This past Wednesday, October 21^st, was National Apple Day. To celebrate, I baked my grandma’s recipe for a Dutch apple pie today! This recipe is sweet, reminds me of fall, and it’s honestly really easy to make (as far as pies go).

For the crust of this pie, you can use a store-bought crust, but I think homemade tastes a little better. To make your own crust, put 1 cup of flour, 2 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon of shortening (I use Crisco), a pinch of salt, and 2 tablespoons + 2 and 1/2 teaspoons of water into one bowl, and blend it all together with a pastry blender (see below). The mixture should become pretty stiff, and you should start to use your hands to finish molding the dough into a ball.

Once the crust dough is ready, lay it out on a flat, floured surface. I just use my countertop and I put wax paper down to make for an easy clean-up when I’m done with the flour. Using a rolling pin (or any similar household object if you don’t have a rolling pin…empty wine bottles work great 😉 ) and roll the dough out into a flat circle, so that it fits into your pie dish. The crust should be pretty thin for this pie. When the crust is done, brush off any excess flour, and lay it into your pie dish, smoothing it around all the edges.

Set the crust aside while making the apple filling. For this filling, you will need to peel and slice 5-6 medium Granny Smith apples (better to slice up too many and have leftovers than not have enough). I like my apple slices thin, so I use an apple slicer, which cuts the apple into 8 pieces. Then, I cut each slice into 4 more slices. Place all the slices into a large bowl, and sprinkle with 1/2 cup of sugar, 1/4 teaspoon of salt, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice. Mix this all around so that the apple slices are evenly coated, and set aside while you make the topping of the pie.

For the crumble topping of this pie, you will use the pastry blender again. In a bowl, add 1/2 cup of sugar, 3/4 cup of flour, and 1/3 cup of softened butter. Blend these together until you get a nice crumble mixture. When the topping is ready, put the apple slices into the pie crust, and drizzle any extra juice from that bowl over the apples when they’re in the crust (see right). When all of the slices are in, top the pie with the crumble mixture, making sure to completely cover all of the apples.

Now it’s time to bake this masterpiece! Set the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit, and put the pie in the oven for 45-50 minutes, or until the top of the pie is a golden brown color. I used a thick, ceramic pie dish this time, so I had to leave my pie in the oven for 55 minutes to get the golden brown top, but if you use a glass pie dish or a nonstick dish, you will likely only need 45 minutes.

To the left, you can see the golden brown color you should aim for on the top of your pie. The top should also be very crisp when it cools, giving you a sweet crunch with the soft apple filling.

This recipe is one of the easier pie recipes I know of, especially if you use a store-bought crust. I hope that this post has caught your attention enough for you to try this recipe out for yourself! Thanks for reading! 🙂