Pie Plant Season

Here we are, back to the peak season for "Pie Plant".  Rhubarb earned that nickname honestly, it really is perfect in pies!  Last night we had a couple of families over for pie so I made two rhubarb pie variations:  with pineapple and with cherries.  I thought I'd be able to choose a favorite but really liked both.  So I recommend you try each of these pies this spring.  A little ice cream or whipped cream makes them perfect!

Pineapple Rhubarb Pie

9 or 10 inch double pie dough

1 1/4 cups sugar
1/4 cup flour
2 eggs
1 20-oz can pineapple tidbits, drained
1 tsp vanilla
4 cups sliced fresh rhubarb

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Line a 9 or 10 inch pie pan with crust.  Roll out top crust.  Set both aside.

Stir all filling ingredients together until well blended and pour into the pastry lined pie pan.  Cover with the top crust and flute edges.  Cut steam vents in the top of the pie then brush with ice water and sprinkle with sugar.  Bake 15 minutes, then lower heat to 375 and bake an additional 30 minutes.  The filling should be bubbling.  Serve warm.


Cherry Rhubarb Pie

9 or 10 inch double pie dough

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Line a 9 or 10 inch pie pan with crust.  Roll out top crust.  Set both aside.

4 cups fresh rhubarb, sliced
2 cups tart pie cherries -  fresh (pitted), frozen (thawed) or canned (drained)
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/4 cup quick-cooking tapioca
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Stir all filling ingredients together and let stand 10-15 minutes, then pour into pastry-lined pie pan.  Dot with 1 tablespoon butter if desired and add top crust.  Flute edges and cut steam vents in the top of the pie.  Brush with ice water and sprinkle with sugar.  Bake 15 minutes, then lower heat to 375 and bake an additional 30 minutes, or until filling bubbles and crust is golden.  Serve warm.

Rhubarb Pie from Sweety Pies

My son Trevor and his wife Ali are expecting their first baby, a girl, this summer.  I'm pretty excited about getting another granddaughter, especially since she'll live much closer than my other grandbabies.  I should be able to see her more often than every few months!  Years ago I taught natural birth classes, and really enjoyed it, but after I joined the "workforce" in 1996 I stopped - there just wasn't time, especially since I didn't charge enough money to really make it worth my time.  After looking at the options in our community, Trevor and Ali asked if I would do a birthing class for them.  This week we started with a little intro and discussed what they want to learn. But the first thing we did was enjoy a dinner of chicken stir fry on the front porch, and finished off with some rhubarb pie.

This recipe comes from the fun book my daughter Cara gave me for my birthday last year.  The pie was great with freshly whipped cream, and would also be great warm with ice cream.  This one is for people who enjoy the sweet-tart flavor of rhubarb.  We loved it.

Miss Maude McCracken's Rhubarb Pie (from Sweety Pies by Patty Pinner)

One 9-inch single pie crust, rolled out, fitted into a pie plate, and edge trimmed and crimped.

1-1/4 cups sugar

1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon grated orange rind

1/4 cup orange juice (I used the juice of one large orange)

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces (I used regular, salted butter with great results)

4 cups trimmed red rhubarb stalks, sliced 1 inch thick (we prefer smaller chunks of rhubarb, I cut it into 1/2 inch slices)

Crumb topping

1 cup all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softened (I used regular butter and omitted the salt)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Prepare the pie crust and set aside.

Combine the sugar, flour, and cloves in a medium-size, heavy saucepan and whisk until well blended.  Stir in the orange rind and juice, and the butter.  Cook over low to medium heat, stirring, until thickened and bubbly, then add the rhubarb.  Stir to coat the rhubarb, then remove from the heat and spoon the filling into the crust.  Place in the oven and bake until the rhubarb is tender and the juice bubbles, about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the crumb topping.  In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and sugar.  Add the butter and, using your fingertips, work it into the dry mixture until pea-sized crumbs form.

Take the pie out of the oven and sprinkle evenly with the topping.  Return to the oven and bake until the topping is golden brown, 10 to 15 minutes longer. Let cool on a wire rack for at least 15 minutes before serving.

Spring Mix Pie

Today was a perfect, lovely spring day - and perfectly lovely for hanging out on the front porch.  The only thing that could make porch sitting more ideal would be having some pie out there.  So I decided to make some pie and invite friends over to share.  Since this was an unplanned pie event on a Sunday, and we avoid doing any shopping on Sunday, I had to use what I could find around the house to create a pie.  I came up with 3 apples, half a container of strawberries, and an orange in the fridge - and a big rhubarb plant in the yard.

I combined these fruits with some sugar and flour and hoped for the best.

Curtis and Mary came over.  Their two sons, and a fiancée, tagged along when they found out there was pie at our house.  Everybody said they liked this pie - and not one crumb was left over.  I loved it.  This is one I would  make again "on purpose".

The only thing that could have improved this pie would be a scoop of vanilla ice cream  Sadly, we had none on hand....and it's Sunday....

Here's how to make this - it's an easy one!

