Tidbits & Nuggets

Fresh Cherry Pie

The day after my neice's party we went cherry picking. The season was just finishing up so we had to do a bit of hunting. It was great fun and there were quite a few varieties of cherries. I kept taking pictures hoping they'd be fabulously artistic (Ha!)

I've also never made a cherry pie, especially from fresh cherries. There is one obstacle between the picking and the pie - the pitting. Since this might be the last time I cherry I didn't want to invest in a unitasker like a pitter. My research uncovered one recomendation to use a paper clip to pry out the pit. It took me forever to get a cupful of cherries. I hightailed it to Bristol Farms and picked up a pitter for around $3.00 and proceeded to kick myself for not doing that in the first place. Much better.

My sister had a great recipe and it came out nicely. My SO gets the cheapest pie turnover pastry things in the store so this pie was a special treat.

Here's the recipe:

1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch double crust pie
4 tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup white sugar
4 cups pitted cherries
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 tablespoons butter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C). Place bottom crust in piepan. Set top crust aside, covered.

In a large mixing bowl combine tapioca, salt, sugar, cherries and extracts. Let stand 15 minutes. Turn out into bottom crust and dot with butter. Cover with top crust, flute edges and cut vents in top. Place pie on a foil lined cookie sheet --- in case of drips! Bake for 50 minutes in the preheated oven, until golden brown.

Did you know they've changed the formula for Crisco? That was the sure fire ingredient for a good pie crust. They took out the trans fats and now it makes a greasy instead of flaky crust. This formula change is causing all sorts of problems. Melinda Lee talked about it on her show last weekend.