Someone asked me on another thread to post my recipe for apple fried pies. This really does come down from my g.g. grandmother in Kentucky.....I finally found it, but couldln't find the thread where I should have posted this. Here goes: INGREDIENTS: 4 cups of dried apples (Schnitz), 2 cups of water, 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 tsp. cinnamon, fried pie pastry (recipe follows) INSTRUCTIONS: Combine apples and water in large saucepan, bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, simmer about 30 minutes or until tender. Cool, mash slightly, if necessary. Stir in 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon, and set aside. PASTRY RECIPE INGREDIENTS: 3 cups all purpose flour, 1 tsp salt, 3/4 cup shortening, 1 egg (beaten), 1/4 cup of water, 1 tsp. vinegar. Combine flour and salt, cut in shortsening with pastry blender until mixture resembles coarse meal. Combine egg and water, sprinkle over flour mixture. Add vinegar and lightly stir with a fork until dry ingredients are moistened. Shape into a ball. Wrap pastry in wax paper. Chill at least 1 hour. Roll out small portions of dough and cut into small rounds (I use a large glass...what ever size you want your pies to be....your choice) Yields enough pastry for about 1 dozen 5 inch pies.
TO ASSEMBLE AND FRY PIES: Place about 2 tblsp. apple mixture on half of each pastry circle. To seal pies, dip fingers in water, and moisten edges of pastry circles. Fold cisrcles in half, making sure edges are even. Press edges of filled pastry firmly together using a fork dipped in flour.
Heat 1/2 inch of oil to 375 degrees in a large heavy skillet ( I use my iron chicken fryer). Fry pies until golden brsown on both sides, turning only once. Drain well on paper towels. Sprinkle with 10x sugar while warm. Makes one dozen (or more if you use the large glass like I do....I like to make them small so they're more like one or two biters) ENJOY.
Jen, if your great grandmother was like my grandmother, they used LARD and not shortening. LARD made her pie crusts and cookies so crisp and delicous. We all know what eating food made with Lard with do to our arteries...guess that is why my Granny died when she was only 96 years old!!! (She had her own teeth and only wore reading glasses when she read her Bible at night. She ate eggs every day... drank whole milk and put butter on her bread at every meal.
Do you think she would do anything differently if she had it to do over again???
Nancy, I had two great aunts in Kentucky who also spread lard on their bread, like butter. They lived well into their 90s. They had an outhouse in the backyard that they used year around. Since they were elderly my father and his brothers had indoor plumbing installed but the aunts wouldn't use it. They thought defecating inside the house was disgusting.
Didn't want to say it, but, yes.......lard. However, I've heard that the best pastry chefs use a combination of 1/3 butter, 1/3 lard, 1/3 'shortening' to achieve the flakiest crusts.....for PIES. But these are fried and have to be handled in the turning process, I believe that is the purpose of the vinegar in the crust recipe...to help hold them together. and, the texture is completely different.
Boy, are you all bringing back the old days! My grandmother also cooked with lard; had eggs and milk and biscuits and gravy every day - and lived to be 95....
"As Jennifer McLagan points out in her celebrated book Fat: An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient, With Recipes, lard’s fat is also mostly monounsaturated, which is healthier than saturated fat. And even the saturated fat in lard has a neutral effect on blood cholesterol. Not to mention that lard has a higher smoking point than other fats, allowing foods like chicken to absorb less grease when fried in it."