In the Kitchen Baking Pies With My Baby

The alternate working title for today's post was, "This is pie-related but you know I didn't have any of the actual ingredients but it still came out gloriously" 

I like baking. I do. But, it seems usually to be so much more of a precise type of cooking, with science-y type chemistry involved and not the kind of slapdash, off-the-cuff, inspiration of the moment type of cooking I normally gravitate towards. 

But, it's Thanksgiving week, which means that it is almost Christmas time, which further means that my long-suffering soul is coming back to life to the smells of cinnamon and balsam and the crooning loveliness of Nat King Cole and Bing Crosby and the incomparable Karen Carpenter. 

This time of year I begin feeling festive and homebody-ish and I feel a little bit like I still want to be a child and a little guilty that I haven't gotten around to being unselfish enough to have one of my own...and dang it I need to make a pie. 

I'm going to make Pumpkin Pie, as it is Thanksgiving, though neither myself or the Mr. are looking much forward to it. But Apple Pie? I can get behind that every day of the week and twice on Sundays. 

But, as the alternate title might suggest, I didn't actually have any apple pie ingredients besides butter and apples. No sugar, no cornstarch. So, I did what I do best and improvised. If you want a proper apple pie recipe, you're in the wrong place. (and the pie crust? I can't be bothered with flour or shortening or whatever it is people use to make them. I bought an organic overpriced one at Whole Foods and it's awaiting contents in my freezer as we speak.)

Without further bother or ado;

Apple Pie Filling

Ingredients:

4 medium apples. (I used 2 large and slightly dodgy honey crisp apples and two pink ladies)

3 tbsp water (I just splashed an indeterminate amount of water in)

2 tbsp butter (I used more like 5. Because...butter.)

1 tbsp (or more) cinnamon

1/3 cup honey (substituted for sugar as I hadn't any)

1 tbsp ground flaxseed. (or you could use 1tsp cornstarch prepared in water and added at the end) I use flaxseed for thickening most things. It adds fiber, it's good for you, and it works the same as cornstarch. 

Method:

1. Peel, core and slice apples. (I sliced thinly and haphazardly)

2. Melt butter and cinnamon over medium heat and then stir in apples, honey and water.

3. Cover, and cook. Stir occasionally for about 5 minutes, or until the apples are slightly softened.

4. Add ground flaxseed or cornstarch mixture and continue to cook until apples are soft but not mushy. Allow apples to bubble for a minute or so. Cool, and then pour into pie crust or freeze. Will freeze for up to one year. (but why, why, why would that ever happen?)

Anyway, Happy Thanksgiving. I'm grateful for this blog and anyone who reads it, and for all of the magazines that publish my work. But I am mostly thankful for my handsome husband and that my newest book, The Word Collector, has garnered such favorable praise. 

Lord love a writer. 

xx