Apple Pudding Pie

I was looking for a non-traditional apple pie for Thanksgiving a few years back and I stumbled upon this one. It is now requested every Thanksgiving. If you like bread pudding, you will love this pie.

The Recipe for: APPLE PUDDING PIE

1 unbaked 9 inch pastry shell (you probably want to do deep dish, there is a lot of filling to be used up)
3 eggs
1 c. applesauce
½ cup fat free vanilla yogurt
½ c. sugar
½ c packed brown sugar
1/3 c. rolled oats
1 tsp. cinnamon
4 slices of bread, cut up (about 3 cups, use stale bread or toast it a little to dry it up)
2 medium cooking apples such as jonathan, rome beauty, or winesap
¼ c packed brown sugar
¼ c flour
2 tbsp butter
½ c nuts (optional)

Directions:
For crust, line the unbaked pastry shell with double thickness of foil. bake in 450 degrees oven for 8 minutes. Remove foil. Bake for 4 minutes more. Remove from oven. Reduce oven temp. to 350 degrees.
For filling, peel, core and slice apples. In a medium mixing bowl stir together eggs, applesauce, yogurt, sugar, ½ c. brown sugar, oats, and cinnamon. stir in bread and apples. set aside.
For topping, in another bowl stir together ¼ c brown sugar and flour. cut in butter until mixture becomes course crumbs. (it is really easy to do in the food processor) Stir in nuts. pour filling into prepared pie crust. sprinkle topping over the filling. cover edge of crust with foil. bake for 30 minutes. remove foil, bake another 30 minutes until top is golden and fruit is tender. makes 8 servings.
hint: Don’t make apples too big or this pie will take forever to cook.