10-11'' heirloom apple pie

 Weigel Production Corp.

Ingredients:

1 - double pastry crust – or 1 single pastry crust & crumb topping

10-12 apples (about 9 cups of apple pieces) - pick a crispy variety like Cortland, Granny Smith, Honeycrisp, Zestars and mix it up!

Juice of one lemon – if you like a little extra lemon make some lemon zest before juicing

1/2c brown sugar

1/2c white sugar

1/4c all purpose flour

1t salt

1T cinnamon

Directions:

Peel and cut apples into larger chunks or slices, put into a large bowl. Add lemon juice (and zest if using) and toss apples to coat in the juice.

Place all dry ingredients into another small bowl and whisk together. Pour dry ingredients over your apples and toss the apples to coat. Allow the apple mixture to sit about 15-20 minutes to help macerate the apples and release their natural pectin. It’ll make a sauce on the bottom of the bowl!

Take your prepared crust bottom and pour ALL the apples and all of the juices from the bowl into the crust (mound the apples up high, they will bake down and reduce).

For crumb topping

Directions:

Pour your filling into the bottom crust, place pie onto a sheet tray or cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. While pie is baking mix together 1/2c flour, 1/2c oats, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 1t cinnamon, 1t salt in a bowl. Add 1/2c softened butter cut into half inch pieces and using your fingers or a pastry cutter, cut the butter and flour together until it resembles a course crumb. (If you don’t want to use oats, increase your flour to 1c and you will have more of a crumbly shortbread top.) After your pie has baked 30 minutes, remove from oven, add the crumble to the top of the pie evenly return the pie to the oven to bake for another 20-30 minutes. Watching for the apple filling to bubble.

After baking your pie – you need to let it rest for 4 hours minimum. It is still cooking and setting up. If you slice before it is finished you will not get slices that hold together.

Your pie can be stored covered at room temp for a few days. Or in the fridge. Cold pie is delicious! Your fully cooled pie can be wrapped well, frozen and thawed for later.

Pie dough

Ingredients:

157 grams of all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon of salt 

½ tablespoon of granulated sugar 

145 grams of unsalted butter, cold, chopped into cubes

⅓ cup of iced water

Directions:

Mix dry ingredients together. Break butter into flour with a pastry cutter or by rubbing with your fingertips until butter is roughly the size of a pea. Add water in small amounts and toss until ingredients just barely come together to form a ball. Do not over water. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour (can be made the day before). Roll dough into a circle and place in an 11 inch pie tin. Roll the edges to fit on the lip of the tin. Refrigerate for at least 15 minutes before crimping the edges. Refrigerate for another 15 minutes before immediate use, or freeze for up to 3 months.