Recipe
🍰 DESSERT
Apple Pie
A double-crust pie of cinnamon-spiced apples in flaky butter pastry, the definitive American dessert.
American · medium · serves 8
prep 40 min · cook 55 min
~606 cal · 4g protein · 94g carbs · 25g fat · 7g fiber · 52g sugars · 16g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
↓ Jump to Recipe
AI-generated illustration
Nothing is more American than apple pie, though like much of American food it is an immigrant, brought by English, Dutch, and Swedish settlers and refined in the farm kitchens of the Northeast. The Pennsylvania Dutch, in particular, made pie an everyday staple rather than a treat.
The essentials are a well-spiced apple filling, a blend of tart and sweet varieties for balance, and a pastry that shatters. Cinnamon leads, with nutmeg and a squeeze of lemon to keep the apples bright, and a little flour or cornstarch to thicken the juices as they bubble.
Served warm, ideally with a scoop of vanilla ice cream melting into the seam, it is the pie of county fairs, Thanksgiving tables, and diner counters, a plain and honest dessert that the whole country has claimed as its own.
Saved recipes and passport stamps are kept on this device. Sign in to keep them across your devices and leave reviews.
Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian and egg-, nut- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 8
2 1/2 cups flour
1 cup cold butter, cubed
8 cups mixed tart and sweet apples (Granny Smith and Honeycrisp), sliced
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar (for the dough)
1 tbsp turbinado sugar, to finish
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
1/2 lemon, juiced
3 tbsp cornstarch
1/4 tsp fine salt
2 tbsp heavy cream, to glaze
Instructions
1
Rub the cold butter into the flour with a pinch of salt until it looks like coarse crumbs with pea-sized pieces of butter still showing, then stir the vinegar into ice water and bring the dough together with as little of it as will hold. Chill 30 minutes.
✎ Chef’s note
Keep everything cold and handle the dough as little as possible; warm, overworked pastry bakes tough instead of flaky. Leave those pea-sized butter pieces visible, because they are what makes the layers, and the spoon of cider vinegar keeps the gluten slack so the pastry stays tender.
2
Toss the sliced apples with both sugars, the spices, salt, lemon juice and cornstarch, and leave them 15 to 20 minutes.
✎ Chef’s note
That short rest lets the apples give up their juice while the cornstarch is already in with them, which is what stops the filling flooding the crust in the oven. Use a mix of a firm tart apple and a sweet one; both hold their shape rather than collapsing to sauce.
3
Line a pie dish with half the pastry, mound the apples in, dot them with a little butter, and top with the second sheet or a woven lattice; seal, crimp, and cut steam vents.
4
Brush the top with cream, scatter over the turbinado sugar, and chill the assembled pie 15 to 20 minutes while the oven heats with a baking sheet on the lower rack.
✎ Chef’s note
Chilling the assembled pie firms the butter back up so the crimped edge holds its shape instead of slumping, and the preheated sheet crisps the base and catches the drips.
5
Bake on the hot sheet at 425F (220C) for 20 minutes, then drop to 350F (175C) for 35 to 40 minutes more, until deep golden and bubbling in the middle, shielding the edge with foil if it darkens too fast.
6
Cool at least an hour so the filling sets, then serve warm.
Pennsylvania Dutch baking tradition.
Ratings & reviews
Cooked it? Rate this dish:
No account needed. Sign in to leave a full review with a comment.
Cooked it?
Kept on this device, no account needed. Sign in to leave a review and keep your passport across your devices.
No reviews yet, be the first to cook it.
🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Pennsylvania (Philadelphia). Pennsylvania Dutch has nothing to do with the Netherlands; it is a corruption of Deutsch. Scrapple descends from German panhaas, pan rabbit, with cornmeal substituted in the New World, and shoofly pie is built on molasses because molasses is what a farmhouse actually had in the cupboard.
🗺️
United States. American barbecue is one tradition that split into many. It took shape in the slaveholding South, where enslaved cooks combined Indigenous, European and African fire techniques over trench pits, then travelled with people: whole hog and vinegar in the Carolinas, brisket and sausage in the Central Texas towns settled by German and Czech butchers, burnt ends in the Kansas City stockyards.
🌍
North America. Almost every regional cooking here records who arrived and on what terms. Enslaved West Africans brought rice, okra, black-eyed peas and the techniques behind Lowcountry and Creole food; Chinese railway labour and later Italian, Jewish, Mexican and Vietnamese arrivals built the way the cities eat; and Indigenous foodways sit underneath all of it.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from United States
Chicken & Andouille GumboA dark-roux gumbo built on the holy trinity, simmered with smoky sausage and served over rice.
Green Chile StewPork simmered with roasted green chiles and potatoes, the smell of a New Mexico autumn in a pot.
Shrimp & Gritscreek shrimp over slow-cooked, cheese-enriched stone-ground grits.
Browse all United States recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Oven, Steamer.
Storing it: Store in an airtight container. Most keep 2 to 3 days at room temperature, and longer refrigerated.
Make it a United States meal
Philly CheesesteakDinner
SazeracDrink
Similar dishes from around the world
MustikkapiirakkaFinland
Kalb el LouzAlgeria
SachertorteAustria
ŞəkərburaAzerbaijan
RoshogollaBangladesh
Bermuda Rum CakeBermuda
Cuisine
Diet
Frequently asked questions
What is Apple Pie?
A double-crust pie of cinnamon-spiced apples in flaky butter pastry, the definitive American dessert.
Where does Apple Pie come from?
Apple Pie is a American dish from Pennsylvania (Philadelphia), United States.
Can Apple Pie be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Apple Pie recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Apple Pie safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Apple Pie take to make?
About 95 minutes total (40 minutes prep, 55 minutes cooking), serving 8.
Get the Sunday Spin
One dish from somewhere in the world, in your inbox every Sunday. No spam, just dinner inspiration you can cook that day.