As Dutch as Apple Pie

The best apple pie I've ever had was this summer in Rotterdam at Café Dudok, a great traditional Rotterdam café that also has a nice little kiddie's corner.

Since my friend A generously unloaded 10 kilos of apples on me from her backyard, I've been cooking with apples for weeks: apple-pumpkin soup, apple muffins, apple coffee cake, apple sauce, frozen apple sauce. Even Suzanne is totally appled out - I hear a bit of disdain (or is it disgust?) when Suzanne says "bapple" with her adapted sign of twisting her knuckle in her ear instead of her cheek.

So, with the last kilo I almost replicated the best apple pie I've ever had. It wasn't as pretty but it was damn good. To quote Jérôme, "c'est vraiment pas mal ce dessert". In French terms, "pas mal" is a BIG compliment.

Here's the recipe in Dutch (running it through babblefish doesn't help much) and here's an adapted recipe in English. The secret seems to be the thick crust made with brown sugar, the spring form pan, letting the apples cook a little bit and the crumble topping. That's quite a few secrets actually.

Happy cooking and I'm officially on apple strike as of tomorrow (when the pie and whip cream are all go).