October reminds us of cool, crisp days, a rainbow of colored leaves, and Halloween. October is also National Dessert Month. With seasonal ingredients like spicy cinnamon, rich caramel, and decadent pecans, 
autumn is one of the best seasons for baking. Who doesn’t enjoy pumpkin pie heaped with Kool Whip? Or apple pie or crisp? How about pecan pie and the many cobblers?
This
month, on October 26th, I’m releasing my last novella in the Musical
Christmas Series. It’s Lucy –The Clarinetist, and like the preceding
novellas, it includes a recipe that one of the main characters enjoys.
This time it’s Andre Almanza who likes apple pie with a cinnamon crumb
crust.
APPLE PIE WITH CINNAMON CRUMB
CRUST TOPPING
INGREDIENTS:
¾ cup sugar
¼ cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg (optional)
Dash of salt
6 cups thinly sliced pared apples (McIntosh work well)
2 TBSP. butter or margarine
Deep Dish Pastry for a 9-inch pie (You need only the bottom crust)Heat oven to 425 degrees. Prepare pastry or use one purchased from the store. (Frozen deep dish varieties work best.)
Stir together sugar, flour,
nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt and mix with apples. Turn into pastry-lined pan and dot with butter.
CINNAMON CRUMB CRUST:
Mix 1 cup flour, ½ cup cold butter, 2 tsp. cinnamon, and ½ cup (packed) brown sugar. Cut dry ingredients into butter with pastry cutter until crumbly.
Carefully spread the mixture on the top of the
apples, packing it down around the edges.
Bake 40 to 50 minutes.
NOTE: You many need to cover topping with aluminum foil for the last ten minutes to prevent excess browning. Serve warm with ice cream or whipped cream.
BLURB:
A merry novella for the holiday season!
Lucy Ciaffonni wants nothing
more than to start her own public relations firm, but she’s stuck at the local
bank performing boring communications and advertising duties. When her best
friend and computer guru, Andre Almanza, buys an area farm to create a barn
theater, Lucy is pulled into the mystery of discovering where a rare, German, H.F.
Kayser clarinet was hidden on the property during Prohibition.
Andre Almanza has always adored
Lucy from afar. He hopes she’ll take the position of barn theater manager. When
she agrees to help him renovate the barn and update and furnish his huge
Victorian house, he is delighted—that is, until the entire town becomes involved
in locating the missing antique instrument. To complicate matters, there are ruthless
people who want to recover the expensive clarinet and cash in on its legend and
value.
Will Lucy and Andre locate the clarinet and finally acknowledge the sparks of romance that have been smoldering between them for the longest time? Will it be the perfect Christmas?
GET YOUR PRE-ORDER AND COPY OF "LUCY ~ THE CLARINETIST HERE!
