Toothy Berry Pie à la Mode

I was shocked to discover that I have never blogged my berry pie recipe. Shocked! Because it's something that I make every summer...and multiple times throughout the summer. And I was even more surprised to discover that summer berries weren't yet at the markets in beautiful, overflowing containers. There were some, but they were ridiculously pricey. Frozen berries to the rescue; they work just as well.

 

I had some fun with natural food dyes and cranked out a JAWS-inspired design. My best friend's older son said, "Aunt Cam, that shark needs braces." True enough.

Ingredients makes one 9-inch pie

Crust

• 2 cups flour + more for rolling
• 1/2 cup organic powdered sugar
• 3/4 cup butter
• 2 Tablespoons vodka
• 2 Tablespoons cold water
• Also needed: parchment paper; rolling pin; pie pan; food dye, if making a colored design

Filling

• 2 pounds frozen berries (I used a mixture of raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries)
• 3/4 cup organic granulated sugar
• freshly squeezed lemon juice from 1 or 2 lemons, to your taste preference
• 4 Tablespoons cornstarch
• 2 Tablespoons butter

Procedure

Crust

In a food processor, combine the flour and sugar, pulsing 3 to 4 times. Add the butter and pulse until the texture looks mealy. Sprinkle in your liquids and pulse until combined. Remove the dough and press into a ball. Divide the dough in thirds and one of those thirds into half again. Form a single ball with two thirds. And if you aren't doing a design that requires colors, you can just leave the last third as is. 

If you are making a design - or replicating mine - dye the crust as follows. Add blue dye to one of the sixths and knead until smooth and a uniform color; add red dye to the other sixth and knead until smooth and a uniform color. Wrap each ball tightly with plastic. Refrigerate for at least an hour.

Filling

Place berries and sugar in a large pan over medium heat. Simmer, until warm and juicy, approximately 8 to 10 minutes. Stir occasionally. Add in the juice of one lemon and taste. If that's to your liking, move on to the next step. I wanted it a little bit more tart and added the juice of the second lemon as well.

Spoon out about 1/2 cup of the juice from the pan into a bowl. Whisk cornstarch into the juice until smooth. Bring pot of berries back to a simmer and slowly whisk in the cornstarch. Cook until it thickens, approximately 5 minutes. Stir in the butter and let cool while you roll out the pie crusts.

Assembly
Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Remove the undyed disk of dough from the refrigerator. Place the dough on a lightly floured piece of parchment paper. Sprinkle the top of the dough with flour and roll out into a 12" circle. Place dough into pie pan. Gently press the dough into the sides of the pan, crimping and trimming the edges as necessary. 

Spoon the berry mixture into unbaked pie shell. Now roll out the blue and red crust and make your design. If you aren't making the JAWS-image, you can use the smaller crust ball to create a lattice or other design.

Place in the preheated oven and bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 40 to 45 minutes. Check it after about 25 minutes and place a piece of tinfoil over it if the crust is getting too brown.

 

Once baked, remove to a wire cooling rack and allow to cool for several hours before slicing. Once cooled completely, you can cut into it.

To stick with our berry theme, we served this pie à la mode with two different kinds of berry ice cream: blackberry with chocolate chip and raspberry sorbet.