Pies in Japan

I had a day off from school on Monday, so I decided to try to make a pie. Seeing that household baking is not common practice in Japan (the closest thing to an oven most houses have is a microwave/toaster combo), I was worried I would not find the necessary cookware and ingredients to make pie. Luckily, I managed to find mini, glass pie dishes, just the right size to fit inside my toaster oven. Each dish was roughly half the size of a normal pie dish, so I made two mini-pies.

Before I left, I looked up the Japanese words for the ingredients I needed and set out. Luckily there was a small baking section in the store where I found shortening (comes in a squeezable tube, kind of like a big toothpaste tube) and "bread flour" which I bought hesitantly, worried it was "bread mix" which has yeast in it, which they also sell. Apparently, it was just regular old flour (phew!).

Apples are really expensive, and buying yellow apples (because you need variety!) was even more, so I spent about $10 on 6 apples.

The pies turned out great! While they weren't my best work in my opinion, my friends and supervisor were thoroughly satisfied.