Apple Streusel Bars

This is an excellent recipe for those of us who don't make apple pie because the crust scares us! Whenever my mom visits, we always have some sort of pie because she is awesome at making crusts!! Me~not so much!

This recipe was very good and came together very good!

I do have some changes I will make for next time I make these!

1. I will use vanilla extract in the glaze instead of almond. My family wasn't too thrilled about the almond taste.

2. I will probably try this next time without the glaze. I thought the bars would be less sweet and still really good without the glaze!

I used my canned apple pie filling for this recipe, so I don't know about what the filling tastes like, but I bet it is just as good as the whole recipe turned out!

Apple Streusel Bars

(Our Best Bites cookbook, which I would recommend to anyone!)

Sweet Pastry

• 
  
  2 cups flour


• 
  
  1/2 cup sugar


• 
  
  1/2 tsp salt


• 
  
  1/2 tsp baking powder


• 
  
  1 cup real butter (and it says NO substitutions!)


• 
  
  1 egg, beaten

Apple Filling

• 
  
  1/4 cup flour


• 
  
  1/2 cup sugar


• 
  
  1 tsp cinnamon


• 
  
  4 cups (about 3 medium) sliced, peeled baking apples ~ Granny Smith or Gala is recommended

Glaze

• 
  
  2 cups powdered sugar


• 
  
  1 tsp almond extract (or my recommendation vanilla)


• 
  
  about 3 tbsp milk, whole milk ~ I used 1% which is what I have on hand!

To make the pastry, mix flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder in a medium bowl. (Make sure the bowl is big enough so when you cut in the butter the mixture wont spill out of the bowl.) Cut in butter with a pastry blender or fork until you have pea sized crumbles. (I found it easiest to cut the butter into smaller "pats" and I added 1 cube at a time. I also in the end, with clean hands ran through the mixture and broke apart any remaining large pieces because my arm was getting TIRED!) Gently mix in beaten egg.

Spray a 9 x 13 baking dish with cooking spray. Gently pat about 2/3 of pastry mixture onto the bottom of your dish and set aside. Preheat oven now to 350 degrees.

Now comes the filling. If you are like me and have canned apple pie filling go ahead and pour that all over your pastry crust. If not, do some apple pie filling this year and that will make this a cinch next time!!!

To prepare the filling, combine flour, sugar and cinnamon. Toss with your cut up apples and evenly coat. Spread onto your pastry crust. Sprinkle your reserved pastry mixture over the top of your apples.

Bake at 350 for 40 minutes. When finished, allow to cool completely. (I looked for my crust to start lightly browning before I took it out!)

To prepare glaze, whisk together powdered sugar, almond (or vanilla) extract and enough milk to reach desired consistency.

Drizzle over cooled bars. The book recommended putting in a zip lock bag and cutting a whole in the corner and drizzling this way. I just grabbed a spoon and started letting the glaze drizzle over the edge of it.

Allow the glaze to harden and then cut into bars and enjoy!!