are going here for a variety of flavor and texture in every bite.
• You can use lemon or lime zest but I think you should add some lime juice to the apple slices as are you are collecting them so that the apples do not brown. It also gives the juice a little more time to soak in. Lemon juice works here as well, but I usually prefer lime in most situations.

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