Sunday, June 20, 2010

CHERRY PIE



There is a first time for everything. A first time for mistakenly attending a wedding reception of complete strangers on a sweltering afternoon and a first time for making a pretty cherry pie. The one gets you feeling hot, sweaty and silly while the other one gets you feeling warm, fuzzy and cheery. I did both this day Sunday. I don't have to tell you which was the better one.

I've had a few questions on how I attended the wrong wedding reception. Well folks, my husband had misread the date of the invitation. (Next time I'll read the invitations). So we went on the wrong day but at the correct place. I got all dressed up just so I could sweat in my nice fancy clothes. Unnecessarily. At the least we provided plenty of amusement for our boys...ho ho ho.


Cherries are so expensive at 56 ringgit per kilo. I had bought a box which was 250 grams at 13.99 ringgit. So I had some adjusting to do for the filling when I decided to do Shirley's of Kokken69 cherry pie recipe from her lovely blog. But it was a perfect amount for  the size I made.Which was a sweet 6 inch pie.


The crust however I had followed largely and it turned out light and flaky just as Shirley had described. Lovely.




The recipe ~ from Shirley of Kokken69 ~

The filling recipe to which I had made some adjustments because I like a pie fruit filling a little soft and juicy as opposed to somewhat raw. So I cooked it.


250 gm fresh cherries
3 T sugar, according to how sweet or less sweet you want it
Juice of 1 lime
1 T cornflour
4-5 T water


Bring all the ingredients together in a small pan or pot. Make sure the cornflour is dissolved. Stir constantly. Bring to a simmer and allow to simmer until the syrup is thick, the cherries a little soft and and the whole looks juicy ans syrupy. It doesn't take long at all. Just 6-7 minutes or less. Adjust for sweetness. I had put too little sugar and I found it to be not sweet enough.

 The crust ~

165 plain flour
113.5 gm chilled butter
1-2 T iced water
pinch of salt
granulated sugar to sprinkle


Sift flour into a medium bowl. Add the salt and mix well. Grate the butter into the bowl. Just use your fingers lightly to mix the butter and flour up evenly. I did not crumble the mixture until it became fine breadcrumbs because I wanted the pastry to be more flaky. Add iced water and stir the mixture and then using your fingers bring the dough together into a firm ball. Do not knead so that the butter does not melt and the gluten is not worked up. Too much kneading will make a tough pastry. 


Once the pastry comes together, chill it if necessary and then roll out in between 2 pieces of baking paper to 1/8 inch thick. Cut a round slightly larger than the pie pan and then lift the pastry and line the pan. Cut the edges to neaten.


At this point I beat an egg and brushed the pastry with egg just so that it will not get sogged (I invent my own words just in case you haven't noticed or if you're new to this blog) by the cherry pie filling.


Top with the cherry filling and refrigerate while you prepare the top crust.


Gather up the pieces of dough into a ball, roll out to 1/8 inch thick and cut strips as I did or thinner if you like. Lay the strips over the filling as you like, latticed or not, press the edges to seal, neaten the edges by running a knife around the edge of the pan  and then sprinkle granulated sugar over the top. 


Bake 30- 35 minutes at 170 C.


21 comments:

Tasty Trix said...

Ok, as beautiful as this pie is (and it's really gorgeous!) I want to hear more about this wedding reception you mistakenly attended! lol.

Shirley @ Kokken69 said...

Hi Zu, I am so happy that you made this. It looks absolutely lovely! Yes,I have come to learn that alot of imported food stuff are really expensive in Malaysia. I just bought more cherries yesterday - a little more expensive than what I paid for earlier- S$6 for 400g. Isn't it great to bake with fresh fruits? Thank you so much for the shout out!

Federica Simoni said...

mmmmmmm.....vista l'ora aspettami per una fetta!!!!:)))

complimenti!ciao!

busygran said...

Beautiful pie! After looking at the pie, I feel like a midnight snack.
How did you do it - wrong wedding? :)

Anonymous said...

cherry in a pie, not on a cake! :P
this is amazing zu!
have always admired people who make pies.
because im never patient enough to get that pastry all decent!
well done ;)

ann low said...

Mmm...I love this too! Already bookmarked it when I saw this at Shirley's site. Beautiful click!

WendyinKK said...

I saw your comment on Shirley's and haha, indeed you made them, and so soon!!!

I just got back from Jusco, but I didn't see any cherries!!!!!
But blueberries were going at 8.99 now, pretty cheap, compared to last month at 15.99.

I'm waiting for my turn at this, that's when I see cherries the next time I go grocery shopping.

fimere said...

aussi belle tarte que celle de shirley kokken je t'en félicite et bravo
bonne soirée

zoom yummy said...

This pie looks wonderful. Delicious. Amazing. I like your cute blog! :) Petra

Linda said...

That is one magnificent pie!
A beautiful cherry pie from a beautiful Cherry on a Cake!
Cherries are about US$4.00 a pound here on sale this week. They are always expensive, but I love them!

Unknown said...

Dreamy pie and dreaming is just what I'll have to do since cherries aren't here yet and even when they do hit the stores I may not be able to afford them.

Memória said...

Beautiful pie and such an amusing story hahaha.

Quinn said...

So this is cherry on a cake making a cherry pie!!!! I must try the crust since you both said it's good! I could tell there's too much pastry, the lattice pattern on top is covering all the oozing juicy cherry filly underneath....

Unknown said...

awesome...

terri@adailyobsession said...

i thot tt only happens to ppl like me so it's comforting to know you make such mistakes too:DD so what happened, did u get your ang pow back??

cherries r 2.50 to 2.90 a kg here n even at tt price i find them expensive. so now i know how expensive they r back home, i will eat a little more of them...pie looks very very good.

Joudie's Mood Food said...

This looks perfect. I love cherry pie. I love all pies. The colours are just so deep and hypnotising.... Wish i had a slice right now....

pam said...

That's too funny!! But this pie is absolutley gorgeous!

Anh said...

I made cherry pie once, a few years back. And it's still the best pie I've made. This looks soo good!

le padelle fan fracasso said...

una sola parola, "favoloso" !!!!
complimenti!

pigpigscorner said...

Beautiful! So glad it's cherry season now, everything is half price!

a quiet life said...

that string tugs at my heart, then my tummy follows!

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