Sweet Cherry Pie with Cornmeal Streusel

After emerging from the north woods and a brief stint back in D.C. to trade my spring sweaters for summer sun dresses, I headed to Berea, Kentucky, where I'm living for the month of July. I'm here on a research fellowship with the Berea College Appalachian Sound Archives, studying the collection of East Kentucky banjo player, songwriter, hotel owner, postmaster, sheriff, and mother of six, Nora E. Carpenter.

As I'm in the process process of constructing a picture of who Nora Carpenter was, I'm also getting my bearings in this place--learning the trails and best blackberry picking spots around the house where I'm staying, finding the best rural ice cream stands and swimming holes, checking out the bars and donut shops and record stores in nearby cities, and trying to make friends--making sure that I keep my head just enough out of the archives.

Berea is a unique place, with its concentration of local artisans and craftspeople, not to mention its number of famous local residents including bell hooks and Jean Ritchie. But in many ways, Berea College seems to be the life pulse of the town, with its radical history of race and gender equality, belief in community and cultural diversity, and emphasis on integration of intellectual and manual labor.

Though things are a little quiet on campus now, with school out of session, I've been taking advantage of some of the school's resources, in particular the Berea College Farm. The farm is one of the oldest student-operated educational farms in the country, and is abundant with over 500 acres of cattle, hogs, chickens and eggs, goats, fish, honey bees, grains, fruits, vegetables and herbs.

Many of the products from the farm can be purchased at the Berea College Farm Store a block from downtown. They sell meat and produce, flowers and herbs, fresh baked goods, and a new favorite indulgence of Crank & Boom Ice Cream, made in nearby Lexington.

So when I set out to make a pie--another practice that always helps ground me in the place where I am--I bought most of the ingredients from the Farm Store and other local producers. I've been trying out the Kentucky-milled all-purpose flour from Weisenberger Mill as well as a red heirloom cornmeal from nearby Salamander Springs Farm.

Though no sour cherries (my favorite) were to be found, this sweet cherry and cornmeal combination is auspicious-- the sweet and smooth flavor and texture of the cherries pairing perfectly with the grit and grain of the cornmeal. And of course, these pie slices were topped with some of that Crank & Boom-- of the Bourbon Honey variety.

 Sweet Cherry Pie with a Cornmeal Streusel
Adapted from The Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book

Ingredients
Nothing in the House pie crust, halved
1 small baking apple, peeled and shredded
5 cups sweet cherries, pitted
2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3 Tablespoons cornstarch (potato starch may also be used)
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
2 dashes Angostura bitters

For cornmeal streusel:
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cornmeal (I used Salamander Springs' red heirloom cornmeal)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup salted butter, cold and cubed

Directions
For the crust:
1. Prepare half of the Nothing-in-the-House pie crust as per the directions. Chill dough at least 1 hour before rolling out and fitting into a greased and floured 9-inch pie pan. Place pie plate in fridge for about 20 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

2. Once you've let the pie crust chill, prick crust with a fork all over the bottom. Line crust with parchment paper and pie weights or dried beans and bake for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, remove weights, and bake 3 more minutes. Let crust cool completely and once cool, place in fridge while you prepare the pie filling.

3. Preheat (or leave on) oven to 425 degrees F. To prepare the streusel top, stir together the flour, cornmeal, and brown sugar in a medium bowl, Sprinkle in the butter pieces and toss to coat. Rub the butter into the dry ingredients with your fingers until the butter is incorporated and the mixture is lumpy but not homogenous. Place in the fridge to chill for at least 15 minutes while you prepare the filling. 

4. Place shredded apple, pitted cherries, lemon juice, brown sugar, cornstarch, sea salt, cinnamon, cardamom, and bitters in a large bowl and toss until well mixed. Pour the filling into the refrigerated pie shell and evenly distribute the chilled streusel on top. 

