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Fresh blueberry pie |
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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Posted: 30 July 2012 at 19:44 |
My lonesome little blueberry bush in the backyard has been going hog wild with the warm and damp weather lately. So I picked some this weekend and made pie. Well, I was lazy and picked up a pre-made pie shell at the store. Last time I'll do that. What a pain in the butt! The bottom was ok, but the dough for the top was impossible to work with. It was so thin I couldn't do anything without tearing it. Made the best of it I could.
6 cups more or less of fresh blueberries, washed and cleaned of leaves, stems, etc. Mix the blueberries together with 3/4 cup sugar, 1/2 cup flour, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon and pour into pie shell. Here's my horrible attempt to get the top crust on. Did the best I could. From now on I'm making crust from scratch, no matter how much free time I have! lol. Bake at 425 for 35-45 minutes, removing the foil from the outer edge for the last 15 minutes. Let cool for 2 hours minimum. I've got an hour an a half to go... the smell is divine! Can't wait to try a slice. |
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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that is NICE, mike - excellent!
no fresh blueberries here, but we do have a few containers of them; i'm judging enough to make one. does the same basic formula work for strawberries? we've got lots of those in the freezer!
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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Hmmm. I've never tried it with strawberries, but I bet it would work just fine! pretty similar water content in them I'd imagine.
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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i never realized making a berry pie was that easy - just some sugar, flour andcinnamon, then in the shell. easy as....pie....
definitely a "gotta-do," and soon.....
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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Ron, I was looking at strawberry pie recipes online and it looks like most of them call for corn starch instead of flour, about 2 or 3 tablespoons. And they all use pectin to help firm it up.
But yeah pies are pretty easy. It's the crust that is a pain usually. |
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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This wouldn't be complete without a plated pic
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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bee-yoo-tee-ful! i'd be all over that; it must have been good!
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ChrisFlanders
Chef's Apprentice Joined: 01 March 2012 Location: Flanders Status: Offline Points: 343 |
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That looks like a very easy thing to do and the bleuberries are in season here too. I'm sure gonna try this, Mike! A few days ago I went to a "pick our own" fruitfarm but the bleuberries were still too delicate to be handled by too much people. I ate a muffin with fresh bleuberries in their café. A-ma-zing! So amazing that I asked for the recipe but all I got were a few tips; use almond powder and lemon zeste... dugh and help! |
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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Thanks Chris, I hope you do give it a try. It's a great dessert that's easy to make.
As for the muffins, I haven't heard of any with almond powder in them. I bet they're good! Seems like blueberries and almonds would be a good combination together. If I still get enough blueberries from my bush this season, I'm going to try this recipe for muffins. It looks pretty good. Maybe I'll find some almond powder and substitute it for some of the flour. http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/08/dairy-contest-finalist-recipe-the-awesome-est-blueberry-muffins/ |
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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One thing you may have noticed in my pie, I didn't mix it up very well and I should have. There were parts where the flour and sugar mix had formed into hard little dough balls. You can see some at the top of the sliced pic, right under the top crust. It was still good, almost like having streusel inside the pie. I think this might be because my blueberries are so big, about 1/2 an inch in diameter for most of them, that the flour mixture doesn't mix in as well. I had quite a lot left over that didn't stick to the berries, which I just dumped on top. I should have mixed it in better. Also when mixing it I tried not to break any of the berries, because I like them whole in the pie. I'm sure if I had been more aggressive with the mixing the flour would have stuck to the berries better. But oh well, it's still yummy and it's not going to stop me from eating it!
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Margi Cintrano
Master Chef Joined: 03 February 2012 Location: Spain Status: Offline Points: 6357 |
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Love blueberry pie Pitrow ...
Thanks for posting your recipe and for all the feedback on the thread from other Food Forum Members.
Kind regards,
Margaux.
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Volamos a Mediterraneo, un paraiso que conquista su gente u su cocina.
