i recently moved into a new house and discovered a magical garden in my backyard. it has a trellis laced with grape vines, lavender, daisies, daisies, more daisies, rosemary, sage, and a very abundant rainier cherry tree. lots of critters like to snack on my cherries, one morning i even spotted little deer creatures nibbling them for breakfast. so for the first pie of the summer, it seemed appropriate to use what nature gave me.
cherry peach pie
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 3 tbsp corn starch (for thickening)
- 5 cups whole pitted cherries, about 2lbs with pit
-3 very ripe peaches, sliced + juice from peaches
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
for crust:
whisk flour, sugar, salt in a large bowl. Add butter and rub with your fingers until small pea-sized clumps form. Add the 5 tbsp of water and mix with a fork until the dough holds together when pressed between fingers. If it is not holding then add a bit more water. Gather dough together, divide in half and form a ball and then flatten to a disk with each half. Place in a plastic bag and let rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 mins.
for filling:
Preheat oven to 425F. While dough is cooling, mix your sugar, cornstarch and salt in a medium bowl and add your cherries, peaches and vanilla.
Roll out one of the dough balls on a well floured surface with a well floured rolling pin. Roll until it is roughly 12" in diameter. Place the dough into your 9" pie dish and trim the edges so that the dough only overhangs by 1/2". Pour your cherry mixture into the dough lined pie dish, mounding slightly in center. Dot the cherries with butter. Roll out the second dough ball into a 12" round. With a knife of a pastry wheel cut 3/4" strips. Arrange this strips on top of the cherries by simply overlapping or by weaving, trim to 1/2". Fold the dough from the bottom crust up and over the edges of the lattice, pressing with your finger tips to seal the dough. Brush the lattice, not the edges, with milk and sprinkle with sugar.
Place pie on a rimmed baking sheet (incase it gurgles and drips) and bake for 15 minutes. Lower the heat to 325 and bake until the filling is bubbling and the crust is golden brown. If the edges are burning to quickly you can cover them with foil. Should be about another 1hr of baking time. Remove pie and let it cool.
