My My Apple Pie

Hello Fellow Food Lovers,

I think we can all agree that pie has become a staple part of the "American Dream" culture. Apple pie in particular, while not originally from the United States, has still become a culinary icon of the U.S. For many families, it symbolizes important holidays such as Thanksgiving and July 4th.

Apple...Mac...get it?!

Anyways, in my family, pie isn't just a delectable treat, it represents the very essence of what my family considers important: food and spending time together. It is a ritual and a symbol. What do I mean by this? Since I can remember, we've baked pies together--blackberry pies in late august, pecan and yam pies for Thanksgiving, apple pies when the apple tree bloomed in the fall, and strawberry rhubarb pies for my mom's birthday. We even served blackberry pie at my sister's wedding a few years ago. Like many families out there, pie represents the ritual of the family coming together for holidays and special occasions, as something everyone can participate in for its creation, and eventually for everyone to enjoy.

Actually, since I'd like to dedicate this blog entry to my family, here's a little family photo back in the Croatian homeland. Here's to you, Blumraks!

So then, like my mother did for me, I want to pass on this very easy pie recipe. I think making a pie from scratch (including the crust) can be very daunting for people, and pie crusts often turn out not how we had hoped. In the tradition of passing on recipes and tricks of the trade to the next generation, I pass on to you my family's awesome apple pie recipe and secrets you can use to make any pie delicious.

This pie most closely resembles the original Dutch apple pie style, which includes cinnamon and sugar in the filling, and a lattice crust. Other styles include Swedish (which has no crust), English (which is more a pudding including raisins and figs and other scrumptables--new word I made up), and French (which is more of a tart). I warn you--this entry is a bit longer than the rest, but it's because I go into great detail about the preparation to make sure you know every step and every trick. The length doesn't mean it's difficult or that it takes awhile!

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

First, start with the insides. This way, you can let whatever you mixed in marinate and blend together (the berries with the sugar, or in this case, the apples with the cinnamon and nutmeg).

Here's what ya need:

• 6 cups apples, peeled and sliced--Granny smith apples have proven to be good for this
• 2 Tbs tapioca
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• A dash of nutmeg for good measure... Sometimes I even like to sprinkle some in my hair when I've had a rough week. What do you think holds it up?

Now mix these ingredients together. You know what my favorite thing about this recipe is? Almost all baking recipes require you to be so exact. Mix the dry ingredients. Then mix the wet ingredients. But oops! don't put in the butter before the egg or it will mix with the gluten in the flour too early..blah blah blah. It's too precise for my liking. But apple pie is different. Here are the ingredients. Mix 'em. Done. Or should I say afgelopen in Dutch?

Let these insides marinate and the tapioca to absorb all the juices. P.S. tapioca is great for all fruit pies--especially berry pies--because it soaks up the extra juices so your pie crust doesn't get soggy.

Now turn to your pie dough. For apple pie, I double this pie recipe so that I have the bottom shell and extra dough to lay over the top, either to make a lattice design or a sheet with cut out little apples.

Here's the recipe you can use for all pies (the bolded numbers are the doubled amounts for the apple pie):

• 1 1/2 cup flour --> Doubled= 3 cups
• 1/2 cup cold butter (or Crisco if you want to get really unhealthy but really delicious) --> 1 cup
• 1/4 tsp salt --> 1/2 tsp
• 1 tsp sugar --> 2 tsp
• 4 Tbs cold water (with ice cubes) --> 1/2 cup
• At least one cup shredded cheddar cheese (this is just for apple pie)

Now caution! This unfortunately, but highly necessary, is one of those recipes that you MUST mix the dry and wet ingredients separately first. And it is very important to keep the butter and the water cold, as these will determine how flaky your crust is (and believe me flaky is good).

So, mix flour, salt, and sugar.

If you have a pastry blender, great! You're life will be easier. If not, take the cold butter, take two sharp small cutting knives, and cut the butter into the flour, salt, and sugar. You know you're done when the butter has been evenly distributed throughout the dry mixture into very small little round balls (like smaller than the fingerprint of your pointer finger). The best chopping technique I found is to hold a knife in each hand, put the knives into the mixture with the points down, and sharp edges pointing away from each other. Then cross the knives and pull part. You can get going really fast at this and you will protect yourself from harm. You might find this ridiculous, but being a poor college student as I was all summer, this is what I did instead of buying a pastry cutter. And believe me, there is no way of getting around this step--cold butter is the most important thing!

