Makes one double-crust pie
One of my favorite memories from childhood is standing at my grandmother’s side helping her bake. Like many grandmas, her specialty was apple pie. By the time I became her kitchen companion, she had mastered this art. She didn’t have a recipe, she just always seemed to know when it was just right.
This is a litt le twist on her classic apple pie, adding cranberries and making the dough with plant-based butter and vegetable shortening. As a chef who cooks plant-based at home for my family, it has been a fun challenge to re-create her magic using new ingredients. My daughters love to join in on the fun now, and oft en help roll out the dough or even slice the apples.
PIE DOUGH
2½ cups all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons plant-based butter, chilled and cut into 1-inch pieces (Miyoko’s brand)
½ cup Spectrum vegetable shortening or other organic vegetable shortening
6 tablespoons ice water
APPLE-CRANBERRY FILLING
8 cups sliced apples (a mixture of sweet and tart is always good but in this case you can use sweeter apples because the cranberries add some tartness)
1½ cups cranberries (I use organic frozen berries)
¾ cup granulated sugar
Zest of 1 orange
2 tablespoons orange juice
½ cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons soy milk
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
For the crust, add flour and salt to a large bowl and whisk to combine. Add butt er and shortening and combine with your hands until the mixture is the consistency of coarse meal; some larger clumps are OK. Slowly add ice water one tablespoon at a time until dough comes together and can be formed into a ball.
Cut dough in half and flatten into disks. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour, or overnight.
When ready to make your filling, preheat the oven to 375°F. Pull the dough from the refrigerator. Dust the counter or rolling surface with flour and gently roll out each disk of dough to roughly 12-inch rounds. Place one round in the bott om of the pie dish, pressing dough into corners, allowing some dough to hang over top of pie dish. Place pie dish in the freezer for 15 minutes to chill while preparing the filling. Into a large mixing bowl, add sliced apples, cranberries, sugar, zest, orange juice, flour, and cinnamon.
Remove the pie dish from the freezer and fill with apple-cranberry mixture. Place second round on top of the filled pie. Seal top and bott om crusts together and gently crimp edges, trimming any excess from the edge. Brush crust with soy milk and sprinkle with sugar. Slice six 1-inch slits into the top of the crust.
Bake for about two hours, keeping an eye on how golden-brown the crust is getting. To prevent over-browning, cover loosely with foil as the pie finishes baking.
