HAVERHILL — When it comes to baking an apple pie to compete at the Topsfield Fair, it’s always a battle to strike the right balance of sweet, sour and texture, plus a flaky crust that makes for a winning combination.
Lindsay’s Award Winning Apple Pie Recipe
For Haverhill’s Lindsay Paris, making and chilling the dough, selecting the right combination of apples and adding traditional ingredients in just the right amounts put it over the top for best apple pie at the fair this year. .
Paris, 40, a producer of the Haverhill Journal for HC Media, took top honors.
“I made my first cake when I was 8 years old and I made the base out of sugar cookie dough, which didn’t turn out very well, but I got better and have been baking cakes, cookies, pies and other delights ever since,” she said. . “I love being in the kitchen.”
She estimates that she has made more than 400 pies in the past 30 years alone, including four apple pies prior to her fair entry in the hopes of having a potential winner.
“I wanted to refine it further to make sure it was good enough,” he said.
Making pie crust is always a challenge, for which Paris offers some winning tips. She chills the dough for two hours before rolling it out and placing it in a pie plate. She then fills the dish with her apple mixture, places the top crust on, and then pops it back into the fridge to chill for another hour.
“I think it helps with flaking,” she said of the added cooling. “For the crust, I add lemon juice to the water, which helps soften it. and add it to my stuffing as well. Once you make enough bad scabs, you learn to do it right. But it’s hard to do. I also make it nice and skinny.”
Paris relies on Cortland and Granny Smiths, which she says help with flavor and texture.
“I like the mix as Granny stays a bit firm while Cortland goes soft for a nice mix of soft and firm. I add a pinch of nutmeg, salt to cut the sweetness, cinnamon, brown and white sugar, flour to thicken, and stir. Then lemon juice. I added butter on top and then covered with rolled dough. It’s a pretty classic recipe.
“The judges said they liked my cake because it was a simple, classic cake with no unusual ingredients,” she said. “They said the crust and filling were excellent.”
“The other cakes were really beautiful and some were really huge,” she said of her remarks at the start of the competition. “I did a simple 9-inch and was surprised when they called me. Now I can’t get in for two years.”
Paris received a cash prize of $75 plus a gift basket filled with goodies from Cider Hill Farm and a half bushel of Cortland apples.
“All the contestants were there, including their families, my husband Fred Paris, and our children Laura, 16, and Ellie, 12, who participated in the kids’ dessert baking contest and won second place for baklava. for which he received $5 and a red. headband.”