As you begin any process you put your heart and soul into the project. It's your baby and you want people to love it as much as you do. The doubt creeps in and you take to desperate measures, that's where I found myself today, consumed by pie. I bought pre-made pies, pre-made crusts, pre-made canned products and proceeded to bake.
Yes, the pre-made pie was certainly easy, but easy isn't always the best. Next came the popular canned product with a pre-made crust. My first curiosity was the amount of actual fruit to goop ratio in the canned product. I sacrificed $4.50 and one can of apple pie mix and discovered about 9.5 oz of apple slices in the 21 oz can. I want more fruit than goop! The recipe on the can calls for 2 cans, so $9.00 for just over a pound of apples. The Orchard to Oven apple pie mix has 2 pounds of fruit and 10.5 oz of glaze, a much better ratio, I think! To me a fruit pie should look more like fruit.
All the pies were baked, now what to do with them? I don't need to eat them all, my husband would love to eat them all, but to save us both, I choose to take them to school. I served the slices. The kids who got the Orchard 2 Oven pie loved it because they said it tasted more like fruit. Several of the kids that got the sugary pies said they liked the crust best. This is not a scientific blind taste test, by any means. I realize that teenagers will eat almost anything; for God's sake they eat hot cheetos and Funyuns for breakfast...don't tell Michelle! They did not receive extra credit for their comments but they did say if I ever gave up teaching I should bake pies...little do they know!