SPRING MIX PIE


Pastry for double crust pie
3 apples, peeled and chopped
8 oz fresh strawberries, chopped
2 large stalks rhubarb, chopped
1 large orange
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour

• Combine the chopped apples, strawberries and rhubarb in a bowl.  Add the sugar and flour.  Squeeze the juice of the orange into the bowl.  Stir to combine.  Let this mixture sit while you prepare the pastry.
• Roll out bottom crust and place in pie pan, pour fruit mixture into the pan.  Top with rolled out top crust.  Brush ice water onto the top and sprinkle with sugar.
• Bake in preheated 425* oven for 15 minutes.
• Turn oven down to 350* and bake for 35 minutes, or until top is lightly browned and the fruit is tender.
• Let cool for half an hour or so before serving.

Another kind of rhubarb pie!

Last week my cousin Lori's daughter, Heather, posted on Facebook that she had made her favorite rhubarb pie - Sour Cream Rhubarb.  I had never heard of this one so I was excited to try it after Heather was kind enough to share her recipe.  We had some new friends as well as some of our long-time favorite friends over, and everybody said they liked this pie. Fortunately these were all people who "appreciate" rhubarb.  If you are a rhubarb fan, you need to try this easy pie.  Rhubarb is at it's peak right now.

Heather's Sour Cream Rhubarb Pie


1 pie shell
1 cup sour cream
1 egg
1/3 cup flour
1-1/2 cup sugar
4 cups chopped rhubarb
Berries if desired (I replaced 1 cup of rhubarb with 1 cup of chopped strawberries)

Pour rhubarb into the crust (along with berries if you are using them).  Mix the other ingredients well, then pour over the rhubarb.

Make topping by combining:
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup butter
cinnamon to taste

Cover the top of the pie with the topping.

Bake at 450 degrees for 10 minutes, then reduce the oven to 350 degrees and cook 30-40 minutes more until golden brown and not too jiggly in the middle.  Allow to cool.  This pie is extra great topped with sweetened whipped cream.

Rhubarb custard pie

When we built our house 10 years ago, we brought along some rhubarb from my parents' house.  They got the rhubarb from my grandmother many years ago.  Grandma probably got it from a relative before her.  This rhubarb is an heirloom.  When we did some other construction in the back yard a few years later the rhubarb sort of got run over into stubble and I thought it was gone for good.  But the next spring it was back and has thrived ever since.  We've given a lot of this plant away for others to grow, so we don't quite have the huge "hedge" of rhubarb we had for a while, but we definitely have all we need to keep enjoying it all spring. 


My mom and grandma have made a rhubarb custard pie which has been popular in the family over the years, but  I never really cared for it.  This week after my husband and I had each invited people over for pie without the other knowing about it, I thought I better make two pies to be safe, so started looking for a new version of rhubarb pie so we could have some variety.  I found this rhubarb custard recipe, which looked super easy (and it was!) so gave it a try.  I really liked it too!  It turns out that neither of the families we had invited showed up, so we called Curtis and Mary and Mitch and Chass and they were happy to come over and help us eat this pie and a strawberry-rhubarb pie.

Rhubarb Custard Pie


1 unbaked single pie crust
3 cups diced rhubarb
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon nutmeg
2 eggs
2 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon butter, cut into chunks

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
• Mix rhubarb, sugar, flour, salt and nutmeg together.  Set aside for 10 minutes.
• Whisk the eggs and milk together in a separate bowl.  Combine with the fruit mixture.  Dump into the pie shell and dot with butter.
• Bake 50 to 55 minutes, until pie is set.
• Serve this pie either slightly warm, at room temperature or chilled.  Top with sweetened whipped cream.

Strawberry-rhubarb pie

I know spring has really arrived when the rhubarb in my garden gets ready for it's first harvest.  The rhubarb was just in time for Mother's Day this year, so I made strawberry-rhubarb pie for my mom.  The rest of the family got to have some too.  I used a recipe from the cookbook "Pie" by Ken Haedrich, although I don't use all the steps he does (he refrigerates or freezes his pastry dough, but I skip these steps because I don't think it's necessary if you handle the dough with care).  This pie got high marks from the 10 people I served on Mother's Day.


Strawberry-Rhubarb Crumb Pie


1 unbaked deep dish pie crust
Filling:
3 cups fresh rhubarb stalks sliced 1/2 inch thick
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
4 cups hulled and halved fresh strawberries
1/4 cup quick-cooking tapioca

Cornmeal Crumb Topping
3/4 cup flour
1/4 cup fine yellow cornmeal
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter, cut into chunks

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
• Combine the rhubarb, sugar and lemon juice in a large bowl.  Toss well to mix, then set aside for 10 minutes.
• Add the strawberries and tapioca to the bowl and toss well.  Scrape the filling into the pie shell.  Bake for 30 minutes.
• Meanwhile, make the topping.  Combine the topping ingredients in a bowl and mix with a pastry blender (or pulse in a food processor).  Once the mixture resembles fine crumbs, rub between your fingers to make large buttery crumbs.  Refrigerate until ready to use.
• Remove the pie from the oven and reduce the temperature to 375 degrees.  Carefully dump the crumbs in the center of the pie, spreading them evenly over the surface with your hands.  Tamp them down gently.  Return the pie to the oven and bake until the juices bubble thickly around the edge, 30 - 40 minutes.
• Let cool for at least 1 hour before serving.  This pie is great served slightly warm with vanilla ice cream.
• It's a good idea to put a large aluminum baking sheet under this pie while baking, as it is beautifully juicy and sometimes bubbles over.