For this apple pie,  I decided to put some cheddar cheese in the dough so that when it baked, the cheddar cheese was already baked in with it. Cheddar cheese and apple go together like...well you would be surprised, I promise! Use how ever much or little cheese as you like to your taste, but again, I would start with at least 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese mixed in. You're gonna find yourself wanting more.

Now add the cold water and continue to cut butter into dry mixture. Add cold water as needed (but try not adding too much as it will mess with the consistency. At a certain point, you're gonna say the hell with it, throw down the knives, and just get in there with your hands like grandma used to. Knead and grab the dough until it starts sticking to itself. Then, divide the dough into two even round balls.

Roll the first ball out onto a floured surface (either with a pastry roller or an empty/full-unopened wine bottle--I swear you can find cheap alternatives for anything in the kitchen). Roll the dough out until it covers your approximately 9 inch pie plate. You're gonna want it so that the dough falls into the plate with excess falling over the sides. Now take a sharp knife, and cut around the plate, cutting off the excess dough hanging off. If there are any holes or tears (which is expected) use this extra pie dough to cover them up, attaching with a dab of cold water. (No one will notice once its baked).

Now put in your filling.

Taking the other ball of dough, roll that out as well until it's big enough to cover the top of your pie. Once you have that, lay it over, cut off the excess all around, and fold the sides of the bottom shell over the top shell around the whole circle. Next, I like to take a fork and press in around the sides of the whole circle to make a nice design. Lastly, I cut an apple design in the top--this both looks nice, and allows hot steam to escape during the cooking process.  You can add whatever design you like, but make sure to poke some holes in the top to allow for this extra heat to escape.

Now your preparation is complete! All-in-all, this part only took me one hour. It's one of the easier, faster pies to make. Unless you're picking the apples yourself...

Put in the oven and bake for 10 minutes at 400 degrees.


Then bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees.


These times aren't exact, so just check often and you'll know it's done when the crust turns a light golden brown!

P.S. There is usually extra dough, so I like to roll out whatever is left, sprinkle some cinnamon sugar and roll into a log. Then I chop this into 1/2 inch thick cinnamon-sugar rolls and throw 'em in the oven with the pie for 8-10 minutes. You can munch on them while you wait for the pie!

P.P.S. For this pie, I had a LOT of extra dough so I decided to make a small apple-nut roll. I rolled out the excess dough, threw some left over chopped apples, some cinnamon, a handful of chopped pecans, and rolled it up like a log. I threw the log in and then chopped it up after taking it out of the oven.

Voila! Take out of the oven and enjoy. Hog it for yourself to enjoy or share it with friends and family.

Love & Doughnuts,

The Mrakulous Kitchen

{fah-HEE-tah}. Or {fah-JAI-tah} if you're trying to mess with the waitress at your local Mexican restaurant

Dear Fellow Food Lovers,

I'm sorry for my 2-week hiatus. It was due to a combination of spring break and allergy season in the 'Springs. But alas, I start my return back to the blogging world with your good 'ol traditional fajitas.

Fajita. The fajita originally comes from the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, where during roundups, cowboys would butcher the cows to feed all the workers. The throw-away meat (e.g. hide, stomach, entrails, and skirt steak) was given to the vaqueros or "Mexican cowboys", who unfortunately, given the sentiments of the time, were not seen as equals to the white cowboys. But alas, they managed to make something delicious out of it, including the popular menudo you see in many street tacos, tripe, fajitas, and other such popular Mexican and Tex-Mex cuisine.

So if it's just leftover meat, why do we pay $18 for fajitas at Jose Muldoon's when we can make better one's at home! They are  simple and easy to put together on the spot, and great for big crowds. Not to mention that they are delicious!

