Lust for Crust

My family archives have astonished me once more! It turns out that an ancestor of mine the spinster Beatrice Taylor, is solely responsible for the creation of apple pies. She also created the first burger patty out of peacock meat, modelled on her own oversized areola, but they didn't take off as peacock mince was pretty fucking horrible. her inspired notion to bake apples in a pastry case however, known then as a coffin, inspired many and the dish soon became commonplace. She had been renowned for her work in pastry, many rich and prosperous families employed her to encase things in pastry as centerpieces for formal gatherings. Her finest work (as documented by the biographer, Ralph Crannyhunter) was a pike pasty with articulated jaws which the noblemen present used to play 'chicken', poking their peckers in and out while blindfolded, as a servant worked the mechanism.

Her apple pie recipe bore only vague resemblance to our present day treat, it had no sugar for one thing, sugar being rare and expensive, but was sweetened with the 'collected amalgamations of her underlinens' whatever that means! It also included swan tongue, plums and 'jelly from a male fox'.

We have a lot to thank her for though as the following recipe reminds us, the apple pie is a majestic dessert valued the world over in a myriad of forms. This is my take on a slice of classic British apple pie, shortcrust pastry casing jammy sweetened baked apples in a bowl with a little custard… Heaven!

I used the new SSA baked apple as it is merely that no cinnamon or spice notes, just a convincing fleshy baked apple. I accented that ever so slightly with a little WF quince jelly which has a sort of apple/pear hybrid feel and a great jammy texture, this could possibly be dropped if you don't have it. The pastry comes from OOO pie crust which is excellent but I added a little more rich bakery and butter with JF biscuit. The custard is TPA vanilla custard II and inawera custard which both taste great and seem to compliment each other magnificently, the WF creme brulee cookie adds to baked note of the pastry and adds further depth to the custard. Steep is advised but a week or so is all it needs, it does however continue to get better the longer it can be resisted. If you feel this needs sweetening I'd advise Sugardaddy at .60% but use whatever you like.