5. Brush pie crust with an egg wash and sprinkle with Turbinado sugar, if desired. Place pie on a baking sheet on the lowest rack of the oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes, then reduce heat to 375 degrees F and continue to bake until the crust is a deep golden brown and the filling juices are bubbling throughout, about 30-35 minutes longer.

6. Remove pie from oven and let cool completely on a wire rack, about 2-3 hours (if you can wait that long). Serve slightly warm or at room temperature. We enjoyed ours with Crank and Boom's Bourbon Honey ice cream.



Related Recipe:
Sour Cherry Pie

Maira Kalman's Cherry Pie

I love Maira Kalman and also love that she loves pie. I can't wait to check out her illustrated edition of Michael Pollan's Food Rules.

Pop Art Pie

Cherry Pie by Roy Lichtenstein c. 1962. It can be yours for a mere $3,218,500. Or you could just make your own.

Pi(e) Day in Ontario

A former Nelper and friend Kara sent in these photos of her family's Pi(e) Day celebration in London Ontario. She says,

We had our pie baking day on Friday, during which we cooked five pies--apple, blueberry, cherry, chocolate raspberry torte and a sweet pinto bean pie-- in addition to two dozen butter tarts (a Canadian treasure, our recipe for which is top secret!). Your nothing-in-the-house pie crust recipe has been a real hit with my relatives over the last few months. It made a lovely addition to my spinach and tomato quiche and the last two pies I made Friday.

We took some pictures of the pie enjoyment zone while we ate the chocolate raspberry torte.


The first picture is of my grandma looking skeptical before eating the pie and then her smiling afterwards.


Thanks for the recipes for the tart and the pinto bean pie! DELICIOUS!

Also, March 14th is Albert Einstein's birthday! The picture I've included is one of my favorites of him; I imagine this is what his PEZ would look like!

HAPPY PI(e) DAY!

Thanks to Kara for these sweet words and photos. For another Canadian pie story, check out this radio piece on PRX. Stay tuned for more Pi(e) Day documentation coming soon...

Damn Fine Pie

Heather got me this print from Chicago's Slow Industries for Christmas. Smiling coffee and cherry pie-- damn fine!

A new farm and cherry pie.

This is a story of two friends, a whole lotta manual labor,
and a dream of growing delicious, organic goodness.

Abra and Jess have started their dream and oh my, how they are succeeding. They are currently growing multitudes of produce and selling it both at local farm markets and to various restaurants in Chicago. Bare Knuckle Farm is on its way!


The last weekend in July, Bare Knuckle Farm hosted its first annual work weekend--a gathering of various friends and ne'er-do-wells who rolled up their sleeves to paint a barn, build a permanent herb bed, weed (and weed and weed and weed), feed chickens and geese, haul rocks from Lake Michigan to be built into an outdoor oven. Despite a few rain clouds and the necessary breaks for fun, a lot of work was accomplished--really!


But let's remember that this is a pie blog, and as such, we must eventually bring this story around to pie. Well, the produce itself is situated on an old farm that houses lots of other deliciousness--like these beautiful cherry trees.


One resident pie baker insisted that we pick a few to make a pie. Twist our arms! We got busy picking, then Jess sat down to pit them all.

That man is a cherry-pitting machine! After that, Jill worked her magic. Flour flew and fingers kneaded, and after sitting a spell in the oven, those babies were baked to perfection.


Of course, we had to wait for them to cool a bit--oh, the torture! That gave us time to play the best.party.game.ever! (Tie breaking round to be held at the Bare Knuckle Farm's second annual work weekend in 2010.) Despite the intensity of the game, the smell drove us to indulge in pie before too long. Jill was so kind as to dish it up with some vanilla ice cream. The perfect combination of sweet and tart, with a wonderfully crumbly crust.


Abra, Jill, Mary, Sara, Anika, Jess, and Erik in the Pie Enjoyment Zone (PEZ).


In our pie-induced stupor, we decided we needed to show the PEZ from another angle.


But really, there's no better indication of the success of a pie than the Breakfast Test.


