Double Apple Pie, Nigella Lawson, How to be a Domestic Goddess

I had always been intrigued by Nigella's Double Apple Pie but never got round to making it because the thought of peeling and coring all that apples just did not seem like a very good use of my time. But with my brother recently back home for the vacation, I decided to take advantage of his enthusiasm to finally make this pie.

Firstly, I'm not very good at pastries. In fact, I suck at it and had real trouble with this one. I just couldn't get it to roll out properly. I was wondering if it had anything to do with the recipe, but I googled it and found that no one else had my problem. I guess as with all things, practice makes perfect, and I will be practising more. She does make it up in the food processor, as opposed to by hand. Perhaps next time I'll try the traditional method. It could be easier. Anyway, back to the pie.

The recipe calls for two different types of apples, hence the "double" element of the pie (no, it's not referring to the size, though it is a rather big pie, and it's baked in a Springform tin). I can't find Bramleys or Coxes here in Singapore, so I used Granny Smiths (for the green Bramleys) and Fuji apples (for the red Coxes). The green apples were to be mashed, and the red ones were to be chunky.

The shortcrust pastry is slightly different from regular shortcrust patries, in that it uses Cheddar in the mix. It may sound weird, but they actually go so well together. I recall as a little girl, I loved eating cheese with apples - in fact that was the only way my mum could get me to eat cheese.

I really enjoyed the pie. It was a very substantial and sliceable pie. It was great when fresh and hot out of the oven. When it cooled, I thought the pastry was a bit tough (my fault), but the filling was great, especially since the apples were of different sizes and textures. My husband, surprisingly, loved the pastry, but wasn't so keen on the filling because he thought the apples were too chunky. I guess he likes them small a la MacDonald Apple Pie. I would love to make these again, but now that my brother has gone back to school, it might be awhile...