Sausage and Apple Pie

I admit it, I am afraid of pastry. True, I will make biscuits on occasion, and sometimes dabble in pizza dough. Once or twice a year I will even be pushed into preparing my own pie dough in order to not have to eat a prepared holiday pie. But those are extreme times.

On days off, however, I always feel like taking on a challenge. Cooking something that will require a lot of time, concentration, and skill. The day had been gray and raining and it reminded me of my time in London a few years ago. It was almost always gray and slightly rainy while there. But one meal I grew to love and appreciate were the hand pies that have taken over the city. Sure, everyone has heard of the classic steak and kidney pie. But in the past couple years London has taken on a food revolution; pub food like fish ‘n chips and hand pies were revitalized.

Borough Market, a hub for unique and organic ingredients, artisanal items (like the best granola I’ve ever had), and pop-up carts selling hot hand pies, falafel, curries, and sausages, has essentially everything you could ever want to put in your mouth. I still dream about this place. And their pie cart? A thing of beauty, with classics like a fish pie, and contemporary flavors like roasted rabbit with rosemary and garlic scrapes. Ah the comeback of peasant and working class food. Love.

Back to pies. While a steak and kidney kidney pie sounded…interesting, I thought I would start with something fall-like (typical) and on the easier side.

Sausage and Apple Pie

Feeds about 8

Ingredients:

Pastry-

• 3 C. flour
• 1 Tsp salt
• 3/4 C. butter
• 1/4 C. plain yogurt (greek also works, whatever is in your fridge!)
• 3 Tbsp vodka, cold
• 3–6 Tbsp ice water

Filling-

• 1 onion, cut
• 10 sage leaves, roughly chopped
• 2 apples, peeled and roughly chopped
• 4 medium sized mild Italian sausages
• 1 Tsp fennel seeds
• 1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 can hard apple cider

1.  For the pie dough, mix together the salt and flour in a large bowl. Cut butter into small pieces (as small as you can cut them!) and mix into the flour. Using a pastry blender or your hands incorporate the butter until the mixture has a sandy texture to it.

2. Stir in the yogurt and vodka. Slowly (one Tbsp at a time) add the water until the dough comes together. Break into two balls, wrap in cling wrap and place in fridge for at least 30 minutes.

3. Remove the casings from the sausages and brown using a large sauce pan. Add fennel seeds.

4. After sausage is cooked through, place aside but keep the sausage grease. Cook the onion in the sausage grease until soft.

5. Add sage and apples. Cook until soft. Remove and add to sausage.

6. Using the same pan, deglaze the pan with the hard apple cider and add apple cider vinegar.

7. Reduce until thickened. Add to sausage-apple mixture.

8. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and butter one large spring form pan (or just a regular pie pan).

9. Roll out the dough big enough to fully cover the pie pan. Ease the dough into the pan and place in the fridge for ten minutes.

10. Roll out other dough in a circle big enough to cover the whole top of the pie.

11. Pull out pie pan and pour in filling. Cover with second pie dough and cut slits in the middle.

12. Brush the edges of the pie with an egg wash. It will keep the dough together and give the pie a pretty golden look once cooked.

13. Bake for about 40 minutes or until top of pie has a golden edge.

14. Allow pie to rest for 5 minutes before releasing the spring form.

15. Serve with a small side salad.

Swiss Chard with Apple-Chicken Sausage

While pumpkin is clearly my favorite fall item, I respect that there are other top contenders like apples and hearty greens. In fact, I may have sort of forgotten about them in my pumpkin excitement of the last two weeks.

You’ll come to find that I tend to put kale in a lot of dishes. I like that kale is slightly bitter, and that it keeps a strong structure when cooked. When I went to my local market, however, I saw the swiss chard. The beautiful red stems that flower up into the leafy green top. They were just too pretty to pass up. And for the most part, swiss chard, mustard greens, beet greens, and the many different types of kale, can easily be exchanged in cooked recipes. Beware of collard greens. Unlike the short cook time of the greens mentioned above, collard greens are in the cabbage and broccoli family (weird that that is the same, yes?) meaning that they have to be cooked for much longer in order for them to be tender enough to enjoy.

Anyways. The grocery store to me is what Nordstrom’s or Bloomingdales is to other girls. I want it all. But, as I am heading up to Wisco for some Northwoods adventures this weekend, cuts had to be made. What I ended up with was that stunning rainbow chard––in red and apparently some white ones snuck in––local apples, and a chicken-apple-gouda sausage. Now, I normally stick away from the chicken sausage. Sure they are healthier in the sense that they have less fat in them (fat is what MAKES a good sausage people), but to give them flavor, other more processed foods have to get mixed in. I know, I’m downing the sausage that I just told you I was excited to buy and eat. Sometimes I like the flavors they put in, and then I decide I just don’t care about the processed meat side of it. I mean come on, a spinach and artichoke stuffed chicken sausage, yes. Apple and gouda stuffed chicken sausage, yes. And since it had the apple, it fit my theme for the day. Thus the decision was made.

Swiss Chard with Apple-Chicken Sausage:

Feeds 2 people

• 1 apple
• 2 Tbsp walnut oil (I think it gives it an extra earthiness, olive oil is fine)
• 1 small yellow onion
• 1 bundle swiss chard
• 1 package of 4 apple-gouda-chicken sausages
• 1 tsp apple cider vinegar
• 1 tsp fresh ground pepper

1. Cut onion into small pieces and caramelize (in small or medium sauté pan) on medium-low for at least 30 minutes.

2. While onions caramelize, cut apple into same size pieces as onion, set aside. Two choices for the sausage preparation: one, leave sausages whole and place in sauté pan with apple pieces, pepper and cook on medium until sausages are nicely browned on the outside. Remove from heat and slice thickly. Set aside. Option two, slice sausages before you cook them. Add them to the pan with apples and pepper and allow to brown on all sides. In option one, the cheese will stay inside the sausage and when sliced after cooking will retain its flavor. The sausage, however, will have less crunchy bits and overall less texture. Option two, your cheese will melt out and coat some of the apple pieces and will lose much of its essence. But, your sausage will have crunchy cheesy bits and have a stronger apple profile. Your choice.

3. Cut ends off of swiss chard and then into ribbons. Add to onions, and add apple cider vinegar. Turn heat to medium and cover. After two minutes stir, cover again. Wait another 3-5 minutes and turn off heat. Add salt to taste.

4. Mix together sausage and a swiss chard in large bowl.

Serving options:

• Add another tsp of pepper (I ground 5 tellicherry peppers for a stronger punch). This helps offset the sweetness of the dish.
• Serve with biscuits or some toasted rye bread
• Add a poached egg on top for a breakfast feel
• Add either roasted walnuts or pepitas (or leftover cooked pumpkin seeds from all that pumpkin you’ve been having ahem… note to self)

Alternative Options:

• Vegetarian: Use northern or cannellini beans instead of sausage
• Depending on what’s in your fridge you can easily exchange the chard for one of the other leafy greens mentioned above.
• Sausage: Two sausage rants in one post is not enough. This is a dish simply modified by what’s in your pantry and fridge along with your personal taste. Want it spicy? Skip the apples and add in peppers to your onions as they caramelize. Spice it up with red pepper flakes instead of black pepper and a spicy italian sausage (I would definitely add cheese on top, like mozz or parm, to this one)