Christmas Pie

I’ve opened up a whole new world of baked awesomeness today!

I baked my very first APPLE PIE!

I did use a box mix for the crust because I wanted to use it up but for the filling I used Paula Deen’s apple pie filling recipe found on the Food Network website. I knew I couldn’t go wrong with a Paula Deen recipe, she’s the queen of home cooking in my opinion.

Here’s the recipe!

3/4 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon, plus more for sprinkling
Freshly ground nutmeg, to taste
7 medium apples, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
1 lemon, zested and juiced

3 tablespoons butter
Egg wash, for brushing
Sugar, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. (After a bit of research I decided to decrease the temperature to 200 degrees C)

Mix together the brown sugar, flour, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a small bowl. In another bowl, sprinkle apples with the juice of 1 lemon and toss. Stir in the sugar mixture to evenly coat the apples.

Set aside. Roll out chilled dough into 2 circles and use 1 round to line a 9-inch pie pan. Chill the other round.

Mound the apple and sugar mixture into the pie pan lined with dough. Dot with the cubed butter. (I forgot about the butter until after I already weaved my pie top)

Using a pastry cutter, cut an even number of strips from the remaining rolled out dough. Transfer every other strip to the pie top and weave in the lattice by folding every other strip back onto itself and laying another strip perpendicularly. Fold the strips back across and repeat until completed.

Brush the top of the pie with egg wash and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Trim the overhanging dough and crimp edges.

Bake pie for 45 minutes. Let rest 20 minutes before slicing. (I wrapped the pie in foil for the first 25 minutes so the top wouldn’t burn.)

Turned out exceptionally well for a first time I think.