And it passed that one with flying colors.

Thank you for two delicious cherry pies, Jill!
And thank you, Abra and Jess, for starting a great new tradition.

Guest Submission: Cherry-Hobo-Campfire Pie with Serendipity Shavings

The epic tale of this pie begins with an act of faith: my housemate announced that we would be having an inter-house Easter potluck/bonfire and that we all ought to make something. I'd never been to an Easter dinner before, and that fact may or may not have had something to do with the decision to make a pie, my first ever. We happened to have some canned cherries lying around the kitchen, and I went to the Bestway in search of some butter (and also to Pfeiffer's for a bike tube, but that is unrelated).

I've made lots of food and food-like things before, but never pie. I don't feel biased against pies--I happen to enjoy them very much. I just tend to make more food-for-the-week stuff, like soups. But for whatever reason, the spirit had moved me, so to speak, in the direction of a cherry pie.

I was raised Jewish, and the people who raised me Jewish live in Florida, so there was no religion or family to distract me from this pie.

Given that this was my first pie, I was very nervous about the crust falling apart. I've heard the horror stories. I checked a couple cookbooks and the general consensus is that the ingredients have to be really cold before rolling them out onto a pie tin. I thus spent as much, if not more time refrigerating the crust ingredients before starting than I would baking the pie. I heated the canned cherries with brown sugar and a thickening agent. I put the latter on top of the former, refrigerated it again just to be sure, and then baked it on 400F for 50 minutes.


At some point in this process my housemate told me that, in fact the Easter potluck had been canceled due to lack of neighborly interest, but we'd probably have the bonfire later on.

At 6:28:46 in the PM I sent out a text message about this resurrection-themed bonfire. A few minutes later I received a call from the host of this blog, although at the time I did not know that this blog existed. Emily said "word on Irving street is that there is a bonfire at your house!" I said "yes, and I made a pie." To which Emily said, "no way, did you know I have a blog about pies?". To which I said "well, it's my first pie ever so it probably isn't worth blogging about." To which, of course, she said "woah I have a whole section about first pies!"

A gang assembled in my backyard after sundown. Pie was consumed hobo-style, which is to say, passed around a campfire, eaten directly from the tin with a single shared fork.

My coincidence of having made a pie for a pie-blogger (and subsequently writing for her blog myself) was dwarfed by other serendipitous and auspicious events. Emily, it turned out, had a friend in common with Isabel, and they phoned him from beside the campfire. It was also revealed that when Iga moved to DC, her best friend Jimmy gave her the phone number of my friend Jordan, who was also present at the bonfire and pictured next to me in the photo above.

I am happy to have discovered this blog, the connections between the people described herein, and the fun to be had from piebaking.

-Sam

Thanksgiving - It Happens

Thanksgiving at Meghan and Gahlord's this year was somewhat subdued but very homey and fun. The dinner was delicious, particularly Angela's brussel sprouts, Meghan's vegetarian gravy, Stacy's spicy stuffing and my cranberry sauce, if I say so myself!

So after lots of liquor and laying around, the pies arrived, some fresh from the oven!

Here's Meghan's pumpkin pie. I rolled out the crust on this one, so it was a little funky, but the pie itself was smooth and spicy - a classic.

Here's Meghan's apple pie. Again, I rolled out the crust, so funkiness occurred. Perfectly seasoned (with help from Ben P.B.), the apples were melt-in-your-mouth awesome.

Here's my cherry pie. Not too sweet with a doughy crust, this pie was almost not healthy-tasting! Stacy liked it.

Here's Stacy's pumpkin pie, which had an awesome flavor and gorgeous look but kinda fell flat due to underwhipped chiffon, not that anyone would've known if Stacy hadn't been so pissed about it!

