Triple Berry Pie
Leif heard the phrase "Triple Berry Pie" somewhere, and immediately became obsessed with the idea. So we made some.
Crust:
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/4 cup corn flour
1/4 cup ground flax seed
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons shortening (I used 1 tbsp coconut oil and 1 tbsp bacon grease)
1 egg
1/4 cup warm water
1 spoonful of honey
Filling:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon (generous) ground cardamom
2 cups fresh strawberries
2 cups fresh blackberries
1 cup fresh blueberries
1 teaspoon grated orange peel
Streusel topping:
1/4 cup corn flour
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons margarine
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
Preheat oven to 375F.
Mix dry ingredients for crust. Cut in shortening. In a separate bowl, beat together egg, water, and honey. Add to cornmeal mixture. Press into 9 inch pie plate to form crust.
For filling, stir together sugar, cornstarch, cardamom, and grated orange peel. Add in the berries, and stir until well coated. Put berries in pie crust - they'll mound up a lot, especially if frozen, but that's fine. They'll cook down.
For topping, combine flour, sugars and cardamom. Cut in cold margarine with knife or pastry blender until mixture is coarse and crumbly. Sprinkle on top of pie.
Bake at 375F for 45 minutes.
Notes: This would probably work better if you just went ahead and made it as a cobbler - none of it really holds together well enough to be a pretty pie. I used frozen berries (still mostly frozen) and it worked fine. Leif really wanted raspberries, but that wasn't what we got, so we said the blackberries were big purple raspberries, and he eventually accepted that. Put a baking tray with sides under the pie pan while cooking to catch spills - the amount of berries seems right, but the juice is too much. We'd have a big mess now if I hadn't done that (a bigger pie pan might have worked. Doing it as a cobbler in a cake pan almost certainly would have contained it). I used 1 cup of sugar in the filling, but will cut it to either 1/2 or 2/3 cup next time - it was sweeter than it really needed to be - almost like berry flavor candy. If you used really ripe berries, you might not need even that much.
The crust came out almost shortbread tasting. I think I'd add a full tablespoon of honey to it next time, as it was a little bland where not soaked with berry juice. I thought the bacon fat really worked well for the flavor, if you're willing to eat such horrid things.
I'm not 100% comfortable with corn flour in everything (see The Omnivore's Dilemma), but it's what we have on hand, inexpensive, and decent tasting.
Sorry about all the sugar, purdypiedad. I may see what I can do with bread next.
Crust:
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/4 cup corn flour
1/4 cup ground flax seed
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons shortening (I used 1 tbsp coconut oil and 1 tbsp bacon grease)
1 egg
1/4 cup warm water
1 spoonful of honey
Filling:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon (generous) ground cardamom
2 cups fresh strawberries
2 cups fresh blackberries
1 cup fresh blueberries
1 teaspoon grated orange peel
Streusel topping:
1/4 cup corn flour
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons margarine
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
Preheat oven to 375F.
Mix dry ingredients for crust. Cut in shortening. In a separate bowl, beat together egg, water, and honey. Add to cornmeal mixture. Press into 9 inch pie plate to form crust.
For filling, stir together sugar, cornstarch, cardamom, and grated orange peel. Add in the berries, and stir until well coated. Put berries in pie crust - they'll mound up a lot, especially if frozen, but that's fine. They'll cook down.
For topping, combine flour, sugars and cardamom. Cut in cold margarine with knife or pastry blender until mixture is coarse and crumbly. Sprinkle on top of pie.
Bake at 375F for 45 minutes.
Notes: This would probably work better if you just went ahead and made it as a cobbler - none of it really holds together well enough to be a pretty pie. I used frozen berries (still mostly frozen) and it worked fine. Leif really wanted raspberries, but that wasn't what we got, so we said the blackberries were big purple raspberries, and he eventually accepted that. Put a baking tray with sides under the pie pan while cooking to catch spills - the amount of berries seems right, but the juice is too much. We'd have a big mess now if I hadn't done that (a bigger pie pan might have worked. Doing it as a cobbler in a cake pan almost certainly would have contained it). I used 1 cup of sugar in the filling, but will cut it to either 1/2 or 2/3 cup next time - it was sweeter than it really needed to be - almost like berry flavor candy. If you used really ripe berries, you might not need even that much.
The crust came out almost shortbread tasting. I think I'd add a full tablespoon of honey to it next time, as it was a little bland where not soaked with berry juice. I thought the bacon fat really worked well for the flavor, if you're willing to eat such horrid things.
I'm not 100% comfortable with corn flour in everything (see The Omnivore's Dilemma), but it's what we have on hand, inexpensive, and decent tasting.
Sorry about all the sugar, purdypiedad. I may see what I can do with bread next.