Apple Pie!

There's something very comfort-food about apple pie, and none more so than this one. I think it's the little bit of custard powder and cornflour in the crust which gives it that bakery texture.

Australian Woman’s Weekly Cookbook Apple Pie Recipe

PASTRY
1.5 cups plain flour
.75 cups SR flour
.33 cup cornflour
.33 cup Custard powder
1 tablespoon sugar
185g butter
1egg yolk
.33 cup water
1 egg


FILLING
7 large ‘Granny Smith’ apples (really sharp green apples)
.5 cup water
3 tablespoons sugar
.5 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon lemon zest
I add a few cloves as well for a really exotic taste

2 tablespoons apricot jam

PASTRY: sift flour and custard powder into bowl and rub in butter and add sugar make well in centre and add egg yolk and enough water to mix to a firm dough and knead lightly cover and refrigerate for 1 hour (you can freeze it if you prefer, for pretty much as long as you need)roll out half pastry put in pie dish (28cm) and spread with apricot jam then fill with apple fillingroll out remaining pastry and brush edges with lightly beaten egg white and cover pie press edges together, trim, brush top with eggwhite and sprinkle with sugar and cut steam vents Bake in mod hot oven for 20 - 30 minutes.

FILLING filling peel quater and core apples cut up and put in a pan with water sugar cinnamon and zest cook for 5 mins or until just tender drain cool to room temp (take out the cloves and the peel before you fill the pie!).

Apple and Honey Cake

This recipe is adapted from a recipe in the the SMH, but it is on a little bit of paper without a date so I can't reference it properly. I made it in two loaf tins so that Sanjay can take one to work tomorrow and I can take the other to show off to Mothers' Group. I like this cake because it uses things that I often have hanging around the house so although this is the first time I've made it I can see it becoming a staple.

Apple and Honey Cake
Preheat oven to 180C and grease a 20cm cake tin (or two loaf tins).

Ingredients
3 eggs
100g caster sugar
70g honey
80g softened unsalted butter
300g sifted self-raising flour
1 level tsp ground cinnamon
3 apples, peeled and cored and cut into 1cm pieces (I used 300g of apple, after it was all prepared, which was 3.5 very small granny smith apples)

Method
Beat together the eggs, caster sugar and honey until the mixture is pale and fluffy. a Beat in the butter (it looked fabulous until I added the butter, but seemed to flatten and reduce dramatically in volume) then stir in the sifted flour, cinnamon and apple pieces.

Spoon the mixture, and it's a bit hard to deal with, being almost all apple, into the cake tin (I think it'll look better if I sprinkle a bit of demerera sugar on the top) bake for 40-45 minutes (test til a skewer comes out clean). Cool on a cake rack.

(Posted the day after baking, after I had a chance to sample and get feedback about it - my verdict is it was a little dry and a tiny bit more honey in the mix or some cream to serve it with might be nice)