Damn Fine Cherry Pie
I
daresay every art school kid of my generation knows the significance
the the phrase “damn fine cup of coffee.” I was living in Ann
Arbor that summer, through the beneficence of a family I still
consider family, having arrived on Memorial Day between graduating college in Pennsylvania in the spring and moving to New York City to start grad school that autumn. Those
two and a half months turned out to be one of the best times of my
life. One constant was that, whatever adventures the weekend wrought,
Sunday night found us gathered around the tv in the family room,
absorbed in the mysteries of Twin Peaks, Washington. Often, plates of
cherry pie were passed around, in honor of Norma's blue-ribbon house specialty and its accompanying damn fine cup of coffee. As if we
needed anything further to bring us together, the pie was made with damn fine Michigan cherries.
I
hope everyone has the benefit of a similar era, however humble, of
being taken care of but utterly free. I explored the streets of this
great college town just because I could. I haunted used bookstores
for pulp James Bond novels from the double features I was attending
at the Michigan Theatre. I went to craft- and art walks on the diag,
wrote countless pages while drinking countless cappuccinos at
Espresso Royale Cafe. I cater-waitered at The Michigan League on
weekend afternoons then went dancing at The Nectarine Ballroom on
Saturday nights. I bought many of the tracks I sweated to on that
dance floor at Schoolkids Records. I was young but on the cusp of
adulthood, virile and no doubt obnoxious because of it, smart,
artistic, and hungry for experience, but I needed the safety net from
which to have it.
That
autumn found me jarred out of the pleasant thrum of summer in a
college town by the the cacophony of New York City as a classroom.
There I met like-minded peers in design school as we figured out our
city and ourselves. I remain friends with many of them to this day,.
One became a filmmaker, one a tv actor, one a chef. One became a
successful interior designer and one a women's rights advocate. Other
classmates settled into careers in cinema studies, as a visionary in
children's television, as leaders in arts in the classroom. We were
too busy for too much leisure but most Sunday nights found us
gathered around a tv, this time with pizza and beer in the basement
common room of an NYU dorm.
Soon
even that melted away, as we settled into living in the city and the
allure of the streets outshone that of Fraser Firs. For me, that
included becoming part of the theatre community as I sewed costumes for cash, and when summer rolled around again it included meeting a
dashing, doe-eyed gent from Virginia who I am still lucky enough to
call husband. It took us a while to get through school, to get
relationship and career settled, to move out of crowded dorm rooms
into cramped city apartments in the working person's trajectory of
building a successful life in the city. We lived in the East Village,
then the West Village, then Brooklyn before landing in Astoria, where
we lived for over a decade in the home from which I started Urban Home Blog. When we moved to Los Angeles after twenty five years as
New Yorkers, we discovered that a quarter century is a long time but
that it goes fast. The young bucks we were still held safe the
fortitude for adventure, but as older men, we had accumulated some knowledge of adaptability.
The arc of this journey has always been towards home. Home means
responsibility which I, typical Capricorn, have never shied away
from. One summer changed my life with the pivotal respite of proceeding
towards home from the life-changing position of having come from one.
I didn't have the easiest of childhoods and there was no way of
knowing how challenging the transition to New York City was going to
be, but that summer in Ann Arbor was the summer of my life. I have
never forgotten that remarkable time that was the gift of remarkable
people. Somewhere along the way I learned to bake a damn fine cherry pie. Here, in honor of that time and in appreciation of the
Michiganders who placed me at the threshold of my adult life, is the
recipe.
Damn
Fine Cherry Pie
Cherries
freeze well and have a short growing season, so it is okay to use
frozen cherries for this pie, but if using frozen, thaw them in the
mixing bowl before making the pie. To pit fresh cherries, use a
cherry-pitter or a paper clip to squeeze the pit from the cherry,
working over a bowl to catch the cherry juice.
