Cherry Pie

This is a lovely, simple cherry pie recipe. I love that it has no frills or fancy ingredients. The filling is just cherries and sugar—not even a vanilla seed in sight, let alone stuff like almond extract, lemon juice, or zest. We took this to a barbecue at a neighbor's house and everyone loved it, as did I. A mildly sweet pie crust worked perfectly with the full-flavored cherry filling. I used frozen black cherries and followed the instructions to let them sit longer and to bake the pie longer. The frozen cherries were not tart, so I used 3/4 cup sugar and the end result was perfect. (I got several compliments regarding how not cloyingly sweet the pie tasted.) The frozen cherries worked great in the filling and retained a firm texture that popped and contrasted with the flaky, buttery crust. I used a 9-inch regular (not deep dish) pie plate. It worked well, even though I got a bit of boil over from the filling. Somehow that made the pie even more attractive, if messy. It's really important to put the pie on a rimmed baking sheet so that it catches any juices. I can almost guarantee that you would make a mess in the oven if you do not. The recipe says to make a lattice as a variation and that's what I chose to do.

I've always suffered from a soggy bottom and a loose middle. My pies, that is, not my figure. (Well, on second thought, maybe both.) Until now. This simple pie has changed my pie baking. I used two 16-ounce bags frozen cherries. I brought them to room temperature so that I could gauge their sweetness. As they were quite lovely as they were, I only added 1/2 cup sugar along with the cornstarch and salt. I baked the pie longer than the time specified as I wanted to make sure that the filling was bubbly and the cornstarch was working its thickening magic. Due to the increased time in the oven, the edges of my pie were getting a tad brown, so I took a square of aluminum foil, cut a circle out of the center, and wrapped the frame of foil around the edges of the pie to serve as a pie shield. Voilà! Cool, cut, and feel victorious. Then head for the gym.

The summer's stone fruit bounty is a favorite in our household, and the next best thing to eating them out of hand is eating them in cherry pie. This amazingly simple and delicious recipe allows you to indulge, even on short notice.

My cherries were very tart, so I used 1 cup sugar. Since the fruit was very juicy, I opted to cook the filling to thicken it as I didn’t want a mess in the oven. This took about 7 minutes until it was thickened and bubbly. I used a 9-inch deep dish pie pan and made a lattice topping for the top layer. I then placed the assembled pie on a rimmed, foil-lined baking sheet. The oven rack was in the middle position. I baked it and took it out of the oven and let it cool for about 2 hours.

The pie crust was nice and crisp, including the bottom. The sweetness of the pie filling was just right and the lattice crust made it look very appealing. I decided to skip dinner and treat myself to a piece of pie. This will be a family favorite.

This is a basic cherry pie recipe that's easy to make, and the taste is good. Because the recipe is so basic, your cherries need to be as good as they can be. I used organic frozen cherries because I didn't want to deal with pitting the stone fruits. I used between 5 and 6 cups cherries, and everything fit in a 9-inch pie pan. I used a little less sugar than the recipe specified, and it was just fine. My cherries were fairly thawed by the time I got home, but I let them sit in the tapioca mixture for 45 minutes, and they were ready by that time.

There are many recipes like this one that call for a pat of butter. I usually forgo it to save the calories and put more butter in the crust, but you can definitely taste the butter, and it does add something to the filling. For me, I think the flavor could be amped up. I prefer to add almond extract rather than a pat of butter. I will often have a crumb topping that includes cinnamon or almonds. This is a good basic recipe, though, and I could see using it as a jumping-off point to make your own with other flavorings and add-ins.

This cherry pie turned out really nice. I used a a regular 9-inch pie plate for the pie along with 5 cups cherries (a mixture of Bing and Rainier). You could probably squeeze in an additional cup cherries, even without using a deep-dish pan. The cherries took about 20 minutes of time to pit, which I did at a leisurely pace while watching TV. They weren’t overly sweet, so I used a full cup sugar. I used the tapioca flour, which I thought worked nicely. I baked the pie at the higher setting for 18 minutes, and then at the lower temperature for 30 minutes and ended up with a golden brown crust, with the edges being slightly darker. The pie came out just a touch sweet for my taste, and I most likely would not use the full cup sugar in the future unless I'm using the full 6 cups fruit.