Often people send me viral photos of cool looking bread design or fancy pie crusts. I love this but one of the things that you often see is the pre-baked pies, but never the end result. Like, what does it look like once You’ve baked it? Is the still as pretty? Or does it all bake together? I decided to give this style of pie — it’s really just a boring old double-crust apple pie, but with the fancy swoosh top crust — a go, and at least with this one, the pattern turned out pretty neat. Pleased with the result.
Ingredients
for the pastry
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/3 cup chilled solid vegetable shortening, diced
6 tablespoons (or more) ice water
for the filling
3 pounds baking apples, Pink Lady or Honeycrisp
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons butter, melted
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
2 tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg, with a tablespoon of water for egg wash
Granulated sugar, for sprinkling
Directions
Blend flour, sugar and salt in processor. Add butter and shortening and pulse in until it turns until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add 6 tablespoons ice water and process until moist clumps form, adding more water by teaspoonfuls if dough is dry. Gather into ball, then divide and flatten into two disks. Wrap in plastic and chill 2 hours.
Preheat oven to 425F.
Peel, core, and slice the apples into 1/2-inch pieces (or slices, if you like). Place apples into a large bowl and toss with lemon juice to prevent browning. Coat evenly in melted butter. Set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk together the spices, brown sugar, flour, and salt. Toss over the apples until they are evenly coated.
On a lightly floured surface, roll out the first pie dough to a 12-inch circle. Place the first round into a 9-inch pie plate, pressing down into the edges. Place the apples into the pie plate, mounding them towards the edge a bit (as you can see from the photo, there is a big, overlapped bit of dough bit in the center. If you don’t put a little bit of indentation in the apples, it will rise up pretty high). Roll out the second piece of dough to a rectangle where one edge is at least 11 inches. cut very narrow strips, less than 1/4 wide. lay strips close to another (or even touching) in a circle. They will overlap and
create a swoosh by themselves as you lay them on the pie. Once completely covered, seal the edges by pinching them together and folding them over. In a small bowl, whisk together the egg with a tablespoon of water. Brush over the pie dough. Sprinkle with granulated sugar, if desired. Chill pie for at least 1/2 hour before baking, particularly if the dough has softened.
Bake pie for 25 minutes before lowering oven temperature to 375F. Bake for an additional 25-35 minutes, or until golden brown. If the edges begin to darken too quickly, cover with aluminum foil to prevent additional browning.
Cool pie for at least 3 hours before slicing and serving.
