Cherry Pie
There are two schools of thought on the procedure for Cherry Pie. One is a standard fruit pie preparation: combining cherries with sugar, flavorings, a thickener, and lemon juice, pouring the mixture into a pie shell, covering with a top crust. The pie is baked until the fruit bubbles, and the oven’s heat thickens the filling.
The alternative method involves making a cherry pie filling by cooking the cherries, sugar, lemon juice, and thickener (cornstarch) on the stove until thickened. After cooling to room temperature, the mixture is placed in the pie shell, covered with a top crust, and baked.
While I’m intrigued by the alternative method and plan to try it in the future, I found that the traditional method for Cherry Pie, as described in the recipe below adapted from The Joy of Cooking, yielded outstanding results. When served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, it makes for the perfect ending to a summer meal.
Sour cherries, either Montmorency or Morello, are the ideal choice for this pie. Their tartness, when balanced with sugar, creates a complex and layered flavor profile. This is akin to the selection of apples for apple pie, where we prefer Empire and Northern Spy varieties over the sweeter Honeycrisp or Fuji.
Naturally every discussion of cherry pie would be incomplete without mentioning the task of cherry pitting. After picking up several quarts at the famers market the last two weekends, we experimented with two types of cherry pitters. A plunger model by Leifheit processed the cherries quickly but did miss a significant number of pits. The Oxo single cherry model took longer yet did a much better job of removing each pit, and it was easier to verify success.
As the sour cherry season is brief and these cherries are seldom found in supermarkets, I suggest visiting your local farmers market this weekend to purchase two quarts of these delightful gems. Once you’ve dealt with the pitting, dive right into this recipe and savor this unforgettable taste of summer.
Cherry Pie
| Yield: 1 9†pie | # of Servings: 8 to 10 |
Ingredients:
1 recipe Summer Pie Dough
Filling:
5 ½ cups sour cherries, pitted1 (about 2 quarts of cherries)
1 ¼ cup (9 oz / 255 g) sugar
¼ cup (1.2 oz / 34 g) cornstarch
2 tbl cherry liquid2
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
¼ tsp almond extract
2 tbl (1 oz / 28 g) unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
Egg wash and sugar:
1 egg, lightly beaten
Turbinado sugar, as needed, (optional)
Special tools and equipment needed:
- 1 9†pie pan
- Cherry pitter
- Pastry wheel, fluted preferred
- Pastry brush
- Baking sheet, large enough to hold the pie pan
Pre-recipe preparations:
- Rinse and pit the cherries. Place in a colander over a bowl to collect the water running off from the cherries (cherry liquid).
Directions
Crust:
1. Roll out the bottom piece of pie dough into a 13†circle. Fit gently into a 9†pie dish.
2. Trim the edge leaving a ½â€ to ¾â€ overhang. Place pie shell in refrigerator, cover loosely with plastic wrap.
3. Roll out remaining dough to 12†circle, place on a large flat surface (silpat, pastry mat, cutting board) and refrigerate.
Filling and finishing for baking:
Preheat oven to 425 °F
1. Combine cherries, sugar, cornstarch, cherry liquid, lemon juice, almond extract in a large bowl.
2. Toss gently and let stand for 15 minutes.
3. Pour into crust, including all the juices that have collected in the bowl. Dot with the butter cubes.
4. Remove top crust from the refrigerator. Using pastry wheel or a knife, cut into ¾â€ strips.
5. Brush edge of pie dish with water or egg wash.
6. Lay 5 to 7 strips of pastry dough across the top in the same direction, making sure they touch the edge of the dough.
7. Create a weave by placing the remaining dough strips over and under the first layer of strips. Follow any YouTube video for help on this, such as the one from King Arthur: How to weave a lattice pie crust – YouTube.
8. Trim the strips close to the edge of the pie. Roll the bottom pastry overhang over the strip edges, and crimp decoratively.
9. Refrigerate for 10 minutes.
10. Brush the lattice with the egg wash and sprinkle pastry strips with turbinado sugar (optional).
Baking: (Total baking time is from 1 hour to 1 hour 12 minutes)
1. Place pie pan directly on oven rack and back for 30 minutes.
2. Remove pie from oven and place on parchment, or silpat, lined baking sheet.
3. Reduce oven temperature to 350 °F. Return the pie to the oven and bake until the juices in the middle of the pie are bubbling, an additional 30 to 42 minutes more. If edge of pie is browning too much, cover edge with aluminum foil.
4. Remove pie from oven and cool on a rack for approximately 3 hours before serving.
5. Pie may be left at room temperature for 1 day. After that, refrigerate or freeze.
Notes:
1 Montmorency cherries are the most common type of sour cherry in the United States. Morellos are another type. Two and half pounds of whole cherries, should yield 5 ½ cups pitted cherries. If using sweet cherries, reduce the sugar to 3/4 cup.
2 Cherry liquid is the cherry tinted water that accumulates as the washed cherries sit in a colander.