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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mike - we had a bunch of blueberries and 2 pre-made/pre-frozen pie crusts, so i'm trying this right now, using the second pie crust for the top and following nearly the same procedure you are. the only difference is that i didn't quite have enough blueberries, so i bought a small tub of frozen raspberries, drained them after thawing and added them. the moisture helped bind the flour and sugar so it all got mixed well, and i'm hoping it turned out well.
just put it in the oven, we'll see how it goes. that top crust was a challenge - should have taken it out of the foil pan before it thawed! |
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Daikon
Chef's Apprentice Joined: 20 October 2011 Location: San Francisco Status: Offline Points: 381 |
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It can be that easy, but the trick to berry pies is guessing how much thickener you need to add so that the filling sets up the right amount -- the right amount varies with the fruit, its ripeness, sugar and pectin content, etc. An easy and delicious way to cheat on that with blueberries is to make a blueberry-pear pie. The pears provide more structure, so you almost never end up with a soupy pie this way.
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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That blueberry and pear pie recipe looks really good, and certainly would be one to try. I'm guessing that the pectin in the pears is what helps with the structure. The walnut-streusel topping sounds like a perfect way to top it off!
My attempt finished pretty well; even though the crust went into the oven looking completey shredded, by the time it came out it looked ok. After cooling for exactly two hours (everyone was counting down the last minute or 5), the pie cut easily into 6 pieces, and the filling held pretty well. I took a couple of pictures and will post.
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Daikon
Chef's Apprentice Joined: 20 October 2011 Location: San Francisco Status: Offline Points: 381 |
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Their pectin probably does help some, but layering slices of pear also produces a laminate with some structural integrity that won't ooze all over your plate.
And it is very tasty. Unless you've got really, really good blueberries that can star on their own, I think that the depth of the combined pear and blueberry flavor actually makes a better pie. There are lots of recipes for blueberry-pear pie, and plenty of room to experiment, so do a little searching and have fun.
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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That was exactly the same problem I ran up against! However I made this again when the second batch of blueberries were ready, and taking the top crust out of the tin before thawing didn't really make much of a difference. It was still hard to work with and fell apart on me. |
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Mike
Life in PitRow - My often neglected, somewhat eccentric, occasionally outstanding blog |
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TasunkaWitko
Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9356 |
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Finally, here are the pictures etc. from when I gave this a try: Hard to believe, but, but that top crust is actually very pieced-together, due to the troubles mentioned above:
It looked like a mess going in but, in my opinion, the final result looks kind of nice.
We served the pie up simply with some whipped topping:
The taste was really good. The blueberries and raspberries were a good match (how could they be anything but?) and the crust, whihc wasn't soggy or limp, had a good flavour to it.
Taking Mike's experience into consideration, I made sure that the filling ingredients were well-mixed. I used raw (turbinado) sugar, and probably added just a little too much sugar or (more likely) flour to the mix; the filling was quite firm, but not in a bad way. Since I enjoy the effect that cinnamon has on things like this, I used probably twice what his method called for, and enjoyed the extra zing provided.
All-in all: success, I think, especially for a first attempt! The only thing I would do differently is perhaps cut the sugar and the flour just a little bit, but not much, and see what the result is like. Thanks to Mike for showing me just how easy something like this can be, and how good the results are. I honestly would never have believed it without seeing it.
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pitrow
Master Chef Joined: 22 November 2010 Location: Newberg, Oregon Status: Offline Points: 1078 |
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Ah, it's that time of year again. I waited a little long and a lot of my blueberries had dropped already. I'm kind of picky and won't eat them once they've fallen off, I know call me weird. Anyway picked two quarts (8 cups) the other day. Might have to find the time to make some more pie tonight.
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Mike
Life in PitRow - My often neglected, somewhat eccentric, occasionally outstanding blog |
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HistoricFoodie
Admin Group Joined: 21 February 2012 Location: Kentucky Status: Offline Points: 4940 |
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Mike, if you use the premade crusts try laying what will be the top crust on your cutting board and cutting it in slices. Then lay them over the top to form a lattice.
It's a bit easier than wrestling with what is basically a brittle dough. That said, far as I'm concerned your pix from last year look great. Where is it written that the crust has to be a solid sheet? |
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