Can She Bake a Cherry Pie?

I will always associate Cherry pie with Washington’s birthday. I grew up on the story of George Washington chopping down the cherry tree, then admitting to the crime when his dad confronted him with the famous (though fictional) line ‘I cannot tell a lie, I chopped down that cherry tree’.  Today is National Cherry Pie Day in honor of George Washington though his actual birthdate is February 22nd (maybe). When I was growing up there was no Presidents’ Day there were two national holidays, Lincoln’s birthday February 12th and George Washington’s. This changed in 1971 as part of the effort to create more three-day weekends.

Pies have been around for thousands of years in one form or another. The English settlers made pies in an enclosed shell that wasn’t intended for consumption. The crust was merely a vessel to cook the filling (sweet or savory) in the hearth. I’m not sure when we transitioned from utilitarian to edible crusts, but I’ll credit the French because they are all about great pastry. Feel free to correct me!

I’m a serious pie fan, and though I do love pecan pie, fruit pies are the ones I like best. I don’t know the last time I made a cherry pie, but if you’re accustomed to store-bought pies, or pie made with canned pie filling, making your own is, well, easy as pie! Fresh cherries are expensive and who wants to pit all those cherries? For pies, unless the fruit is in season and crazy cheap I opt for frozen. 

Lattice tops are pretty, but they also serve a purpose. Berries are full of water, and as they bake they’ll give off a lot of steam. The open spaces in a lattice top lets that steam escape and keeps both the top and bottom crusts from getting soggy. If you cook your filling first, a lot of that water will evaporate, and you can use a solid top crust, but like all pies, they need vents. 

I got this one together with less than an hour of hands-on work, but the crust does need to rest an hour. I use my go-to crust recipe for this. 

Cherry Pie

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Ingredients

• 4 cups frozen sweet cherries
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup instant tapioca
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract

Directions

Step 1

Put all pie filling ingredients into a heavy bottom pot and cook over medium heat until mixture starts to bubble

Step 2

Put bottom crust into 9" pie pan, allowing edges to hang over Add filling to crust

Step 3

Cut top crust into six 1 1/2 "strips

Step 4

Brush the edges of the crust with water, then weave the lattice over the top, leaving spaces between strips Press strips to edges of crust, then working around the edge crimp to a decorative edge

Step 5

Brush milk over the lattice top, sprinkle with sugar Bake at 375 for 50 minutes or until filling is thick and bubbling