My Best Dutch Apple Pie

Crust:

4 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 1/4 cups crisco
1/4 cup butter flavor crisco
4-10 tablespoons ice cold water

Chill crisco until cold. Add first two ingredients to food processor. Cut crisco into small chunks. Then process until the chunks are the size of peas. Add cold water two tablespoons at a time until dough holds together.

Roll out and place into greased pie pans.

Filling:

10-12 apples of your choice (a few different varieties) for more flavor, peeled and sliced
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
Dash salt
6 tablespoons butter for top of pie before streusel topping

Mix apples with above ingredients. Put in pie crust. Top with slices of butter

Streusel:

3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup crumbled butter


Crumble butter with a fork into first three ingredients and put on pie.

Bake at 425 degrees until apples are cooked well and bubbling.

Simple Marinara Sauce

1 large can crushed tomatoes
Tomato paste
5 cloves garlic minced
1 onion, chopped
Grated pecorino Romano cheese, about 1/4 cup
Fresh basil
1/4 cup red wine
Sprinkle of crushed red pepper

Add some olive oil to a pan and sauté onions until transparent, add minced garlic. Add salt and pepper.

Add crushed tomatoes, about 1/2 can water, and a squirt of tomato paste, and a little more salt and pepper to taste.

Add basil, red wine and crushed red pepper.

Simmer about 15 minutes. Turn off and let cool. Toss with pasta.

Toss

Dave’s Greek Salad Dressing

3/4 cup virgin olive oil
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 cloves grated garlic
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tbsp. Oregano

Shake in a container. Serves 2.

Pizza or Bread Dough

This recipe came from Marilyn Manetta. It was her mom (Josephine Maira’s) recipe.
For the stuffed breads I used all purpose flour and added another tsp of yeast. 

8 cups 00 flour
3 cups water
3 tsp salt
1 tsp dry yeast
4 tblsp olive oil

Mix ingredients together to form a soft dough. Let rest 10 minutes. Knead with a table mixer for 5 minutes or by hand 7-8 minutes until smooth.

Add more flour as need until dough is not sticky.

Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl. Cover and let rise an hour to hour and a half until double in size.

Punch the dough to de-gas and divide it into 3-4 balls. Cover the bough and let rest one hour, then shape.

To shape your pizza take a ball of dough and press into a disc shape.

Stuffed Spinach and Sausage Bread

You can use any bread dough

For the spinach and feta bread

1 large bag of fresh spinach
1 container of feta cheese
Pecorino Romano cheese to taste
Olive oil
Garlic powder
Salt and pepper

Cook and drain the spinach. Add the garlic powder and other ingredients. Let cool.

For the sausage bread

Sausage taken out of casing
Sweet red pepper, chopped
Onion, chopped
Garlic, minced
Olive oil
Pecorino Romano cheese
Salt and pepper

Sauté the pepper and onions and garlic. Add chunks of sausage. Cook until brown. I add some chicken broth if the mixture gets too dry. When it’s done, add your cheese and let cool.

Roll out your dough. I use a rolling pin to spread it out as large as your pan. On the dough I rub olive oil almost to ends of dough. Then I sprinkle salt and pepper, garlic powder and more cheese.

Then I spread out the spinach or sausage mixture almost to end of dough. Take the shortest end and roll like a pinwheel tucking in the sides as you go.

Seal the end with an egg wash. Place on a well oiled sheet pan. Poke holes over the top with a fork to let the steam out. Bake at 400 degrees until bottom is browned and it starts to smell good.

Nancy’s Feta Appetizer

Dave’s Bacon

preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Line a baking sheet with foil.

Place bacon strips on baking sheet leaving room between each strip or they will stick together.

Bake for 17 minutes.