Miss Dove's Apple Pie

This Apple Pie is an old family favourite, made by Mum usually to finish off a roast dinner.  It was a favourite of Dad's (Col Skelton) and he loved it served with vanilla ice cream.  Mum wrote all her favourite old recipes in a handwritten recipe journal, but sadly, it has gone missing.  Luckily between us we have been able to resurrect a number of her recipes through memory.  Many of the recipes I recall were in imperial measurements, thanks to Robs for doing the conversions on this one.  This pie is a bit of work to make but well worth the effort.

Preheat Oven to 170c.

Pastry
3/4 cup soft butter
3/4 cup caster sugar
approximately 1 cup milk (add as needed)
1 lightly beaten egg
3 cups self raising flour - sifted
Scraped vanilla bean
Pinch of salt

Filling
6 large granny smith apples - peeled and sliced
9 whole cloves
Juice of 2 lemons
1/3 cup water
1/3 cup sugar

Cream butter and sugar in electric mixer.
By hand - add egg and vanilla bean seeds.
Mix in flour and salt alternately with the milk (you may not need all the milk) until the pastry forms a ball.
Minimum handling of the pastry at this stage will give it a finer texture.
Wrap in clingwrap and refrigerate (best for 30 minutes) while making the apple filling.

Grease a deep ovenproof dish with butter.
Place sliced apples, sugar, water, lemon juice and cloves into a medium saucepan and cook with lid on for approx 10 minutes or until apples are softened.
Take off stove and leave to cool.
When cooled, cut pastry into thirds, using 2/3 for the base and 1/3 for the top.
Roll 2 circles, one to fit the base and come up to the top of the dish, and one to fit and cover the top of the pie.  Make sure you have approximately a 3cm overhang of pastry around the top edge to allow for shrinkage.
Place the larger pastry circle into the greased oven dish lining the base and sides, pushing to fit.
Fill the pie dish with the cooled apple mixture
Place the smaller pastry circle over the apples allowing for an even overhang at the sides.
Using a sharp knife trim the excess pastry off making sure you allow for shrinkage.
Press around the edges to seal with your finger or with the handle of a wooden spoon.
Lightly glaze the pastry top with milk using a pastry brush and sprinkle lightly with granulated sugar
Cut some slits in the top to allow the steam to escape
Cook in the preheated oven for approximately 30 minutes or until the pastry is lightly golden.