Favorite Apple Pie

My husband just went rummaging sale-ing.  It is one of his favorite things to do, and he seems to believe we can never have too many kitchen gadgets.  Anyway, he bought a little topper that is supposed to be placed on an apple pie while it cooks and will leave little apple shapes browned into the crust.  He also bought apples.  I think I am about to bake a pie. 

There are many variations on apple pie, of course.  And then there is apple crisp, apple betty, apple cobbler, apple cake, and so on.  There is one for apple crisp and one for apple cake to be found right on this very blog--as well as apple rhubarb pie, apple peach pie and some other combos.. 

I love all of them, but this is my go-to recipe when I just want delicious, can't-be-beat, old style and basic-but-fabulous apple pie. 

Ingredients

Pastry for two-crust pie
6 large tart apples
2 Tbs. flour
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1/8 tsp. salt
1 Tbs. lemon juice
3 Tbs. butter or regular margarine (not the soft kind)

What to Do

•  Peel and slice apple into saucepan.  Add 1/4 cup cold water and bring to a simmer.  Simmer about 5 minutes or till just tender. Cool.
• Fill pastry-lined 9 inch pie pan with apples.
• Combine remaining ingredients, except butter.  Sprinkle over apples.  Dot with butter.  Moisten edges of bottom crust.
• Adjust top crust.  Cut six vents like chevrons, one in each piece.
• Bake in very hot oven (450 F.) for ten minutes.  Reduce heat to moderate (350 F.) and bake 45 minutes.  Makes 6 servings.

Variation: Caramel apple pie 

Cover bottom pastry with 1/4 cup melted butter or margarine.  Spread 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar over the butter.  Sprinkle with 1/2 cup pecans.  Now follow the above recipe except use only 1/4 cup brown sugar.  This makes a luscious caramelized pie.

Apple Rhubarb Pie

Yesterday Ken came home with a bag of Granny Smith apples (purchased mainly because it gave him several cents off a gallon of gas) and announced, "I think an apple rhubarb pie would be great."  I had a bunch of rhubarb from my daughter's patch--but I never heard of apple rhubarb pie.  A little searching turned up a few recipes, and I tried this one because I had the Jell-o on hand.  It was delicious.  Slightly tart, of course, being rhubarb and Granny Smith apples, but a dollop of whipped cream was perfect.  Next time I'll try it with vanilla ice cream.  (I asked both the men in my house if I should make it a bit sweeter, and both said no.)

Ingredients

dough for a two-crust pie

2  c. rhubarb, diced
2 c. apples, sliced
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 (3 oz.) pkg. strawberry gelatin
1 c. sugar
1/4 c. flour
1/4 c. melted butter

What to Do
Roll out half of pie dough and arrange in an 8 or 9 inch pie pan.  Mix all pie ingredients together and spoon into prepared crust.  Roll out remaining dough and cover, tucking edges under and fluting. (A lattice top would be nice for this pie.) Bake at 350 F for for about one hour or until top is lightly browned and fruit is bubbly. Serve with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Magic Coconut Cream Pie

Fun for making with children and for occasions when you are short on time but want a lovely dessert!


Ingredients:
4 eggs
½ stick butter (softened is better)
2 cups milk
1 cup coconut
½ tsp baking powder
1 cup sugar
½ cup flour
¼ tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla

What to Do:

Put all the ingredients in the blender and blend until smooth. Yes, all of them. Pour into well greased 9 inch deep dish pie pan or into a 10 inch square pan. Bake for around 1 hour (usually 5 or so minutes more than an hour) at 350 degrees F. Chill well before serving.

The crust wil be on the bottom, the custard part will be in the middle, and the coconut will be on top. Fun and delicious, (though the crust is not like a regular pie crust)

Blender Pecan Pie

This is the easiest pecan pie recipe imaginable, but I don't use this recipe because of that. It's the best! A bit less sweet than many pecan pies. Also a good pie to freeze for later. It will expand, so don't worry if your pie pan is not full before cooking.

Ingredients

Unbaked pie shell

2 eggs
2/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup light corn syrup
2 tbs. butter or margarine, melted
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup pecans (I use a bit more)
12 pecan halves

Fit pie pastry into pie pan and flute edges.

Put eggs, sugar, salt, syrup, butter and vanilla in blender container or food processor and blend well.

Add one cup pecans and blend just enough to chop nuts coarsely. Poor into pie shell. Place pecan halves on top.

Bake in hot oven (435 degrees) for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and continue baking until top is lightly browned, about 30 minutes.

If your grocery store stocks the kind of shrivelled, sad pecans that we find around here, allow me to suggest you order pecans from SunnyLand Farms. Worth every penny!

