Those of you who know me real well know that I have Celiac and anything made with flour is verboten!  So, as it is every year I have two opportunities to either make a pie or make as sister and I call it  UGLY PIE!!!  It is always so, the uglier it looks the better it will taste.

So, today I wanted to use up my green apples from the apple farm and began the preparations.  Peeling and cutting apples, mixing in sugar, cinnamon, and my secret ingredient.  Then came the preparation of the crust.

Sorry folks, but this one comes out of a bag.  It is safer for everyone that way.  Not only does it come out looking and feeling like crust, but it usually tastes pretty close too!  Well, to avoid all the trouble that Gluten Free crust can give you, huh?  You don’t know what a pain in the backside GF pie crust is?

Well, GF pie crust does not contain gluten, and it is the gluten in any pie crust, cake, noodle, pancake or bread that makes it hold together.  So without this gluten you get a sticky, unruly glob that looks like crust, but has to be assembled like a patchwork quilt.  As soon as you get it rolled out (between two pieces of waxed paper, not wax paper BTW, but that’s another whine for another blog post) and try to get it into the pie plate and onto the top of the pie, you get REALLY TICKED OFF BECAUSE IT ALL FALLS APART.  Ahem, sorry but… you can’t imagine the frustration.  Well enough of that…

So today I get to the crust part and actually got the bottom crust into the pie plate in relatively one piece!  In went the filling and I was feeling quite accomplished.  Now for my traditional “Pile of Fall Leaves” top crust, now where did I put those cookie cutters…  No, not here, no, not there, hum, better go back around and check again.

Aurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhhhh!

MY VERY SPECIAL ONE AND ONLY ANTIQUE GF  OAK LEAF COOKIE CUTTER IS GONE!

I have been here over a whole year and I just figure that out!

NOW WHAT WILL I DO???

Punt.

So, I rolled out the crust and put it in the freezer for 3 min. to set it so I can get it off the paper.  And, since this crust will be a solid I cut a hole into the center so the little Pie Bird can peek out of the middle.  So far so good.  Now for the moment of truth… I invert the paper, center the hole over the bird, and begin to release the paper from the crust…

ITS A MIRACLE, IT DID NOT TEAR!

Now because it is in place I begin crimping and this goes well too!

Next, I have a bit of fun and cut little birdie feet all around the top and sprinkle on some sugar.  Well, nothing left to do but put it into the oven.

About an hour later I open the oven to peek at the progress and get a face full of SMOKE!!!  Seems that as beautiful as it all went together there were cracks in my fluted crust edges and the pie bird apparently went on strike!  What a mess!

Thankfully, the pie was done anyway and I removed it from the oven post haste.

So how did it look?  See for yourself!

So uh, by our definition, my sister’s and mine, does this mean that if my pie looks OK that it will taste like it was made with road apples?