Apple & Blackberry Pie

Loosely adapted from a recipe on BBC Online, this delicious pie has a zesty pastry and is therefore surprisingly light and yummy for a pie.

INGREDIENTS
-Pastry
250g of plain white flour
Normal sized pack of unsalted butter
Tbl spoon of cater sugar
2 tbl spoons of cold water
1/2 a lemon's juice
-Filling
1kg of eating apples
Normal sugar to taste
Optional: Lots of blackberries picked fresh if possible
-Glaze
An Egg

Sounds complicated but it is not and is actuallly quite a forgiving recipe. Ideally you would have someone pealing, coring and chopping into pieces the apples while the other person makes the pastry. Take quite a large bowl, pour in the flour and mix in the caster sugar. Now take that pack of butter and cut it into small pieces. Add these to the flour and crumble in with your fingers until the butter disappears. Now add the water and squeeze half a lemon into the mix. Knead it again and it should be a nice consistency like playdough. Take just over half the pastry mix and roll it out until it is large enough to cover the bottom and sides of a lightly buttered roasting dish. Prick the pastry with a fork. Now bang it in the oven for 10 minutes or so until the pastry is crisp but not too brown at gas mark 7/220*c.

Take the dish out of the oven and add the chopped fruits then sprinkle generously with white or brown sugar. Cover the top with more rolled-out pastry and if you are feeling adventurous try to connect the top and the sides with some of the beaten egg used as glue. Prick the top of the pie and glaze it well with the remaining egg. Now bake on gas mark 6/200*c for about 1/3 hour or until the top looks golden brown.

As it cools, see how tart it is and add caster sugar dusted over the top according to taste.

Excellent served with ice cream but hurry as those blackberries will not be there forever!