Apple & strawberry pie

A gorgeous summer fruit pie that is beautifully accompanied by a big dollop of fresh cream. You don’t have to use strawberries  …….. blackberries, blueberries or raspberries taste just as good.

Ingredients:

• My shortcrust pastry 
• 3 large or 4 med cooking apples
• punnet of strawberries
• juice of ½ lemon
• 3tbls granulated sugar
• baking beans or rice

Method:

Make the pastry and chill for at least half an hour.

Preheat the oven to 190°c/FAN 170°/GAS 5 and grease a large ovenproof plate.

Split the pastry 70-30 and place the 30% back in the fridge for the lid. Roll out on a lightly floured board so that’s it’s slightly bigger than your plate. Do not stretch the pastry as it will shrink when cooking. Place in on your plate and put some baking paper over and pour in your baking beans or rice. Place in the oven and bake for 10 minutes.

While the base is cooking prepare the fruit. Wash hull and drain the strawberries and cut in half or quarter them depending on size.

Peel core and slice the apples. Place them in a bowl and add the lemon juice. You can add the sugar at this stage if you want to. I leave it until the fruit is on the pie base.

When you remove the pie base from the oven take the greeseproof paper with the beans on out too and leave to stand for a few minutes.

In the meantime roll out the pastry for the lid.

Place a layer of apples across the pastry base then pour the rest of the fruit over it. Sprinkle the sugar over evenly if you haven’t done it before.

Although the pastry would have partly cooked around the pie rim still brush it with a little milk so that the lid will stick to the base. Lay the lid on top and pinch the edge with your fingers slightly twisting the pastry all the way round. You can brush the top with milk or a beaten egg if you want to but I prefer not to for a fruit pie, I don’t like risking the pastry to be scorched.

Place back in the oven and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

If you use a glass ovenproof plate like I do, you can look underneath and check the pastry is cooked well.