ThisThis recipe is a slight twist on an old favorite.  It is a great Thanksgiving Day dessert because it uses cranberries along with the apples in the filling.  The topping is a traditional streusel topping which is really easy and good for topping any fruit pie or fruit crisp you can make.  I used to use easy frozen pie shells to cut down on the work and the results are still great because the filling and topping are both so good. Ingredients for the filling: 4 Granny Smith apples, peeled and sliced thin 6 ounces fresh cranberries (skip if not available) 1 cup sugar 5 tablespoons flour 5 ounces canned cranberry juice cocktail (substitute 6 ounces water if not using cranberries) 1 home made or frozen pie shell, in a glass pie plate 9 x 1¾ inches ¼ - ½ teaspoon cinnamon if not using cranberries For the streusel topping: ½ cup sugar ¼ cup brown sugar ¾ cup flour 1 ½ cup nuts, chopped, walnuts or my favorite – pecans 4 ½ ounces butter, cold from the fridge, cut up into pats Optional – ¼ teaspoon cinnamon if not using cranberries Optional drizzled white icing: 1 Tablespoon plain yogurt 1 teaspoon water 1 pinch salt ½ cup confection sugar Here are the directions for the best apple pie recipe that I know: Mix all the ingredients for the filling except for the pie crust and cook them in a pot on the stove until most of the cranberries pop.  This will take around five or ten minutes, then let it cool and pour it into the pie crust. Then place all the ingredients for the topping together in a bowl and work the pats of butter into the mix.  I use my hands.  It will not blend into a smooth mixture and that is okay.  The mix will be pretty loose and have lots of chunks and that’s okay too.  Spread the topping onto the pie and bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes until the topping begins to brown and the filling is starting to bubble through the topping.  It will rise a little bit while baking and fall a little when it cools. After cooling, try the optional white icing.  Just whisk all the icing ingredients listed above until the mixture is completely smooth.  Then drizzle it in strings onto the cooled pie; you can use an empty ketchup squeeze bottle, piping bag or just a spoon. If cranberries are not available, or you want to make a more traditional apple pie you can just skip the cranberries.  Then substitute 6 ounces of water for the cranberry juice cocktail.  You can also add ¼ - ½ teaspoon cinnamon to both the filling and the topping for that old fashioned apple pie taste. “Streusel” comes from the German word meaning something that is sprinkled or scattered, and is related to the English verb “strew”.  This topping can also be baked on top of muffins, cakes or breads.  It’s so easy to make and has a big impact.