To start, I made guacamole. Now this is not a necessary item to make for fajitas, but homemade guacamole is always a treat. For the guac I used these ingredients:

• 4 avocados (this made enough guacamole for two people's dinners, and 6 friends to "taste", i.e. inhale, and there was still some leftover)
• 1 small white onion (by small I mean touch your pointer finger to your thumb and its the size of the circle that makes)
• 1 lime
• A small heap of cilantro (I would say about 2 cups in total, but I edge on the larger portion of cilantro)
• 3 roma tomatoes
• Salt (to taste)
• Pepper
• 1 large spoonful of Cumin (remember our friend cumin from my first blog entry?)
• Paprika (mainly for a nice decoration on top)

Now blend the avocados, 2 of the tomatoes, some of the cilantro and cumin in a blender. This will give your guacamole a creamy, milky texture. Now this step is not necessary, but I found that smashing the avocado took a lot of time and left the guacamole chunkier than I like.

Here is a visual comparison: the one on top was not made with a blender, and the one on the bottom was. They are both delicious, it's just a matter of preference--but they will definitely taste different!

 

After blending, mix in the last tomato diced into small pieces, the rest of the cilantro, the diced onion, a squeeze of lime, salt, pepper, and paprika on top. Mixing in these last ingredients as diced rather than blended will give your guacamole a nice appearance of red, white, and green colors (yay Mexican flag). They also add some firmer texture to the smooth creamy blend you have just prepared. Alright now guacamole done! Either snack on it with Tostitos while you make the fajitas, or put in the fridge for later consumption.

Now to the fajitas. I had two more of the small white onions so I chopped those up, along with one red bell pepper. I threw them in a pan along with about 3-4 tablespoons of butter. I start with these first because they take the longest to cook. Make sure to keep stirring, as the onions and bell peppers will burn easily and need to be moved around every minute or so. These cooked for about 15-20 minutes on medium heat. You'll know its ready when the onions turn a tan color and have a sweet taste to them (and they'll smell fantastic).

In between stirring the onions and bell pepper, I took the tortillas and placed them on a plate in the oven, set at 250 degrees F. Next, I began cooking the meat in a separate pan.

I first started cooking already chopped up beef I bought at the grocery store. The beef was labeled for stirfry, so I figured that would work for fajitas as well. WRONG. This beef was rubbery and tasteless. It tasted like day-old cheap Chinese beef, the kind that has a grayish color and takes forever to chew. No matter what spices I put in this beef, the texture and taste were awful. So, for the future, do NOT buy stirfry beef at the grocery store! Try to find skirt steak, beef labeled for fajitas, or just get thinly sliced cuts of beef, cook, and dice 'em yourself.

But! Do not fret about my fajitas. I had a package of already diced grilled chicken that I threw in the pan once discarding the beef. This chicken was already cooked and thus only took 4 minutes to heat up. I threw in a few tablespoons of butter, some pieces of cilantro, and some Mexican chile seasoning that included oregano, cumin, salt, chile pepper, and onion, and lastly a squeeze of lime. Stir, and it's ready!

Now each person takes out a warm tortilla from the oven, throws on some of that fabulous guacamole you made, a dollop of sour cream, the bell peppers and onions, a couple pieces of chicken, and Buen provecho (meaning to enjoy your meal)!

In total, the onions, bell peppers, and chicken made four well-stuffed fajitas. You also have the option of adding in shredded cheese, salsa, and rice and beans. I also considered making a corn-mango-cilantro-lime salsa that would have added an interesting sweet taste to the mix, but my mangos were frozen and would have taken too long to unfreeze. But, it's an idea for the future!

All-in-all, the guacamole took about 30-40 minutes to make (the chopping and the picking of the cilantro took the most time). Making the bell peppers and onions took about 20 minutes. And the meat, if already cooked, only takes 5 minutes, and if uncooked only takes about 10. If you're trying to use uncooked skirt steak (which I would suggest in honor of the original vaqueros who ate them) it will cook faster than if you were cooking a T-bone or rib-eye. In total, that gives us an upper estimate of 1 hour 15 minutes in total to prepare and cook guacamole and fajitas. Not too bad, right?

No go and try fajitas my little vaqueritos/as. You'll be surprised how easy and delicious they'll be!

As always,
Love & Churros