as a person who bakes a lot of pies, i can honestly say that there isn’t much you can do to improve an apple pie.  sure you can change the type of crust or add different things to it but in the end, you still have an apple pie and what more could you want?  chocolate may be my first choice in all other types of desserts and sweets but when it comes to pie, apple is always my favorite and a perfect choice for a cold and dreary winter day.

this week’s tuesdays with dorie/baking with julia challenge is hosted by gaye of laws of the kitchen and the participants baked the french apple tart found on pages 379-381.  to view the full recipe, visit gaye’s blog or be kind and buy a copy of the book, baking with julia; it is worth every penny!

the recipe makes a 9″ tart which was just too much for two people.  first thing on the list was to make a quarter of the pie dough recipe.  lurking in a bowl in the dining room was a group of apples left from thanksgiving; embarrassing isn’t it.  further inspections yielded a bag of fourelle pears (from the same holiday) living in the produce drawer in the fridge.  needless to say, i had plenty of fruit to make the recipe!

 the filling recipe is a little different.  the apples were peeled, cut into cubes and mixed with the other ingredients.  this mixture was spread out on a pan and roasted.  two things, my apples were old and didn’t give off much juice and second, i forgot the bread crumbs.  neither caused problems-the filling mashed up nicely.

to keep it simple, i used mini pie pans rather than tart pans.  the quarter sized batch of pie dough made 4 pie shells.  i prebaked them all and froze two for another day.  my favorite baking trick is to use a coffee filter to line the pie shell and then use glass marbles for weights.

 then they were arranged around the top of the pie, brushed with a little melted coconut oil(rather than butter) and sprinkled with sugar.

hot from the oven, mmmmmmm….apple pie.  it was real tasty with some vanilla ice cream!!!  be sure to visit the tuesdays with dorie page to see how the rest of the bakers made out.