Ah, lounging. It was good to see Adam and some new faces, too. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

Alright, back to my cherry pie breakfast. Love, Mandy

PS Meat pies! I totally spaced. 'Hey, Mandy, got any room for meat pie in that story?'
One was a tourtière, made by J.B., which people just adored. This style of meat pie originates in Quebec, is enjoyed by people with (and without) Quebecois ancestry throughout Canada and Vermont and is usually made with ground pork and/or veal and/or beef. I believe J.B.'s pie involved venison, but I'm not sure. With a perfect flaky crust and great mix of meats and vegetables, I have no doubt this meat pie would make many a meateater's 'best of' list.

The second pie was a meaty quiche by Tanner. I am not positive what it involved, though I think it was sausage. I did note how lovely the meat and veggies looked on the top of the quiche. Yum.

George Washington Cherry Pie

I made this pie today for Thanksgiving at Meghan and Gahlord's house because I wanted to make a light pie that would be relatively low on the glycemic index. I had Gahlord in mind. Cherries are lower than many fruits, and the pie has very little refined sugar in it, using apple cider and the sweetness of cherries instead, except for the topping, in which I reduced the sugar but still used it because, well, it's Thanskgiving. Here's the recipe:
  
George Washington Cherry Pie
 
Ingredients:
1 1/3 c. wheat flour
1/4 tsp. sea salt
1/4 c. canola oil
1/2 c. + 1/3 c. apple cider
4 c. fresh or frozen cherries
2 Tblsp. arrowroot powder
1/2 c. all purpose flour (could use wheat)
1/4 c. sugar
2 Tblsp. butter

For the crust:
1. Combine and sift 1 1/4 cups wheat flour and 1/4 t sea salt. Add 1/4 cup canola or other oil and combine until oil is in pea-sized clumps. Add about 1/2 cup of apple cider and just mix, adding more cider if you need to. Refrigerate for 10 minutes. 
2. Roll out crust as thin as you can and put in a greased pie plate. Weigh it down to prevent bubbling in the oven with another pie plate filled with dried beans (or whatever technique you like). Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes until it just starts to brown.

For the filling:
Pit and half 4 cups of fresh cherries (I used frozen ones from this summer, already pitted). Put in a sauce pan with 1/4 cup of apple cider and simmer until cherries are good and soft, about 10 minutes. If you have a ridiculous amount of liquid, pour some off and drink it and think of my mother, who always does this! Combine 1/4 cup apple cider with 2 T arrowroot powder and add to cherries. Turn off heat. It should gel up.

For the crumb topping:
Combine 1/2 cup flour, 1/4 cup sugar and 2 T butter.

Put the pie together; you know how. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-15 more minutes, until the topping browns lightly. You might also want to put a tray underneath the pie because it might leak!

Happy Birthday (Pie), Grant!

For my brother's 21st birthday I made him a fresh cherry pie. I also gave him a bottle of Maredsous beer, which is brewed at the monastery in Belgium where my grandma's cousin Renee is a monk--it was Grant's 21st, after all, and being his older sister, I felt obliged to supply him with some sort of booze).

I used fresh Michigan cherries--part Rainer (the yellow variety) and part Bing (the stains-your-hands-deep-red variety). I had hoped to use sour cherries because they seem to make better and more flavorful pies, but they didn't have any at the local Elkhart, Indiana grocery store.

I used the recipe from my mom's old "Joy of Cooking"(not sure what year). It called for tapioca, but I substituted it for flour because I didn't want it to have that gelatin-like consistency that many cherry pies seem to have. I used my standard crust recipe, though we didn't have whole wheat pastry flour, so I just went with all-purpose.

Thanks to mom for sacrificing her hand's skin tone by cutting the pits out of the cherries (we couldn't find our pitter).

To do the lattice top (a signature mark of cherry pie!) I cut a template out of cardboard so that each strip of dough would be approximately the same width. It was my first independent-attempt at lattice top and I was pleased with how it turned out.

I think my brother was as well, though this picture doesn't do much to show it:

We topped it with DQ soft serve. Don't know if there are pics of us in the pie enjoyment zone, though.