Apple Pie

It's fall! I happen to really really like fall. But every fall, I start to feel bad. Because there's the one project that up until now has eluded me. My greatest downfall as a housewife. Well that and vacuuming. Man I hate vacuuming. But doesn't my front door look pretty? My greatest downfall has been pie making. I suck at it.

Well I did until now. I went grocery shopping and decided I would do something nice for the Brain. He loves pie. I don't. So there's lots for him when I make it and usually he forces it down. There have been some really bad pies that have come out of my oven. Burnt ones. Soggy ones. Fairly transparent ones. I've even screwed up using the already made roll out crust.

But I've been looking at all the apples in the store and I decided to give it one last go. The Joy of Cooking recipes for pies haven't turned out so well for me before though so I knew I didn't want to retry them. Finally I remembered that in the midst of all my fancy cookbooks, I had a big red Betty Crocker cookbook. You know the one I'm talking about. The one that everyone's mom has. I think my mom gave me hers actually. I figured you can't go wrong with Betty Crocker. I was right!

For the first time ever, I created a pie that was beautiful. And the Brain kept saying from the living room. "This is a good pie! A DAMN good pie!" I almost made another one on the spot. Except I didn't have any more of the roll out pie dough and I wasn't about to learn how to master crust the same day that I finally make a good pie.

Apple Pie

from the Betty Crocker's Cookbook

Pastry for 9-inch two crust pie

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

dash of salt

6 cups thinly sliced, peeled apples (I used a combination of Gala and Granny Smith)

2 Tbsp unsalted butter

Heat oven to 425 degrees. Line pie plate with one half of the pastry. Mix sugar, flour, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt. Stir in apples. Mound apple mixture into pie plate. Dot with butter. Cover with top crust, poke with fork and cut a steam hole in the center. Cover edges with 3-inch strips of aluminum foil to prevent excessive browning; remove foil during last 15 minutes of baking. Bake until crust is brown and juice begins to bubble through slit in crust, about 45 minutes.