Because I’m putting some effort into the presentation, I’m not making a top for the pies. I want the layers of sliced apple to be visible. If I happen to have enough dough left over, I might make a lattice for the apple pie, brush egg yolk on it, sprinkle sugar on top.
Because my oven is a piece of garbage, each pie will be on a silicone mat, and I’ll be ready to make and put a pie shield on just in case they start to brown. The baking time will be around 45-60 minutes, and I’ll be checking after 30. Golden brown crust, and bubbling from the apples is the usual way to check for doneness. Since today’s apple pie is made with slices, and not the pre-cooked filling version, I’m only checking based on the crust.
Same for the custard, but I will also test with a toothpick – it should come out fairly clean once the custard is set.
ALL THE BAKING IS DONE AT 425F !
Pie Crust
Ingredients
- 1 lb flour see #1 below
- 8 oz unsalted butter, cold, and cut into 1" cubes 2 sticks
- 1/2 tsp salt if using unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup ice cold water see #2 below
Instructions
- Place the flour, butter, and salt in a food procecssor, and pulse a few times, until the smallest pieces of butter are about the size of large peas.
- Slowly add 1 tbsp of water and pulse a few more times. Repeat until the dough starts to come together, but is still a little crumbly. The amount of water will vary a lot based on the flour you're using.
- Shape into a ball, cover with clingwrap, and let rest in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
Notes
- Measure the flour by weight, not volume (approx 4 cups).
- You might need up to 3/4 cup of cold water. The dough should hold its shape when you squeeze a small ball in your hand.
1 pie will be blind baked 15 with weights, 10-15 without, until light brown
3lbs of apple slices tossed in:
- 1/2 cup sugar (can do 50-50 brown and white)
- 1.5 tbsp cornstarch
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp ground ginger
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
Pour in any juice from the bowl with the spice mix.
Brush with 2 tbsp melted butter & 2 tbso boiled cider/applejuice
Bake at 425 for approx 10 minutes, until golden brown
Other pie will not be blind baked. 1.5 lbs of peach slices lining the bottom, topped with a custard (creme brulee because I said so – recipe below, I’m pouring the custard on the peach slices before I pop it in the oven), and I’ll pour some caramel on top when it’s all done, which is the other way to make the crispy sugar topping for creme brulee.
I’m also going to demonstrate torching sugar for creme brulee.
The third way get the caramelized sugar on creme brulee is to sprinkle sugar on top of the ramekins, then broil it. I feel this is the worst of the 3 methods
Creme Brulee (+ Keto)
Ingredients
- 4 egg yolks
- 2 cup heavy whipping cream
- 4 tbsp sugar See #1 below for keto
- 1 tsp vanilla extract or 1/2 scraped vanilla bean
- 1 pinch salt
- 4 tbsp turbinado sugar, "sugar in the raw", or just regular white sugar. See #1 below for keto
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300F.
- Cream yolks, sugar and vanilla until thick and creamy.
- Pour cream into saucepan on low heat, bring to just steaming (not boiling).
- Slowly pour cream into eggs while beating.
- Return mixture to clean saucepan (or use a double boiler with simmering water) until it coats the back of a spoon, approx 3 minutes,
- Immediately pour into shallow ramekins, or heat-proof dish.
- Place ramekins into a flat baking pan, and pour boiling water halfway up the side.
- Bake for 30 minutes or until set (slight jiggle).
- Remove from oven, remove from water bath, and let cool to room temperature.
- Refrigerate minimum 1 hour, preferably overnight.
- Sprinkle 1 tbsp turbinado in an even layer over each ramekin, and torch (or carefully broil).
- Optional - garnish with sprig of mint, a few berries.
Notes
- Allulose works just like regular sugar. Erythritol does work in the custard, but I do not recommend torching it because it has a high melting point. It's easier to melt and caramelize erythritol in a heavy-bottomed pan. Preheat the pan on medium heat, sprinkle the erythritol evenly, and gently stir with a heat-resistant spatula until caramelized. Carefully pour that over the custard in each ramekin.
264 calories, 26.7g fat, 3.9g protein, 2.4g carbs Regular version:
354 calories, 26.7g fat, 3.9g protein, 26.4g carbs These numbers don't include the garnish. If you're using a vanilla bean, keep the pod in the saucepan to infuse more flavour - don't mix it into the custard!
NOTE – I’m using the creme brulee (above) instead of the custard listed in the Peach Custard Pie (below)
Peach Custard Pie
Ingredients
Pie & Filling
- 1 9" Pre-made pie crust (or your own half pie crust recipe) Raw, not blind-baked.
- 1 cup Greek yogurt sour cream also works
- 3 large egg yolks
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 5 medium peaches, approx 1.5 lbs
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Streusel Topping
- 1/4 cup butter
- 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/8 cup sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425F
- Roll out the pie crust to 1" larger than the pie plate, trim and crimp the edges.
- Peel and slice peaches around the bottom of the crust.
- Whisk the yogurt, yolks, flour, sugar, vanilla until smooth, and pour over the peaches.
- Bake 30 minutes, or until the custard starts to set.
Streusel
- Cut the butter into the flour until crumbly, then mix in sugar.
- Remove the pie from oven, place a pie crust shield (see below), sprinkle the streusel over the centre of the pie.
- Bake 15 minutes, or until knife inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Cool on a wire rack for an hour, serve warm with whipped cream and/or ice cream.
Notes
Easy caramel:
heavy-bottom saucepan
add 2/3 cup of sugar
add 1/3 cup of water
stir so the sugar is mixed in well. Feel free to add more water
turn on heat to medium-high
Leave it alone until the water is all gone, and the sugar start to turn golden brown.
Immediately remove from heat.
Pour this over whatever you were afraid to torch.
(I’ll pour the caramel on the peach custard pie after it comes out of the oven and cools for a few minutes.)
How to torch things.
Flame on low, you want the invisible part just after the blue flame to be touching the sugar.
Move the torch around to evenly heat all the sugar.
Once it’s melted, it will start to caramelize very quickly, so as soon as you see colour, move the flame.
#1 – about 1 tbsp of sugar in the raw/turbinado sugar is all you need per ramekin. The sugar should stick to the custard, so you can shake off the excess. Too much sugar is bad.
#2 – when the sugar starts to change colour, it can burn very quickly, so make sure to keep the torch moving. Once you see light to dark brown spots all over the top, you’re done. I personally don’t like the dark-to-black spots because it tastes burnt to me. Yes, I know what creme brulee means. I also don’t like the taste of burnt sugar.