The facts were these…

Apologies it’s been a little over a week but university work causes disruptions to the usual programming. I hope you enjoyed last week’s pie and have maybe started watching the show yourself! I’ve really been having fun with this series so far as pies are so straightforward to make it allows me to be experimental with flavours. This week its S1:E2 titled ‘Dummy’, the pie mention comes from the narrator this time though not the characters themselves.

Chuck: Jeanine? [THE PIE HOLE: The trio is piled in a booth watching Jeanine inhaling an entire pie. She tries to speak with her mouth full]

Chuck: What?

Jeanine: [takes a drink of milk and swallows] I couldn’t tell you anything before because they were watching me. I hid at work to make sure no one would follow me home. The truth is: Bernie and I were so in love. It all started when he came to see this sales training thing and he was on a long lunch break and it was love at first sight – I couldn’t take my eyes off him! He just mesmerized me, my heart leapt out of my chest and I just couldn’t look away, I don’t know what it was, it’s like I got all misty-eyed, y’know, and I –

Narrator: And as Jeanine continued to eat her triple berry pie, she told them the story of her love affair with Bernard Slaybeck. [FLASHBACK: Mark Chase is showing his models how to present a spore and jiggle for customers]

Just like last week, rhubarb pie also makes an appearance in this episode so it may be revisited at a later date. In the spirit of being open, I am not a huge fan of berries but I wanted to try something I wouldn’t normally gravitate towards! Despite this, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and the pastry in particular on this one turned out superbly.

Three Plum Pie

Serves 10 (roughly)                 Takes 1hr ( + 40 mins chilling time)

Ingredients

For the pastry:

225g Butter (room temperature)

50g Caster sugar

2 Eggs

350g Plain flour

Zest of half a lemon

1 Egg yolk (for egg wash)

A sprinkle of sugar for the top

For the filling:

850g Berries (3 types) I used strawberries, blackberries and blueberries.

110g Caster sugar

30g Soft light brown sugar

3tbsp Cornflour

Zest of half a lemon

Squeeze of lemon juice.

Method

1. For the pastry beat the butter and sugar together then add in the eggs
2. Add the flour and lemon a bit at a time and as  a dough starts to form use your hands to mix. Cover the pastry with cling film and pop in the fridge to chill for 40mins
3. Preheat the oven to 180°C/ 160°C fan
4. Wash/chop the berries and place in a bowl with the sugars, cornflour and lemon. Mix through.
5. Once the pastry is chilled roll out two thirds of the dough and lay it into your pie dish making sure you push it tight into the edges. Leave some pastry over hanging as it will be trimmed later.
6. Pour the filling into the pastry case. And brush the edges of the pie with water/egg wash.
7. Roll out the final third of the pastry and cut into strips. To make the lattice lid, place strips going vertically across the pie. Pull back the even number strips and place one going horizontally across. Put the even strips back over and pull back the odd numbered strips, putting another one on horizontally while leaving a gap. Repeat this process until the whole pie lid is complete.Trim the pie edges and pinch them with your fingers or crimp them with a fork.
8. Egg wash the pie and sprinkle with some golden caster sugar.
9. Pop in the oven for 40 minutes or until golden and cooked through. Check it half way through as you may need to cover it with foil to stop the crust burning.
10. Leave to cool a little then cut a wedge and with ice cream, cream or custard!

lots of love,

Alice x