Baking Bonanza: Birthday Bash

Heya Nesters! This weekend I was delighted to be graced with the presence of my Dad. You see, his birthday is today and he decided to come take a trip up here {from NYC} for the weekend to see family and friends.  And Saturday night we planned a nice dinner together in my humble {and dinner table-lacking} abode. 

I made a serious meal of pork tenderloin in a pomegranate sauce {Amazing recipe! I've made it several times and I HIGHLY recommend trying it.} with purple roasted mini potatoes, lemon sauteed brussel sprouts and homemade apple pie.  Yum!

If you remember from this post last week, I made monkey bread, apple crisp and my first attempt at apple pie. From what I hear, apple pie is the test of a truly good baker. Well, I cheated and used the Pillsbury pre-made pie dough. Here is last week's pie:

Both look pretty good, huh?  It's too bad the first one was completely doughy on the bottom crust.  I'm not kidding, it was not cooked at all! R.A.W.  Gross. *Two Thumbs Way Way Down* So I contacted Ally over at High Heels & Aprons and asked her what to do with a soggy crust and she pointed me in the right direction!  {Thanks Ally!}  I ended up just forgetting about my original pie and trying Ally's recipe that looked so darn good.  Low and behold, it was PHENOMENAL! 

Looks kind of awesome right? I love that you cook the apples before putting them in the crust. It makes for a really creamy, soft filling that is tasty like you wouldn't believe!

So, happy birthday Dad and I hope you enjoyed your apple pie!  

Nesters, have you had any recent apple pie success or disaster stories? Or any other cooking or baking tales? Tell us all about it!