April’s Cherry Pie
April Wu
Crust:
1 ½ cups of all-purpose flour (but you’re gonna dust more so honestly who cares)
6 tbsp cold unsalted butter
1 tsp salt
Ice water
Filling:
2 lb of cherries (or as many as you can fit in your pie <3)
¼ cup of sugar
1 tbsp cornstarch (or any starch: tapioca, potato, etc)
Instructions:
Make the crust! Combine flour and salt with cold butter that has been cut into 1 cm-ish cubes.
Smush the cubes between your fingertips so they get covered in flour or use a fork to mash them into smaller crumbles.
Add ice water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until the crust barely comes together. It should feel really dry but still hold in one solid mass.
Shape the pie crust dough into a flat disk and wrap it in plastic wrap to rest it in the fridge until it’s cool, about 30 minutes to an hour.
Make the filling! Use a chopstick (or any other flat-ended stick) and punch a hole through the cherry from the spot where the stem breaks off. This should de-pit the cherry.
Toss cherries with the sugar and cornstarch in a bowl and set it off to the side.
Roll out the chilled dough and drape it over your pie pan. Crimp the edges if you like or just let it hang over (those bits may be ugly but they’re the crispiest parts).
Stab the bottom of the pie crust with a fork so steamy air has somewhere to go when it bakes.
Add macerated cherries to the crust and bake at 400F for 35-40 minutes.
Let cool and enjoy :)
Other notes:
You can use salted butter in the crust and just omit the added 1 tsp of salt. I personally like it this way cuz it contrasts with the sweetness of the cherries :P
I leave the cherries whole because when it cooks down they kinda burst in your mouth when you eat them and they’re full of caramelized reduced juice, but you can slice them into smaller pieces if you want more structural integrity in the filling.
