As I commented in KTK a couple of evenings ago, I have recently acquired a few pints of blueberries. By a few, I mean ten. They were on sale at Kroger for 98 cents per pint (regular $3.99), and well, how could I resist? I bought five, and then I returned the next day and bought five more when I saw that they were still on sale. The only problem is, my kitchen is small and and my fridge and freezer are full, so I don’t particularly have room for all of these blueberries. Or maybe that’s just the excuse I’m using to justify pie…
I haven’t made, or eaten, pie in a very long time. I save my occasional pie indulgence for Daily Kos, although I consider that a rare treat. Honestly, in the battle between pie and cake, cake usually prevails. But I needed to get rid of these blueberries somehow, and blueberry pie was sounding like a mighty tasty way to do it. After searching around for a good recipe, I suddenly remembered that I could get my grandmother’s recipe from our family cookbook (which I wrote about here). My grandma was well known inside and outside of our family for her cakes and pies—the same grandma who taught me how to make pie crust at a very early age (see photo above). And, as far as I was concerned, her blueberry pie topped them all, so I decided to recreate it. A ridiculous thing to say, because there’s no recreating my grandma’s baked goods, but one can try.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid that I made poor Grandma roll over in her grave by using a frozen pie crust, something that she would never do (I used Trader Joe’s, if you’re wondering, which is probably about the best frozen pie crust you can get). Sorry, Grandma, but ain’t nobody got time for pie crust right now. But in case you’re wondering about how she taught me to make it, that recipe is in the cookbook, too:
1 double crust pie or two shells:
1 ½ c. flour
1 scant tsp. salt
¾ c. shortening (didn’t she used to use lard?) (The lard must have been before my time—inside joke, I guess.)
Mix flour and salt with spoon; add shortening. Gently and quickly work shortening, until half is crumbly and fine and about half is little chunks, then add just enough cold water to make it hold together in a ball. The fine part makes pie crust tender, the chunks of shortening make it flaky. Careful, don’t use too much flour to roll out.
Grandma’s blueberry pie recipe is simple enough. It is the same recipe she used for blackberries and raspberries, blackberry being my mom’s favorite and blueberry being mine (I can’t say that I’ve ever had Grandma’s raspberry pie). When I read the recipe, I realized that I got a special mention in the cookbook for being such a fan of her blueberry pie:
Use about half of pie crust, line a 9-inch pan. Take a little flour and spread on lower crust. Use about 4 cups fresh or frozen berries. Mix with 2/3 or 1 cup sugar and 3 tablespoons flour and fill crust. Use sugar according to sweetness of unsweetened fruit. Pour in crust; dot with oleo (the use of “oleo” is how you know this is authentic Grandma recipe). This improves pie and gives a nice flaky upper crust. Using blueberries, you may want to add a little lemon juice. Bake at 350 degrees for about 1 hour. Favorites of Terry, Sharon, Jeff and Chris (hey, that’s me!).
I went with 2/3 cup of sugar, which was almost perfect for my tastes. I actually could have done with a little less than 2/3 cup, but the BF disagrees. The only real change I made is that I also added a little lemon zest along with the juice...because it seemed like the right thing to do. The lemon zest, it turned out, was a great addition if you like sort of strong lemony background flavors (which I do). Oh, and I brushed the pie crust with an egg wash.
Two things you need to know about me and pie: (1) I do not wait for pie to properly set. I mean, come on, GTFO if you think I’m waiting a few hours to cut into this. (2) On a related note, I always demolish the first slice. It looks more like a blueberry hemorrhage than a slice of pie. But IDGAF because this was delicious. I served it up with a few scoops of Blue Bell vanilla ice cream, which got all melty and mingled with the warm pie:
OMG. Just as good as I remember! Back to eating vegetables tomorrow...
What do you want to kibitz about tonight?
NOTE: The BF and I are planning to attend Houston Pride today. As a result, I may not be around this evening for the comments (or, if I am, it may be sporadic). It’s an open thread, as always—I’ll get to the comments as soon as I can!