Cherry Rhubarb Pie

My one complaint about this pie is that I should have added a bit more sugar. That, or I used inferior cherries that weren't terribly sweet (from a cheap grocery store down the street). I eyeballed the amount of fruit that went into the pie, and I think my ratio of fruit-to-sugar was off. When you're cooking with tart and tasty rhubarb, you really don't want to screw that up. If I made it again, I probably would add another half cup of sugar to the filling. That said, with a dollop of vanilla ice cream to mellow out the tartness, it was perfect. Here's the recipe:

Cherry Rhubarb Pie

ingredients:
pastry dough sufficient for two pie crusts
1 large bag of cherries, pitted and halved
about 6 stalks of rhubarb, cut into 1/2" slices
1 cup sugar
5 T. arrowroot starch

Mix all the filling in a large bowl. Roll out bottom crust and place in pie dish. Pour filling in. Roll out upper crust, place on top, cut vent, and crimp to seal edges. Bake at 425F for 25 min, then reduce heat to 350F and bake for another 40-50 min, until crust is golden and fruit goo starts splashing out of the crust vent.

Current Pie Tally: 88

Rhubarb Custard Pie

Reinforcements showed up to help us unpack boxes and arrange furniture. Thanks Meemaw! In exchange, I made Meemaw's favorite pie: Rhubarb Custard. This is my mother's (a.k.a. Meemaw) grandmother's recipe. Since my new house has a gas oven from the '40s, I felt like I was able to recreate the baking conditions that might have been used at that time. The verdict: gas ovens and pies were meant to be together. I followed the original family recipe to the letter and cooked it in my retro Pyrex pie dish. The resulting pie was perfect. The crust was golden and flaky and the custard was creamy and evenly cooked throughout. My mother and I consumed half of the entire pie ourselves on the first day of its existence. This definitely came out better than the first time I made it, and I will definitely be making more. The ingredients are the same as the first version. Here are the cooking instructions I used this time: Bake at 400F for 50-60 min. (52-54 min. for the one I made).

Current Pie Tally: 87

Summer Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

In true Wonder Wife fashion, I pulled this pie out for our "hey, we just moved down the street" neighborhood BBQ. With the generous help of our friends and neighbors, we were able to get all of our belongings moved into our new place by noon. I pulled this pie out of the freezer and popped it in the oven while we were shuffling things around in the afternoon. I was excited to see how the frozen pie would bake up in the new gas oven as opposed to electric. I like it! I would definitely say it does a more even cooking job. I liked it so much I made a Rhubarb Custard Pie the following week. More on that in the next post. Here's the recipe for the Strawberry Rhubarb pie from the freezer:

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

ingredients:
pastry dough sufficient for two pie crusts
2 quarts strawberries, hulled and halved
about 4 cups of rhubarb, cut into 1/2" slices
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup arrowroot starch

Mix all the filling in a large bowl. Roll out bottom crust and place in pie dish. Pour filling in. Roll out upper crust, place on top, cut vent, and crimp to seal edges. Freeze for up to 2-4 months. Bake at 425F for 25 min, then reduce heat to 350F and bake for another 50-70 min, until crust is golden and fruit goo starts splashing out of the crust vent.

*It occurred to me that I normally add cinnamon to Strawberry Rhubarb Pie. I left it out of this one as an oversight and thought it came out quite nice. I wouldn't say I prefer either, but it's definitely good either way.

Current Pie Tally: 86

Lime Meringue Pie

This pie is the result of my dessert contribution to a neighborhood Iron Chef contest. All the contestants unanimously agreed to let a child win the dessert round, but that aside, I don't know that my pie would have won. There was some tough competition! I will also admit that Lime Meringue Pie is not an earthshattering pie. It's good, on par with any Lemon Meringue Pie, but I would prefer many of the other pies I make. I am, however, very pleased with the visual effect of this one. I deduced that the pie would be yellow unless I did something about it, so I added 1-2 drops of liquid green food coloring. The secret ingredient of the contest was lime, after all, and I didn't want to serve a yellow lime pie.

For me, the combination of that spectral green with the white fluffy merinque evokes visions of mermaids and sea blobs (for more on sea blobs, click here). I toyed with the idea of calling it Sea Blob Pie - both to honor the recent literary accomplishment of our neighbor (also in the Iron Chef competition) and because the pie didn't set very well. I was under time pressure as the hour of our Kitchen Stadium debut neared. As a result, the pie didn't get as much cooling time as it needed. The filling was all oozy. It really needed half a day in the refrigerator prior to slicing. Despite the shortcomings, I would definitely make this pie again if the meringue mood hits and I want something with a touch more zip than lemon. For the recipe, click here. My substitutions are that I used lime juice and lime zest in place of lemon, and I used arrowroot starch instead of cornstarch.

Current Pie Tally: 85