Taking the apple pie to heights never before seen!

Man, this truly almost became a pie-in-the-sky project! I’ve been thinking of apples and how to use them in the Royal Selangor Jellyriffic Challenge and as Nate hinted at in yesterday’s Mulled Apple Cider Konnyaku post, this was supposed to be part of that post.

Why wasn’t it part of the post? Well, obviously there were some hiccups so we had to problem-solve the issues and thankfully, it all worked out and here it is now today. Better late than never!

Think Outside the Cone

I absolutely love pies and wish there were pie shops here in Kuching. We Malaysians love dessert and yet, I feel that pies have not really caught on here whereas in the US, you will find pies sold everywhere! I especially miss good fruit pies like apple pies, blueberry pies, fresh strawberry cream pie to name a few. What do you do when you can’t get them here? Well, make them yourself I guess!

And I have. Especially with apple pies (because thankfully, we can buy apples here for a reasonable price whereas berries are just way too prohibitive in price to consider making into pies). So far, I’ve experimented with four different pie recipes and am still on the lookout for the best one.

For today’s post, I had to think outside the cone to bake the crust and the filling since the Royal Selangor Jelly Mould cannot be used in baking.

The base was made by cutting a circle of pie crust that was wider than the base of the mould and folded around to get a higher edge. I still wanted to create a lattice top for my apple pie so what I did was to crumple up some aluminium foil inside the mould to get the shape of the mould.

Then I wrapped some parchment on the outside of the mould and stapled it. This I slipped on top of the moulded foil. I made two of them so that I could bake two pies.

Apple Pie-in-the-Sky Crust Recipe

adapted from The Best Recipe
Prep time: 1 hr / Total time: 4 hrs
Ingredients
(makes 2 pies for the Royal Selangor moulds with leftovers for some turnovers and another Banana Cream Pie)

12.5 oz all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting dough and work surface
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp sugar
12 Tbsp unsalted butter, chilled, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
5 Tbsp all vegetable shortening, chilled
6-8 Tbsp ice water

Method:

1. Mix flour, salt and sugar in a bowl. Scatter butter and shortening pieces over the flour mixture, and rub it in with your fingers until it resembles coarse, sandy meal. You should not have any butter pieces that are bigger than a pea.

2. Sprinkle 6 Tablespoons ice water over mixture. Fold the water in quickly to the mixture using a spatula until the dough just comes together. If the dough is not coming together, add the remaining water. Divide dough into two balls and flatten each into 4-inch-wide disk. Dust disks lightly with flour, wrap each in plastic, and refrigerate at least 30 minutes, or up to 2 days, before rolling.

3. Sprinkle some flour unto your work surface (adding more as necessary). *Roll one disk out (save the other for another open faced pie), starting from the center of the disk and working your rolling pin outwards, until you get about an even 1/8 inch thickness. Using your Royal Selangor Jelly Mould as a guide, cut out two bases which are about 1/2 inch wider than the mould base. Fold the outer layers in to form a double layered wall around the circle. For the lattice tops, cut out 12 strips of dough (long enough to drape from one side to the other over the top of the mould). Lay three strips on each parchment mould replica to form the vertical lines. Lifting alternate strips of the vertical dough, use a short strip to create the first horizontal circle at the top (joining the ends together). For the second horizontal layer, lift the alternate vertical strips to create a weave design. Finish by laying the last longest horizontal circle near the base, again lifting the first set of vertical strips. Repeat with the second mould.

4. Preheat the oven to 210 C or 425 F. Brush the lattice dough with an egg wash mixture to give it some shine. Weigh down the base doughs with some heavy duty foil (and some pie weights if you have them). Bake for 12 minutes, then remove the foil and bake for another 5 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from oven and cool before assembling the pies.

*I find that when making a regular pie crust, rolling out the dough between two plastic wraps is best as you don’t need to use too much flour (which will make the dough less flaky). This also helps to ease transferring the dough to your pie plate when you’re making pie crust—just remove the top plastic, pick up the dough with the bottom plastic wrap attached, flip over on to your pie plate and remove the bottom plastic.