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One Pie Crust
(lots of useful crust info here)
50 grams cold butter, cut into small cubes
1 cup flour
very cold water
In a large bowl, mash butter cubes into flour with a fork until it looks like yellow flour with a few small butter chunks here and there. This can take a while (half hour to an hour depending on how many pie crusts you're making at the same time). Try to keep everything as cold as possible.
Sprinkle cold water into the butter-flour mixture while stirring with fork. You're aiming for a consistency where if you press some of the bits together, it'll stick. Try to avoid having too many of those big slugs of overwatered dough.
Press the mixture together into a ball. If you've added enough water, it should stick together - if not, add more water. Pour everything out of the bowl onto a large flat surface to mold it all together. You're aiming to have a ball of dough that sticks together well enough to stay a ball when you let go of it.
Wrap the dough ball in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for at least half an hour.
A while later, probably after you've finished making pie filling, bring out the dough ball and let it warm up for a few minutes.
Roll it out into a flat round shape. You can fold over any jagged overthinned edges and roll them back into the main crust area. Sprinkle flour on everything everywhere all of the time, to keep it from sticking. If it gets stuck you get holes and if the holes are really big you have to start over.
Maple Nut Pie
(more or less this)
One pie crust, rolled out and plated and in the freezer for at least 30 minutes
2-3 cups chopped walnuts and pecans
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup maple syrup, preferably B grade
2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons butter
1/8th teaspoon cinnamon
1/8th teaspoon nutmeg
1 egg, beaten (egg wash)
Mix the eggs, flour, maple syrup, butter, cinnamon, and nutmeg together, more or less in that order.
Bring out the frozen pie crust.
Put nuts into pie crust. Pour mixture over the top.
Brush pie crust edges with egg wash.
Bake at 190 C for 40-45 minutes. Probably put foil on pie crust edges after 20 minutes to keep it from getting burnt.
Apple Pie
(basically this)
Two pie crusts
6-8 apples of various sorts, such as granny smith, fuji, jazz, etc.
1 lemon for the juice
1/2 cup sugar
2 or 3 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 egg, beaten (egg wash)
Peel and thick-slice the apples into a large bowl. Sprinkle in some lemon juice after doing each apple to keep the slices from browning.
Add sugar, flour, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
Mix it all together until the apple slices are well-coated.
Put in fridge to keep chilled while working on rolling out bottom crust.
Roll out and plate bottom crust. Fill with filling. Roll out and cover with top crust.
Brush top crust with egg wash.
Bake at 190 C for 20 minutes, then 175 C for another 45 minutes.
My go-to recipe website for pies is Simply Recipes. Not only does it have lots of great pies (and other food), it has some great articles about pie crusts. The top parts of the recipe pages are usually about the food item (for example, the apple pie recipe talks about using different kinds of apples besides granny smiths) and are very informative for pie novices like me.
Anyhoo... so the fun part of pie making is converting all the units. "A stick of butter" isn't very useful in New Zealand, because that's not how butter is sold here. I can buy blocks of butter that have 50-gram measurements on the outside wrapping. It took a bit of googling to work out how many grams a stick is, and therefore how much flour to use. It works out to something weird like 116 grams per 2.25 cups flour, so I simplified it down to 50 grams butter per 1 cup flour equals 1 crust, which works out just fine.
Then the other fun part is baking temperature. American recipes are all in Fahrenheit. Neither of my ovens (a big main one and a toaster) have the Celsius degrees marked out at high resolution, so I have to guess where to set it.
I've also simplified down the spices to just cinnamon and nutmeg for both pies, just to cut down on how many little jars of stuff I have to keep around. They both still taste great.
Pie making in general is an all-day endeavour. I've taken to making two pies at the same time, since it's faster to make three crusts in one go than do them individually. Dividing it into thirds is a bit tricky, so in future I might start making four crusts at a time and freezing one, then two crusts the next time plus the frozen, or something.
Anyhoo, so the way it usually goes is:
make pie crust dough, put it all in the fridge as individual dough balls
make apple pie filling, put that into the fridge
roll out one dough ball for the maple nut pie, put it in the freezer
roll out second dough ball for the bottom of the apple pie, add the apple pie filling
roll out third dough ball for the top of the apple pie, complete the apple pie
preheat the oven to 190 C
make maple nut pie filling, pull out and fill the frozen crust
brush both pies with egg wash (one egg is plenty to do two pies)
bake maple nut pie at 190 C for 25 minutes
put in apple pie, put foil on pie crust of maple nut pie, bake for another 20 minutes
pull out maple nut pie
turn down heat to 175 C, bake apple pie for another 45 minutes
I haven't figured out a good use for the trimmed edges of the various pie crusts. Sometimes there's a lot left over, like I could use them to make another mini-pie. So far they're just getting composted.
