Tag Archives: pie for Valentine’s Day

Sour Cream Apple Pie

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What a sweetheart of a pie! Thin slices of apples are enveloped by creamy, delicately flavored custard. Sour cream makes it slightly tangy, contrasting with the sweet, crunchy cinnamon streusel topping.

I don’t remember where I got this recipe, but I know I’ve been making it for at least thirty years—and I don’t even like apple pie.

At least, I don’t like the kind with sticky, sugary, gooey filling that has so much cinnamon in it you can’t even taste the apples. Pies were not served in my household when I was growing up (with the exception of pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving), so the closest thing I remember was that nasty apple dessert in the TV dinners. Oh, and Hostess fruit pies. (I ate the glazed pastry and discarded the fruit filling.)

I’m sure there are good traditional apple pies out there. Your grandma probably makes a beauty! But give me this sour cream version any day.

The type of apples you use can make a big difference. I put some Granny Smith apples in this pie, but wasn’t crazy about how firm the apples were. If you want to use them, try steaming or simmering them briefly before adding to the sour cream mixture. If you have access to Honeycrisp, they’re wonderful in pie. Braeburn and Golden Delicious are very good too.

My recipe makes enough filling for a large deep-dish pie. If you are using a standard pie pan, you’ll have filling left over. You can bake it in lightly buttered ramekins, topping each with streusel mixture. (Make another half batch of streusel, if necessary.) Or you can toss in another cup of apple slices and make two pies.

Sour Cream Apple Pie
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Author:
Makes one large deep-dish pie.
Ingredients
  • PIE CRUST:
  • 2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup shortening, chilled
  • ¼ cup milk
  • 1 tablespoon vodka (or vinegar, if preferred)
  • PIE FILLING:
  • 1½ cups sour cream
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla
  • ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
  • ½ teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 3 tablespoons flour
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 6 cups thinly sliced apples (best: Honeycrisp, Braeburn, Golden Delicious. A mixture is good!)
  • CINNAMON STREUSEL TOPPING:
  • ½ cup granulated sugar
  • ⅓ cup flour
  • 2 teaspoons cinnamon (reduce if you want a light-colored topping)
  • Pinch of salt
  • ¼ cup butter, melted
Instructions
  1. PIE CRUST: Combine flour and salt in a medium bowl. Cut in shortening until it looks like coarse crumbs.
  2. Mix milk and vodka (or vinegar) together and pour all at once into flour mixture. Toss lightly with a fork just until it forms a ball.
  3. Roll out between two sheets of parchment, lightly dusted with flour.. Roll from the center out, Remove top sheet of parchment. Lay pie pan upside down on dough. With a pastry cutter or sharp knife, cut a circle of dough at least 1½ inch bigger than the pan, all the way around. Place pan right side up and move dough to pan, carefully easing it in. (Hint: slide a flat baking sheet under the parchment. Gently place the pie pan upside down, centered on top of the dough. With one hand on the pie pan and one under the baking sheet, flip it all over. So easy!)
  4. Fold excess dough under and crimp or flute the edges. Place in the refrigerator to stay cool.
  5. PIE FILLING: In a large bowl, stir together the sour cream, eggs, vanilla, nutmeg, and cinnamon until well combined..
  6. Stir in the sugar, flour, and salt.
  7. Heat oven to 400 F.
  8. Peel and quarter apples. (Approximately 4 large apples or 6 medium). Remove the cores and slice thin—less than ¼ inch. When you have about 6 cups, stir into sour cream mixture.
  9. Remove pie pan from refrigerator and pour apple filling into crust, all the way to the top.
  10. Place pan in the oven with a baking sheet on the rack below, just in case of drips. Bake for 15 minutes. Without opening oven, reduce heat to 350 F and bake for an additional 45 minutes.
  11. CINNAMON STREUSEL TOPPING: Combine sugar, flour, cinnamon, melted butter and salt.
  12. Remove pie from oven and crumble the topping over it, covering the entire surface. (Add piecrust cutouts here, if desired.)
  13. Return pie to oven and bake for an additional 20-25 minutes, or until crust is light brown and topping is firm.
  14. Allow pie to cool on a rack until just barely warm. Wonderful when topped with vanilla ice cream!
  15. Store covered in the refrigerator.
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Adding a little vodka (or vinegar) to the liquid makes a flakier pie crust.

Work the shortening into the flour mixture, using a pastry blender. Cold fingers work, too.

Add liquid and toss lightly with a fork until dough can be gathered into a ball.

Ease the dough into the pan, folding over edge and crimping.

Slice the apples thin (less than 1/4 inch), especially if you’re using Granny Smiths; they take forever to get soft! Stir into sour cream mixture.

Fill up that pie! The filling will puff up in the oven, but I’ve never had it drip. Just in case, put a baking sheet on the rack under it. (This will still allow air flow.)

After an hour of baking, remove pie and add topping. (I added some Valentine’s Day hearts too.) Return to oven until crust is toasty brown and topping is firm.

I made an extra half batch of dough and filled these cutouts with cinnamon sugar and sprinkles.

Baked! Let it cool until it’s JUST warm enough to melt vanilla ice cream.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Hope it’s sweet.

Peanut Butter Pie Crust – and Chocolate Pie!

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A peanut butter and banana sandwich is one of my very favorite comfort foods. And, of course, the combination of peanut butter and chocolate makes me very, very happy; my favorite candy bars fall in this category. So when The Man suggested I try adding peanut butter to my pie crust, it only took me seconds to get on board with that. Banana pie. Chocolate pie. A match made in heaven!

