Apple Pie
By the Tapas kitchen · Updated
- Prep
- 45 min
- Cook
- 1 hr 20 min
- Rest
- 5 hr
- Total
- 7 hr 5 min
- Yield
- Serves 8
While the dough chills, the apples sit in sugar for an hour, and the juice they give up is boiled down to a syrup and poured back in. Boiling it separately means no gap under the top crust and no puddle on the plate. Bake until the juice bubbles slowly and thickly at the slits, then give the pie 4 hours on a rack so the filling sets before you cut it.
Ingredients
Serves 8
For the crust
For the filling
For the top
The salt amounts here are for Diamond Crystal kosher salt. If you have Morton kosher salt, use a little over half as much, because its grains are denser and saltier by the spoon.
Steps
- For the crust, whisk the flour, sugar and salt in a large bowl. Toss in the butter and press the cubes between your fingertips into flat flakes, until the largest pieces are the size of peas and some are bigger. Drizzle in about two-thirds of the ice water and toss with a fork; squeeze a handful, and if it holds together without crumbling, stop. Otherwise add water a spoonful at a time.
- Divide the dough into two pieces, one slightly larger, press each into a flat disc, wrap, and refrigerate at least 1 hour, or up to 3 days.
- While the dough chills, peel and core the apples and slice them a scant ¼ inch thick. Toss them in a large bowl with the brown sugar, granulated sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, salt and lemon juice. Leave them at room temperature for as long as the dough chills, tossing once or twice; they will release a lot of juice.
- Tip the apples into a colander set over a bowl and let them drain for a few minutes. Pour the juice into a small saucepan with the butter and boil it until it has reduced by about half and turned thick and syrupy, 5 to 8 minutes. Toss the drained apples with the cornstarch, then pour the hot syrup over and toss again.
- Set a rack in the lowest position with a sheet pan on it and heat the oven to 425°F. On a floured counter, roll the larger disc into a 13-inch circle and ease it into a standard 9-inch pie plate without stretching it. Pile in the apples, mounding them in the center, and scrape in every bit of syrup.
- Roll the second disc into a 12-inch circle and lay it over the apples. Trim both crusts to a ½-inch overhang, fold the edge under itself, and crimp. Cut four slits in the top, brush it with the cream, and sprinkle with the turbinado sugar. Chill the pie for 15 minutes while the oven finishes heating, so the butter is cold when it goes in and the crust bakes up flaky.
- Bake on the hot sheet pan for 20 minutes, then turn the oven to 375°F and bake until the crust is deep golden brown and the juice bubbles slowly and thickly through the slits, 45 to 55 minutes more. A thermometer pushed through a slit into the filling should read at least 200°F; below that the cornstarch hasn't thickened. If the edges brown too fast, cover them with strips of foil.
- Cool the pie on a rack for at least 4 hours before cutting, so the filling sets.
Notes
Baked pie keeps loosely covered at room temperature for 2 days or in the fridge for 5. The dough discs freeze for 3 months; thaw them overnight in the fridge. To freeze the whole pie unbaked, skip the cream and sugar, wrap well, and bake from frozen, adding 15 to 20 minutes. If you use store-bought crust, you'll need two rounds.
To make more or less of it, paste the ingredients into our recipe scaler and it works out every amount. If you don't have a kitchen scale, the grams to cups converter turns these weights into cups and spoons.
