Dye Free Halloween: Pumpkin Spice Apple Pie + More

Halloween is a season of candy and spooky treats. Most candy in America is unfortunately filled with lots of artificial food dyes. I’m all for things in moderation, but I think you can have plenty of fun and tasty treats without the extra disruptive dyes. To start, you can never go wrong with locally picked farm apples. My family had a fun weekend of apple picking where we ended up with 10+ lbs. of organic apples. It was a great outing but preserving that many apples kept me busy for a week! I used up a good chunk of the harvest making delicious homemade apple sauce in the slow cooker. This quickly turned into baking more family favorite dye free Halloween treats. 

The first treat to use up these apples is a delicious pumpkin spice apple pie with a flaky lard pie crust. This recipe is great when you are running low on precious butter. By using lard or shortening, you can still achieve a flaky short crust for your pie. The lack of butter in the filling does not take away from how lovely it’s spiced and the smoothness of the sliced apples. This recipe goes wonderful with a HUGE scoop of vanilla ice cream and is a Dye Free American Classic family favorite.

Flaky Sweet Lard Pie Crust

1. Combine dry ingredients, including cinnamon if adding. 
2. Cut fat with forks or knives into pea-sized amounts.
3. Add water until the crust is smooth and combined.
4. Let pie dough rest for 30 minutes and make the pie filling while it sits.
5. Preheat your oven to 425 F.
6. After resting, dust a surface with flour and cut the dough in half.
7. Evenly roll out one-half of the dough in a circle to create the bottom crust. Aim for a thickness of 1/4 to 1/2 inch depending on the heaviness of the filling.
8. Roll into your pie dish and keep chilled until ready to fill.
9. For partial baking: poke holes in the bottom of the pie crust and bake for 10 minutes without starting to brown the crust.

To Freeze or Make Ahead: Shape into a disc and wrap tightly to freeze after step 3. When ready to use, defrost it in the fridge overnight and let it sit at room temperature just long enough to roll it easily.

Pumpkin Spice Apple Pie

1. Combine all ingredients except the flour in a large bowl and mix them thoroughly.
2. Sift the flour over the apples and mix thoroughly.
3. Pile the apples high in a pie dish, creating a dome.
4. Roll out the second disc to place on top or cut into long rectangles to do a lattice top. Cut steam holes if using a whole pie disc for the top. 
5. Seal the edges by pressing the crusts together and crimping them.
6. Use the scrap dough to make Halloween shapes and decorations. Place shapes on top with a little egg wash as glue to help it stay in place.
7. Put back in the fridge for ten minutes prior to baking for extra flaky crust, otherwise put an egg wash and a sprinkle of sugar on top to encourage browning and bake for 45 minutes.
8. After that, cover the top with foil, reduce the oven temperature to 350F and let bake for an additional 30-40 minutes until the inside is thickened.

Pumpkin Spice Applesauce

This crockpot apple sauce was my favorite apple recipe in my preservation because it was the easiest way to get a delicious end result. This treat is dye-free, and the natural color of the slow-cooked apples and pumpkin spices make it a lovely fall snack.

1. Add all ingredients to the crockpot and set on high for 6-8 hours, or low for 10-12 hours. If using frozen apples, add an extra hour or two.
2. After cooking, mash and/or whisk until combined and desired thickness is reached.
3. Refrigerate and enjoy within 3 weeks.

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Starting Compost from Kitchen Scraps

Even with winter approaching, you can still start a kitchen scrap compost. It will still decompose, although it will be slower due to the colder temperatures. By the time spring rolls around it should be ready to use and give your plants an extra boost. 

Starting a compost from kitchen scraps is a good way to homestead no matter where you are in your journey. It’s an efficient use of your resources and reduces waste. Check out this article for more habits to begin a homestead lifestyle without spending any money.