I had qualms about how the peanut butter would affect my crust, but my concerns about texture were unfounded. The pie crust, though slightly less flaky than my favorite recipe, didn’t turn out heavy or tough as I’d feared. It was actually, well, perfect. I don’t use that word lightly because I tend to tinker with things until I’m satisfied, but I wouldn’t change one thing about this crust – and was tickled with it on my very first attempt.

So I’ll just amuse myself by considering all of the possibilities this crust offers. And believe me, I have a whole list of interesting recipes waiting for their turn in the limelight. For now, I’ll concentrate on pies. Specifically, chocolate cream pie. In this post, I’ll give you the recipe I used for my chocolate pie, and in a future post you’ll get this:

Coming soon: Banana Cream Pie with Peanut Butter Crust

The pie crust itself is very easy to work with. I had no problem at all fashioning some of it into roses, leaves, hearts, stars, and even holly. With a cookie cutter or press, you can easily customize for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Valentine’s Day.


Peanut Butter Pie Crust - and Chocolate Pie!
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This pie crust recipe makes enough for two deep-dish crusts or 1 generous crust and enough left to use for designing pie decorations. The dough can be frozen for later use.
Ingredients
  • CRUST:
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon brown sugar
  • ½ cup creamy peanut butter, chilled (not old-fashioned)
  • ½ cup shortening, chilled
  • ¼ cup buttermilk
  • 1 tablespoon vodka or vinegar
  • ¼ cup chopped chocolate, or semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • Finely chopped peanuts (optional)
  • FILLING:
  • 1 cup sugar
  • ¼ cup cornstarch
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon powdered espresso
  • 3 cups whole milk
  • 4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
  • 4 egg yolks
  • ¼ teaspoon vanilla
  • ¼ cup butter
  • Decorations (optional): whipped cream, chopped peanuts, shaved chocolate, pastry crust cutouts.
Instructions
  1. Heat oven to 375 F.
  2. Make crust: In a medium bowl, combine flour, salt, and brown sugar.
  3. With a pastry blender, work the peanut butter and shortening into the dry ingredients until well combined. There should be no large lumps.
  4. In a small bowl, combine buttermilk and vodka (or vinegar). Pour into dry ingredients and stir just until combined. Dough should not be too crumbly. If it is, drizzle in a tiny bit of water and combine.
  5. Divide dough into two pieces. One will be for the pie crust and the other will be for cut-out decorations if desired. (Hint: for ease of rolling, make the piece you will use for crust a little larger than the one for decorating.) If you don’t want to make decorations, divide into two equal pieces and freeze the other half for another time.
  6. Dust one piece of dough lightly with flour, place between two pieces of parchment, and roll out evenly until larger than the diameter of your pie pan, all the way around. Remove the top piece of parchment, place the pie pan upside down on the dough, and cut a circle at least 1 inch bigger than the pan, all the way around Remove scraps.
  7. Slide a flat baking sheet or large piece of cardboard under the bottom parchment and flip the pan, dough, and parchment over in one movement. Remove baking sheet and carefully remove parchment. Ease the dough into the pie pan, roll edges under, and crimp the edges.
  8. Line with foil and fill half way with dry beans, pie weights, or sugar. Bake for 20 minutes.
  9. Take crust from oven and gently remove foil and weights. Poke crust all over with a fork and return to oven. Turn heat down to 350 F. and bake for an additional 15 minutes, or until crust is golden brown.
  10. Remove crust from oven and place on cooling rack. Sprinkle with ¼ cup chopped chocolate and let it sit for 5-10 minutes, melting the chocolate. Spread over bottom of the crust and sprinkle with nuts if desired.
  11. Remaining dough can be used to make cutout designs for the pie or can be wrapped well and frozen.
  12. Make filling: In a small bowl, whisk together egg yolks. Set aside.
  13. In a large saucepan, whisk together sugar, cornstarch, salt, espresso powder, milk, and unsweetened chocolate.Cook at medium-high heat, stirring constantly until mixture begins to boil.
  14. Turn heat down to medium and continue cooking for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Adjust heat as necessary to keep the mixture at a low boil.
  15. Add about ½ cup of the mixture into egg yolks and whisk together. Pour egg mixture into the pan, stir well, and return to low boil. Continue to stir and cook for 2 additional minutes. Remove from heat.
  16. Stir in vanilla and butter until the filling is smooth. Pour into the pie shell and let the pie cool. Cover with plastic wrap and chill for 4-6 hours.
  17. Serve with whipped cream, a sprinkle of chopped peanuts, and shaved chocolate if desired.
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Of course, you could also make an easy chocolate pudding filling. It’s not quite as good, but in all honesty, this recipe is all about the crust!

Work peanut butter and shortening into dry ingredients with pastry blender

Add liquids and stir just until dough holds together.

Roll out between pieces of parchment

Place dough in pan and flute edges. (Or use a pan that does it for you!)

Bake 20 minutes. Remove pie weights and poke holes with fork. Back in the oven!

Bake 15 more minutes. Move to rack. Add chocolate (chopped or chips) and let it melt.

Spread.

Sprinkle with chopped peanuts if desired.

Whisk eggs, set aside. Cook filling.

Pour a small amount of hot filling into egg yolks. Whisk and return to the pan.

Stir in butter and vanilla, then pour into crust and cool. Refrigerate 4-6 hours

Jazz the pie up however you wish, right before serving.

I suggest you make extra crust and freeze it, because I have some fun ideas coming your way!

Lorinda