Pastry (and Blueberry Peach Pie)
Tom has been saying for a while that he wanted a reminder of how to make pastry for pies. Summer is not the best time to make pastry, especially when it’s hot and muggy. But it is a great time for fruit, and we had blueberries and peaches from Wilson’s to use up. One thing I learned when I was very small is that pastry gets really tough when it gets over-worked. When I was about six my mum showed me how to make pastry, with both of us working in the same bowl – that pastry was hard as a rock. The next time she gave me my own bowl, and we worked side by side. That pastry came out melt-in-your-mouth tender. From then on, I always had my own bowl. So that’s what we did this time too. Tom and I worked in separate bowls and made two pies. You can never have too many pies.
- 4 oz butter, chilled
- 2 oz shortening. chilled
- 2 oz lard, chilled
- 3 cups flour
- ½ tsp salt
- 1-2 Tbsp sugar (if a sweet pie)
- ice water
- Mix flour, salt and sugar (if sweet pastry) in a bowl.
- Cut fats into small pieces and add to the bowl
- Rub the fats into the flour with your finger tips until it resembles crumbs with a few larger pieces. Mostly everything should be smaller than a pea.
- Add the iced water to the mixture a few tablespoons at a time, mix gently just until most of it is coming together in large lumps.
- Form into two discs, wrap in plastic and stick in the fridge for an hour or two.
- It freezes quite well, just defrost in the fridge before you want to use it.
Just out of the oven – yum.
I’ve started using instant tapioca for thickening the filling. But I have learned you need to give it enough time to start absorbing the juices before putting it in the oven otherwise you get crunchy tapioca bits – very unpleasant. Also I don’t use it with a lattice top for the same reason, some of the tapioca on the top will be crunchy not gooey. Feel free to use something else if you don’t like tapioca.
- pastry for 2 crusts
- 1 pint blueberries
- peaches (enough to fill the pie dish, probably at least 4)
- ¼ cup instant tapioca
- ¾ cup sugar (more or less to your taste)
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees, and put a heavy baking sheet in to heat up.
- Rinse the blueberries and pick out any stems or unripe ones.
- Slice the peaches, I don't bother to take the skin off. If the Skin bothers you, first blanch the peaches briefly in boiling water, and then peel them
- Gently toss the berries, peaches, tapioca and sugar in a bowl. Then let it sit for at least 15 minutes while you roll out the dough.
- Roll out the bottom crust and line the bottom of a 8-10 inch pie dish.
- Roll out the top crust.
- Fill the pie with the berry mixture, and brush the edges with water.
- Put on the top crust. Trim and then crimp the edges.
- Brush the top with milk or cream and and then poke some holes in the top crust. This is where you can also make decorations out of any scraps of pastry and put those on top as well.
- Place in the oven on the heated baking sheet. Turn the temperature down to 400 degrees and bake for 40-50 minutes.