(lots of useful crust info here)
50 grams cold butter, cut into small cubes
1 cup flour
very cold water
In a large bowl, mash butter cubes into flour with a fork until it looks like yellow flour with a few small butter chunks here and there. This can take a while (half hour to an hour depending on how many pie crusts you're making at the same time). Try to keep everything as cold as possible.
Sprinkle cold water into the butter-flour mixture while stirring with fork. You're aiming for a consistency where if you press some of the bits together, it'll stick. Try to avoid having too many of those big slugs of overwatered dough.
Press the mixture together into a ball. If you've added enough water, it should stick together - if not, add more water. Pour everything out of the bowl onto a large flat surface to mold it all together. You're aiming to have a ball of dough that sticks together well enough to stay a ball when you let go of it.
Wrap the dough ball in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for at least half an hour.
A while later, probably after you've finished making pie filling, bring out the dough ball and let it warm up for a few minutes.
Roll it out into a flat round shape. You can fold over any jagged overthinned edges and roll them back into the main crust area. Sprinkle flour on everything everywhere all of the time, to keep it from sticking. If it gets stuck you get holes and if the holes are really big you have to start over.
Maple Nut Pie
(more or less this)
One pie crust, rolled out and plated and in the freezer for at least 30 minutes
2-3 cups chopped walnuts and pecans
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup maple syrup, preferably B grade
2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons butter
1/8th teaspoon cinnamon
1/8th teaspoon nutmeg
1 egg, beaten (egg wash)
Mix the eggs, flour, maple syrup, butter, cinnamon, and nutmeg together, more or less in that order.
Bring out the frozen pie crust.
Put nuts into pie crust. Pour mixture over the top.
Brush pie crust edges with egg wash.
Bake at 190 C for 40-45 minutes. Probably put foil on pie crust edges after 20 minutes to keep it from getting burnt.
Apple Pie
(basically this)
Two pie crusts
6-8 apples of various sorts, such as granny smith, fuji, jazz, etc.
1 lemon for the juice
1/2 cup sugar
2 or 3 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 egg, beaten (egg wash)
Peel and thick-slice the apples into a large bowl. Sprinkle in some lemon juice after doing each apple to keep the slices from browning.
Add sugar, flour, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
Mix it all together until the apple slices are well-coated.
Put in fridge to keep chilled while working on rolling out bottom crust.
Roll out and plate bottom crust. Fill with filling. Roll out and cover with top crust.
Brush top crust with egg wash.
Bake at 190 C for 20 minutes, then 175 C for another 45 minutes.
My go-to recipe website for pies is Simply Recipes. Not only does it have lots of great pies (and other food), it has some great articles about pie crusts. The top parts of the recipe pages are usually about the food item (for example, the apple pie recipe talks about using different kinds of apples besides granny smiths) and are very informative for pie novices like me.
Anyhoo... so the fun part of pie making is converting all the units. "A stick of butter" isn't very useful in New Zealand, because that's not how butter is sold here. I can buy blocks of butter that have 50-gram measurements on the outside wrapping. It took a bit of googling to work out how many grams a stick is, and therefore how much flour to use. It works out to something weird like 116 grams per 2.25 cups flour, so I simplified it down to 50 grams butter per 1 cup flour equals 1 crust, which works out just fine.
Then the other fun part is baking temperature. American recipes are all in Fahrenheit. Neither of my ovens (a big main one and a toaster) have the Celsius degrees marked out at high resolution, so I have to guess where to set it.
I've also simplified down the spices to just cinnamon and nutmeg for both pies, just to cut down on how many little jars of stuff I have to keep around. They both still taste great.
Pie making in general is an all-day endeavour. I've taken to making two pies at the same time, since it's faster to make three crusts in one go than do them individually. Dividing it into thirds is a bit tricky, so in future I might start making four crusts at a time and freezing one, then two crusts the next time plus the frozen, or something.
Anyhoo, so the way it usually goes is:
make pie crust dough, put it all in the fridge as individual dough balls
make apple pie filling, put that into the fridge
roll out one dough ball for the maple nut pie, put it in the freezer
roll out second dough ball for the bottom of the apple pie, add the apple pie filling
roll out third dough ball for the top of the apple pie, complete the apple pie
preheat the oven to 190 C
make maple nut pie filling, pull out and fill the frozen crust
brush both pies with egg wash (one egg is plenty to do two pies)
bake maple nut pie at 190 C for 25 minutes
put in apple pie, put foil on pie crust of maple nut pie, bake for another 20 minutes
pull out maple nut pie
turn down heat to 175 C, bake apple pie for another 45 minutes
I haven't figured out a good use for the trimmed edges of the various pie crusts. Sometimes there's a lot left over, like I could use them to make another mini-pie. So far they're just getting composted.