Peach & Berry Pie

This pie is beautiful, and it tastes even better than it looks. I made it last week as a potential entry in a pie baking contest. It is a slightly different version of my strawberry peach pie (that won second place last year.) This was my attempt at the blue ribbon entry, but circumstances beyond my control dictated that it never got to the contest. Still, as we ate it by firelight one evening, one of our friends said, "Oh my, this is a first place pie as far as I'm concerned!" Good enough then, and I'll share it here. :-)

Ingredients
pastry for top and bottom, 8 or 9 inch pie
(lattice top would be nice for this too)
1 c. raspberries
3 c. peaches (pitted, peeled & sliced)
1 c. strawberries
4 Tbs flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
pinch nutmeg
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. butter

What to do:
Line pie pan with one pastry. Combine ingredients (except butter) and pile into pie pan. Dot with butter and cover with top pastry. Seal and flute edges and cut several slits in top. Sprinkle a little extra sugar and cinnamon on top. Cover edges with aluminum foil to prevent excessive browning. Bake at 425 degrees F. for about 40 minutes. Cool. Top with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream if desired.

Note: I used the fruit amounts above because that is what I had. I don't think it would matter if you used all peaches and strawberries (though that would require a bit less sugar) or different combinations of the three fruits, depending on what you have.

Classic Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

Ah, Spring! A Baltimore Oriole has been spotted at the feeder, dandelions are taking over the lawn, temperatures are finally reaching the 70s and---the RHUBARB is up! I remember my first taste of rhubarb. I was about 10 and had never heard of it, but I was served a bowl of warm rhubarb sauce at the famous fried chicken restaurant at Knott's Berry Farm, Anaheim, California.

I thought it was about the most wonderful thing I'd ever tasted, and I told my mother I could not understand why we had never had it before. She had never tasted it either. We had a large and healthy stand of it by our mobile home at Trinity Bible College, and I've since learned that it is beloved in the cold states.

Here is the first of a few rhubarb recipes. This one about as simple as it gets. Sometimes simple things really are the best!

2 c. rhubarb, cut into 1 inch pieces
2 c. fresh strawberries, sliced in half
1 1/4 cup sugar
3 tbsp. flour
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
3 tbsp. butter, melted
2 eggs, slightly beaten
2 unbaked pie crusts

Mix strawberries and rhubarb together. Place on bottom crust in 8 or 9 inch pie pan. Mix other ingredients well. Pour evenly over top of fruit. Top with pie crust.
Sprinkle with sugar and a little cinnamon and put some vents in top crust.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Bake for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and finish baking until rhubarb is tender. Serve with whipped cream.

Fresh Strawberry Peach Pie

This pie won second place in a pie contest this weekend (out of 16 entries). It missed first place by one point. :-) I made it over coals in a dutch oven, but I'll turn it into an oven-baked pie as best I can. I'm going to make at least one more before I can no longer get good peaches.

FRESH STRAWBERRY PEACH PIE

Heat oven to 375 degrees F.

FILLING:

3/4 to 1 cup sugar, depending on sweetness of fruit
1/3 c. all purpose flour
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
pinch of nutmeg
dash salt
4 large peaches, chunked, 2 c. sliced fresh strawberries (1 pt.) cut in halves
1/2 tsp lemon juice

CRUST

Use any good pie crust recipe and make as usual except add 1 tsp cinnamon and 1 tbs. suger to the dry ingredients. Instead of a top crust I cut out a large strawberry shape (think heart except flat on top), added a few leaf shapes up top and poked holes in the crust. Sprinkle this with a little sugar if you like.

Combine fruit mixture in large bowl. Spoon filling into pastry-lined pie 9 inch pie plate. Add top crust. Cover edge with foil. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes. Remove foil. Bake 30 to 40 minutes or until crust is light brown. Cool until warm for serving.

Cool Rasberry Pie

An easy and cool dessert for summer.

Ingredients:

Graham Cracker pie crust (I like Keebler.)
1 can Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup lemon or lime juice
a Few drops red food coloring, if desired
1 8 oz. carton of Cool Whip or similar whipped topping
About 1 1/2 cups fresh rasberries. Can use frozen, but thaw slightly.

What to do:

If you use food coloring, stir it into the lemon juice. Combine the Eagle Brand milk with the juice. Fold in the whipped topping and the raspberries. Pour into the crust. Garnish with berries or fruit of choice. Chill.

Double the recipe for a 9" x 13" cake pan. You can also make this recipe with strawberries or diced peaches, and you might like to try an Oreo cookie crust instead.