Bake Apple Pies for Charity

         I have decided to include posts about the recipes that I prepare for either my own family or to serve for a larger gathering. I am not famous for my cooking but I have been asked quite often in my lifetime to share my recipes for baking pies.
       My grandmother taught me at a very young age how to make pie crusts. She was an expert baker. So I will attempt to share all that she passed on to me through my blog here with clarity. It is important to remember that making pie crusts is a bit of an art form; it takes practice to get these just right. If you bake a pie once a week for a whole year, you should be an expert by the end of that year and it will taste so good to practice your skills!
       To make a standard pie crust you will need a 9inch diameter, glass pie dish. The type of pie dish that one bakes in is actually important. Sometimes I bake in tin pie pans, the dough seems to respond differently in these by baking quicker. However, it is never my intention to bake desserts quickly, only that I haven't the money or storage space to invest in more than a few glass pie plates that don't always travel as well as the tin and are expensive to replace if someone forgets to return them. In any case, I think it is important for a young baker to begin cooking his or her pies in Pyrex dish ware because it seems to tell a more accurate story about the way heat is dispersed in your oven.
       Memorize the recipe for a one pie crust with a top and bottom: 1 1/2 cup of flour, 1/3 cup of Crisco brand shortening, and one teaspoon of salt. You will need extra flour to prepare the countertop for rolling out the pie dough.
       Put all three of the ingredients into a mixing bowl. Use either a pastry cutter or the backside of a fork to combine these ingredients until they look like crumbs. Add cold water slowly in a trickle just until all of these crumbs stick together. Flour a clean surface generously, roll out the dough, lay it inside the pie plate and trim off the edges with a knife. Then repeat these same steps after adding the fruit for the top. In order to get the top to stick properly to the bottom of the pie crust, you must also dab on water around the rim of the dough at the plates' edge. When the top pie crust overlaps this area, press it down gently with your finger tips. The dough will seal the fruit into a kind of pocket. Always prick the top of the crust with the tips of a fork or knife so that steam from the baking fruit can escape during the baking process.
       Juices will leak from these holes during baking so it is important to place a cookie sheet or tin foil underneath the pie while it is baking so that you won't need to clean the entire oven afterwards! Bake the apple pie at 350 degrees for an hour in the center of your oven. After 45 minutes in the oven, pierce the surface with a knife to see if the apples are soft and cooked. I like my apple pies to have a little bit of a crunch. So I always check the pie to make sure that the apples are not overcooked. I like an apple pie, not an applesauce pie.

Baking a pie crust is an art form. Remember a few tips to make a flakey pie crust: don't handle the dough to often while rolling it out, the oil from your hands can toughen the dough. Also, the humidity in a kitchen does affect the way a pie dough bakes so, it's best to work fast during warmer seasons. Left, pie dough crumbles. Center, adding small portions of cold water to get the crumbles to stick together. Right, flour your clean counter before rolling out the dough!

      All ovens have a personality is seems. What I mean by this is some of them cook unevenly and others seem to never truely heat up properly. I have an excellent oven but I know it's little quirks and bake in accordance to them. My oven does not bake fast so I often need to make an extra allowance for time while I work with it. As you learn to bake pies in specific, you will discover interesting things to watch out for with your own oven temperatures. My grandmother used to say, "If you want to figure out how heat is distributed in an oven, bake a pie in it." What she meant was that farmer's pies reflect uneven temperatures and cooking because you can not only taste it but also see how these cook by looking at the crust.
       What is a farmer's pie? A farmer's pie differs from many other types in that the cooking of it happens only inside of the oven, not on the stove top and when it comes to baking apple pies, I cook them no other way.

Left, I have shaved off the skins of my Jonathan apples with a carrot peeler, You may leave a few skins on this adds texture to your pie. Center, the apples are roughly chopped and the cores discarded on the lawn for the birds and squirrels. Right, the apples tossed into the crust lined pie plate. Don't forget sprinkle in the sugar, flour, and cinnamon. The dabs of butter are very necessary too; distribute these evenly on top. Remember, farmer's pies are not cooked on stove tops. All of the ingredients must be included for baking before layering the top crust on to seal the pie!

       I use Jonathan apples for my homemade pies. This is because they are tart and sweet. They hold their shape and flavor during a bake, therefore making them the perfect variety for pies. I will cut up approximately 9 to 13 Jonathan apples per pie, depending upon the size. I shave the skins off using a carrot peeler and chop up the apples (discarding the cores) in medium sized chunks. Do not over chop the apples, if you use smaller slices to bake inside a pie, you will end up with mush! Sprinkle 3/4 cup of white sugar evenly over the top of the apples after piling them inside the pie crust. Don't add too much sugar! If you need your serving to be sweeter, eat that slice with vanilla ice cream. Sprinkle also two Tablespoons of flour evenly across the top and 5 to 6 cut teaspoons of butter on top of the flour. Sprinkle cinnamon over the top of the apples if you prefer. After this, roll out the pie crust top and wet down the edges before sealing it with either a fork or with your fingers. I make a sun shape with the point of my fingertips to seal the crust together, just as my grandmother taught me to do so many years ago. Bake 350 degree oven 45 minutes to one hour if needed.

Left, the apple pie is ready to bake in the oven. See the pricks made with a fork to give a place for the steam to go during bake time. The juice will also escape from these holes, so put a protective cookie sheet underneath the pie in the oven. Right, what my apple pies look like just after I remove them from the oven.

Church of the Crucifixion annual fundraiser