Basic Pastry Dough (p. 781), Sour Cream Apple Pie (pp. 772, 773)

Pie crust - It always seemed like some mercurial process that could go off the rails at any point. Confession: I've never made a pie from scratch.The reality is, it isn't difficult as long as you follow a few guidelines.

Meez:

Chopped apples in mildly acidulated water (splash of apple cider vinegar)

Pie crust (in wax paper, more on this later)

Didn't get a shot of the sour cream mix or the crumble mix.

Procedure:

To make a piecrust, the book recommends using a food processor. At this point, I don't own one, with the exception of a little 3 cup job that came w/my blender. So I blend and cut fat into doughs by hand. So do this until you get pea-sized lumps. Work in some icewater. Divide the dough into 4 pieces and smear it to distribute the fat. Flatten into a disc and chill.
Roll out the dough until you have a 13-inch round. I roll my dough between 2 sheets of wax paper, a trick I picked up from my mother. This allows you to get a thin dough without worrying about a floured surface and rolling pin. Place this dough into a pie plate, trim it up and chill it.

Make up the sour cream mix. Eggs, sour cream, vanilla, sugar, flour, nutmeg, and salt.
Core and cut up a pound of apples. I did this earlier and rested them in acidulated water so there wouldn't be any unsightly brownage. I went with Golden Delicious apples (instead of the recommended Granny Smiths) I picked up from the Floyd County Harvest Festival. The nice ladies attending the booth assured me they'd be just fine for a pie. They were right.
Arrange your apple slices in your chilled piecrust and then pour the sour cream mix over it. Put it in the oven for 15 min. @ 400. Reduce to 350 and bake for about 45 - 50 min. While this is going on you want to assemble your crumble mix, which is 1/3 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1 tsp cinnamon, a pinch of salt, and 1/2 stick butter. Blend together with your hands until you get small clumps. I blended it a bit long and wound up with a smooth paste. I chilled the paste and then ran a fork through it to make bits and pieces, which I then topped the hot browned pie with and baked for a futher 10 minutes at 400. I cooled it for about an hour.

Sour Cream Apple Pie, fresh out of the oven.

So, how was it?

The short version:

a hot mess.

It fell apart a bit. I served it with some vanilla ice cream.

The crust was crumbly and tender, probably too crumbly. I don't know if this was due to a lack of blind baking or just me not working the dough enough.

What did you learn?

Cut this pie with a sharp knife. The apple chunks will make your slices uneven if you use something with a dull edge. Also, in the future, I'll try using alcohol instead of cold water to blend into my pastry. I think either Cooks Illustrated or Harold McGee recommend this. I have some good apple brandy I'd use for another apple pie.

Recommend it?

Yeah, the sour cream mix really added a nice tang to the apple flavors. It's a bit like the mixture in a danish, except less thick.