The phrase ‘as American as apple pie’ came about in the early 1900s, but this symbol of America has been around since the 1600s. Traditionally, it’s only made with apples, but we added berries to cut the sweetness of the caramel.
Ingredients (serves 6)
• 2½ cups flour, plus extra for dusting
• ½t salt
• 230g cold unsalted butter, in 1cm cubes
• 6T ice-cold water (more if needed)
• 3 large Granny Smith apples, peeled and thinly sliced
• 2 lemons, juiced
• 4T brown sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 1 cup raspberries
• ½t cinnamon
• ¼t nutmeg
• 3T fl our
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1t vanilla essence
• 1 cup cream, whipped
Caramel sauce
• ½ cup sugar
• 2T water
• 58g salted butter, cubed
• ¼ cup cream
• 1t coarse sea salt
• 2T honey
Method
Place flour and salt in a bowl and mix in butter with your fingertips, until it resembles crumbs.
Make a well in the centre, pour in three tablespoons of ice water and mix well until a dough forms.
On a floured surface, gently knead dough into a ball.
Wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate for an hour.
Make the caramel sauce by stirring sugar and water together in a saucepan on medium heat until the sugar dissolves, then add butter and cook, stirring, until the sauce is copperbrown and bubbling.
Carefully whisk in cream and mix until combined – it will have large bubbles. Add salt and honey and mix well, then remove from the heat.
Toss apple slices in a bowl with lemon juice and sugar, and leave to stand for 10 minutes.
Add berries, spices and flour, making sure the apples are well coated.
Preheat oven to 200˚C. On a floured surface, divide dough into two and roll each piece into a 28cm diameter round. Place one in the base of a 22cm pie dish and crimp the edges.
(Set aside the other round for the lattice topping.)
Spread three tablespoons of caramel sauce over pastry and bake for five minutes.
Spoon the apple-berry filling onto the baked pie base, and top with leftover caramel sauce.
Create the lattice on top of the pie (see box, above left), brush with beaten egg and lightly sprinkle with sugar.
Bake for 35 minutes until pastry is golden and the filling is bubbling around the edges.
Stir vanilla essence into whipped cream, and serve dollops of it with the pie.
Making the lattice
• Cut a 28cm round of pastry into 12 strips, each 2cm wide.
• Place six strips in rows on top of the pie.
• Pull back every second strip halfway and lay down the other six pastry strips to create the ‘woven’ effect.
• Press the edges of the strips down so that they don’t shrink during baking.
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