Sweet as...

Cherry Pie

Afternoon bloggers and readers! As promised here is a post about my first cherry pie making experience. (from scratch) I researched multiple recipes throughout the week and found a recipe I liked the ingredients of, printed it, clipped it…and made it better!

Now, I know what you are thinking…why spend that time researching and not using it. Well I did…kinda…it was a guideline more than anything. I am the type of person who likes to cook by taste, yeah their recipe may be lovely but I may want a bit of vanilla in mine as well as almond extract or…well you get the idea. So let’s get down to it…

Filling:

4 tubs of Cherries (250g each)

½ cup of granulated sugar

1 tbls of almond extract

1tbls of vanilla extract

2 tbls corn starch (corn flour in the uk) *I couldn’t find any so I used normal plain flour tasting the stewing cherries to make sure I didn’t loose the taste.

Crust (doubled up the recipes):

1 ½ cup of Plain (all purpose flour)

¾ cup of Lard (Crisco)

1 good heaped tbls of salted butter

½ cup of water.

2 tsp of sugar.

*My pie crust though very tasty turned out to me almost like the texture of a graham cracker crust instead of the flaky effect I was hoping for. It’s a learning process and to any new cooks just always try different routes till you find the one perfect for you.

1. I mixed all my dry ingredients with the food processor.

2. Put in the lard and butter in cubed or pinch and blended till it was crumbly. I tipped into a bowl and formed into 4 balls each weighing between 3 to 5 oz.

3. I put them in the fridge to chill, while they chilled I removed the seeds from the cherries. (best to put on a movie as you do this, it can get a bit old quick.

4. Take the pitted cherries and place into a pot with ½ cup of water, sugar, extracts and corn starch into a large pot. Reduce down on a medium heat.

5. While simmering down I removed the dough to a floured surface. (I found this easier to do between two sheets of grease proof paper to keep them from sticking to the rolling pin.)

6. When the dough is flat I removed the top paper and put the pin tin on the top and flipped it right side up. I found this easier to keep the dough from coming apart.

7. Make sure your cherries have reduced down enough as you don’t want a lot of juice in the pie. (The corn starch helps to thicken it)

8. After the pie base it ready and your cherries have cooled some placed them into the pie and rolled out the lid for it and place it on top with a light brush of butter over the dough.

9. Bake at 350deg F 175deg C for about 45minutes (or until golden brown)

10. Take out when ready, let cool and then enjoy.

It has turned out wonderful!

There are a few things I may try differently. I might prebake the crust next time and do an egg wash over the top and try some lemon juice in the cherries and use milk instead of water.