Apple Pie

In Asian culture, gift giving is a common practice. If you are a teacher,  you get never-ending gifts from doting parents of your students. My sister is a kindergarten teacher. Last week, she brought home  2 kilograms of apples, a gift from a generous parent. We are enjoying the abundance of the fruit.  Big sis is juicing them with carrots. So we have fresh carrot-apple juice to drink.  I made apple pie.

Apple Pie

Ingredients for the crust
200 g flour
100 g butter, diced
4 g salt
15 g icing sugar (add more if you like  sweeter crust )
5 ml water ( 1 Tsp)
1 egg, lightly beaten


Procedure:
Combine the icing sugar and salt in one bowl, the water and egg in another bowl.
In a larger bowl, rub butter into flour until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.  Toss the icing sugar mixture with the flour mixture to combine.
Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour in the egg mixture.

Using a wooden spoon , fold the mixture together. When the dough starts to come together, dump it onto  lightly floured work surface. With the heel of the hand, knead the dough until all  butter is incorporated and dough is smooth.

Shape dough into a disk, wrap in cling wrap and chill for at least an hour.

For the filling you need:
2 apples
15 g butter
25 g sugar
water (optional)
lemon juice
vanilla
cinnamon

While you wait for the dough to firm up a bit, prepare the apple filling.

Peel, core and dice the apples.
Note: To keep the apples from browning  add lemon juice.

In a small pan, add butter. Quickly swirl the pan to evenly coat the bottom.Once the butter has almost melted, add  diced apples and stir around until they absorb the moist from the butter completely.

Add  sugar.

Toss the mixture gently until the sugar caramelizes. Cook in low heat about 3-5 minutes.
Note: If the pan gets too dry while cooking, add a bit of water.

Lastly stir in cinnamon  and vanilla. Quickly remove from heat. Let cool.

Now back to the  cool dough. When I make pies or tarts, I find that it is easier to roll out dough when baking paper is used. I lay baking paper much bigger than the dough on my work surface, place the dough onto it, then cover it with another baking paper.  No mess!

 Roll dough evenly into about 2.5 mm thick layer.

When dough is rolled out into desired thickness, place the apple filling in the middle. Take the upper end of baking paper and gently fold dough over itself. Press the edges together to seal.Trim the edge of the pie even.

With a pastry crimper, crimp the edge to make the pie look pretty. Make 3-4 slits in top of pie to allow the steam to escape. Brush with egg wash to achieve golden pie crust. ( I forgot this!)

Bake in a preheated oven at 160 degrees C for 20 minutes or until golden in color.

Enjoy!