Thanksgivingworthy Apple Pie

Apple pie is a Thanksgiving staple in my book. Although I'm an expert at eating them, I'm not an expert at baking them, yet. Emily was with me on Saturday night and walked me through this recipe because she clearly possesses superior baking skills and she's also admitted to making mini versions of this for herself from time to time, check it out here. Why did we make an apple pie a whole week before Thanksgiving? Because we can, that's why.

I was also interested to try baking a pie in a cast iron skillet, so I used this recipe from Food52 with three components of crust, filling and crumb perfection. I was unaware that using cast iron pans is good from a natural health standpoint. Besides being versatile, non-stick and great heat conductors, using cast iron pans regularly will actually boost your iron intake, and uses less water to clean up. 

My friend Lucy, a pastry school graduate, made a phenomenal quiche this summer. Her secret, she revealed, was replacing half the amount of water in the crust dough with vodka. The vodka evaporates much quicker with no residual flavor, leaving the crust extra flaky and delicious. It was so good I wanted to try her method with this pie.

Skillet Apple Crumb Pie 

Food52

For the Crust:

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

3/4 teaspoons salt
16 tablespoons (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cold and cut into about 1/2-inch cubes
3 or 4 tablespoons of ice water

3 or 4 tablespoons of chilled vodka

For the Filling:
6 apples (I used 3 Granny Smith and 3 Honeycrisp)
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 lemon, juiced and zested
3/4 cups light brown sugar
pinch o' salt

For the Crumb Topping:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes

1. Start with the crust dough. Mix together the flour and salt in a large bowl. Add the butter and, working quickly with either your hands, two knives or a pastry cutter, work the butter into the dough until the pieces are roughly the size of peas. With a wooden spoon, stir in the ice water and chilled vodka, alternating just until the mixture comes together into a workable dough. Pour the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, and press into a round. Chill in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. In the meantime, you can prepare your pie filling and topping.
2. Rinse, peel, and de-core your apples. Then cut them into slices about 1/4-inch wide, and place them in a large mixing bowl. Add the flour, cinnamon, lemon juice and zest, brown sugar and salt and mix to combine.
3. In a medium-sized bowl, mix together the flour, both sugars, cinnamon and salt. Add the butter and work it into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse sand. Chill in the refrigerator until ready to use.
4. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
5. On a well-floured surface, roll your crust out to about 1/8-inch thick. Roll the dough onto your pin to transfer to your skillet, unroll, and lightly press into the edges. Trim the edges so they are flush with rim of the skillet. With our leftover bits we used a cookie cutter to add decor to the top.
6. Pour the apple filling into the dough shell. Top with the crumb topping, mounding the flour mixture in the middle and lightly packing it down over the apples.
7. Bake for about 30 minutes, until the top is golden brown, then reduce the heat to 350 degrees F and bake for another 40-45 minutes more, until the apples are tender when pierced with a knife. If the topping is browning too quickly, cover the pie with aluminum foil.
8. Let cool until warm or room temperature and serve with vanilla ice cream or lightly whipped cream.

This pie came out so well it didn't lose points for presentation when it slid apart on the plate into a pile of gooey goodness. The crust was buttery and flaky, the apples were the perfect duo of tart and sweet, and the crumb topping was the crunchy texture that brought it all together. My only regret was that we didn't have some ice cream for the top!

So the vodka pie crust was a great success. Now I wonder if I can get the same results with say, an amaretto or bourbon, that would leave a flavor behind. An experiment for another day.