Mini Apple Pies

Fall is here

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The last few days were chilly and rainy over here in the D, you can tell it's getting colder every day. An easy way to keep yourself warm while having a cup of coffee on the porch is putting on some weight, a fresh layer of fat instead of 2 sweaters. Apples pies will help with that.

Ingredients

for the pie crust:

• 1/2 cups flour;
• a pinch of salt;
• 1 stick butter;
• 3-5 tb. spoons ice water;
• 1 egg (for egg wash);
  I also used a seasoning called Winter Baking, I like to use it a lot when it comes to pies. I got it from Whole Foods, but you can essentially use everything that goes in it separately, or skip it all together. Here's what Winter Baking is made of: brown sugar, cinnamon, lemon zest, orange zest, allspice berries, cloves, vanilla bean, nutmeg.

for the pie filling:

• 1-1/2 cup diced apples (peeled and cored);
• 1 tb. spoon lemon juice;
• a handful of walnuts (optional);
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch;
• 1 tb. spoon ground cinnamon;
• 4 tb. spoons sugar;
• 1 teaspoon water;
• 1 tb. spoon butter.

Directions:

1. Mix together flour, salt and some Winter Baking spices (if you're using them). Grate in cold butter, if you happen to not have a cheese grater around, you can just finely chop it with a knife. Make a crumbly kind of dough, but don't knead it.
   Start adding ice water a little bit at a time just until you start noticing that the dough is coming together. You don't want it to thin either.
   Shape the dough into a ball and let chill in the fridge for an hour or overnight.

2. Mix diced apples with ground cinnamon, cornstarch and lemon juice, set aside.

3. Place sugar and 1 teaspoon of water in a saucepan and let the sugar melt and develop a light golden color, add in the butter and cook for about a minute or so.
   Let the mixture cool a bit and pour it over the apples, add in walnuts if you're using them.

4. Take the dough out of the fridge and let it rest for a few minutes. For this amount of ingredients I was able to make three little pies (about 5 inches in diameter), but feel free to make 1 larger pies, or 2 small ones, you do you, in other words :).

5. Roll out the dough, put the filling in and assemble your pies. Move the pies into your freezer while you're waiting on your oven to get heated.

6. Preheat the oven to 380-400 F, apply the egg wash to your pies and sprinkle a bit of sugar on top. Bake the pies for approximately 25-30 minutes.

The images were taken with a Canon EOS 5D Mark III and a Canon EF - 24-105mm - F/4 lens.

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