YOU ARE THE FRENCH APPLE OF MY EYE

"A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie."
Tenneva Jordan

Oh, please!

We have a lovely apple tree. I made a French apple pie with some of our bounty. French apple because I didn't want to deal with a top crust.

I always do a rustic edge on the crust. Those perfect edges just look to me like they are trying too hard and in the event that the apples need to cook a little longer and the crust gets a little overdone I hate to resent the apples for ruining all of my hard work. Anyway, that's how I see it.



Here are the recipes I used:

QUICK PIE CRUST
Single Crust

1 3/8 cups all-purpose flour
3/8 cups oil (6 Tablespoons)
3 Tablespoons cold milk
3/4 tsp salt

Mix all ingredients with a fork or spoon until the mixture becomes thick and forms a ball. Divide in half for a double crust. Pat into a thick pancake shape. Sprinkle some water on a board and place a piece of wax paper large enough for the pie crust on the board. (The sprinkle of water keeps the wax paper from slipping.) Place the dough in the center of the wax paper and then place a second piece of wax paper over the dough. Roll the dough into a circle large enough for the pie pan. Without removing the wax paper, drape, centering, the dough over the rolling pin. Carefully peel off the top piece of wax paper. Carefully place (roll) the dough into the pie pan, centering it (exposed dough side is down, wax paper side is up). The dough is fragile so be careful. Shape the dough to the pan. Carefully remove the remaining wax paper. If the dough is torn, simply press it together with your fingers.

OLD FASHIONED APPLE PIE WITH FRENCH CRUMB TOPPING
7 c. sliced, peeled McIntosh or good cooking apples (about 7)
1/2 c. packed light brown sugar
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
Dash of ground cloves
1 tbsp. lemon juice or 1 1/2 tsp. grated lemon rind
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tbsp. cornstarch or flour
4 vanilla wafers, crushed, or 3 tbsp. finely ground nuts (optional)
1 (9 inch) unbaked pastry shell

1/3 c. butter
1/3 c. brown sugar
3/4 c. flour
1/2 c. chopped nuts (optional)Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In large bowl, combine sugar and cornstarch (or flour). Mix together with apples, brown sugar, spices, and lemon juice. Sprinkle wafers or nuts on bottom of pie shell. (This keeps crust from becoming soggy.) Spoon apple mixture into pie shell.

Make French Crumb Topping by mixing 1/3 cup butter and 1/3 cup brown sugar together. Cut in 3/4 cup flour. Stir in nuts. Sprinkle topping over apples in pie plate. Bake for 50 minutes or until topping is golden and apples are tender.

TIP: For a lovely taste thrill, mix 3 or 4 teaspoons of cinnamon into 1 quart softened vanilla ice cream. Refreeze. Serve a scoop of the cinnamon ice cream on warm apple-pie slices.

Enjoy!