For
the crust
2-1/2
cups all purpose flour plus extra for rolling
1
tablespoon granulated sugar
1
teaspoon table salt
1
teaspoon baking powder
2
sticks unsalted butter plus extra for the pan
1/4
- 1/3 cup ice water
Heavy
cream
Coarse
or vanilla sugar for dusting
For
the filling
2
pounds fresh or frozen pitted cherries
1-1/4
cups granulated sugar
¼
cup cornstarch
1
teaspoon almond extract
1/2
teaspoon ground mace
Salt
Make
the crust
- Place the 2 sticks butter into a large mixing bowl. Set aside to soften.
- Place the 2-12 cups flour, tablespoon of sugar, salt and baking powder into a bowl. Shake the bowl to ensure the dry ingredients are mixed together.
- While the butter is softening, use the remaining butter to coat the bottom and sides of a ceramic or metal deep dish pie pan. Place the prepared pan by the rolling surface.
- Sprinkle a clean breadboard or other food safe surface with flour. Place a rolling pin by the rolling surface.
- Once the butter is workable, no more than 5 minutes, transfer the dry ingredients into the bowl containing the butter. Use a pastry blender to incorporate the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles small crumbs. Sprinkle the dough with 1 tablespoon ice water.
- Sprinkle your hands with flour. Use the heel of your palm to gently bring the mixture in the bowl together, folding the dough up and sprinkling the dough with scant tablespoons of water as needed. Work just until the mixture comes together.
- Gently transfer the dough to the floured rolling surface. Sprinkle the dough lightly with flour. Use a bread knife to cut the dough in half. Transfer one half of the dough to the mixing bowl.
- Starting at the center of the ball of dough and rolling outwards, roll the remaining dough half in four directions corresponding to 12, 3, 6 and 9 on the face of a clock.
- Turn the dough ¼ turn and repeat step 8.
- Continue rolling and turning the dough until it is about 1/4 inch thick and large enough to cover the prepared surface of the pie pan.
- Fold the rolled dough into half and gently transfer it to the prepared pie pan. Unfold the dough and settle it into the pan, pressing the sides and bottom of the crust so that it is even and pushing together any holes to patch them.
- Repeat steps 8 – 12 with the remaining dough half. Gently transfer the top crust to a plate. Place the plate and the pie pan into the refrigerator to settle while you mix the filling.
- Place the pitted cherries and any accumulated juices into a large bowl. Measure the almond extract into the bowl and lightly toss the extract with the cherries and cherry juice.
- Mix the sugar, cornstarch, mace, and pinch of salt together in a small bowl. Transfer the sugar mixture to the bowl containing the cherries and cherry juice. Mix all of the ingredients together.
- Heat the oven to 475 degrees F.
- Line a baking sheet with a length of aluminum foil. Place the pie pan on the baking sheet.
- Gently transfer the cherry filling to the pie pan. Distribute the filling evenly across the dough, and use a silicon spatula to get all of the filling into the pan.
- Gently unfold the top crust over the pie. Gently tuck the crust edge down to fit snugly on top of the filling.
- Tuck the crust edge, trimmed as warranted, under the edge of the bottom crust along the side of the pie pan. Crimp the edges of the two crusts tightly together.
- Safely use the tip of a knife to cut several slits in the top crust of the pie. Note: you can also weave a lattice top crust for this pie, or use cookie cutters to cut shapes with which to build a top crust. Just be sure the top crust has openings for steam and juices to escape while cooking.
- Pour a bit of cream into a cup and use a pastry brush to paint the top crust with cream. Sprinkle the cream with coarse sugar or vanilla sugar.
- If desired, fix a pie shield to the outer edge of the pie pan.
- Carefully place the baking sheet holding the pie into the heated oven.
- Bake the pie until the crust is golden brown and the filling is bubbling, approximately 1-1/2 hours. Note: check the pie at 1 hour and then every 10 minutes thereafter, to prevent overcooking.
- Let pie cool before cutting and serving.
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