CHERRY PIE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 28, 5 January 1940, Page 44

CHERRY PIE

Cherry pie is a most delectable dish, of course. It is best to put the deep pie dish (nearly full of cherries) in the oven for a while, with a little water and plenty of sugar, before you make the. pie crust. The fruit is nicer when softened first in this way; it seems to have more flavour. Let it cool before putting on the crust; then bake till the crust is cooked and brown. In America, cherry pie is more or less a national dish-(in honour of George Washington and his famous tree-chop-ping escapade, I was told)-and they have grand cherry pie competitions, usually in Chicago. Hundreds of competitors come from far and near, and the great event takes place at the big hotel at which I stayed when in Chicago last year. Here is the winning recipegiven to me by the judge, Grace Gray, the Director of the Gray Institute of Home Economics. You will notice that "Canned Cherries" are used: Champion Cherry Pie One and a-half cups of flour; ten tablespoons of lard; one teaspoon of salt; and five or six tablespoons of ice water. Sift the flour and salt together, add the lard and blend. Then add the ice water gradually, and roll. For the filling, have two and a-half cups of pitted sour canned cherries, drained; one-third of a cup of cherry juice; two and a half tablespoons of fine tapioca; one-eighth of a teaspoon of salt, one cup of sugar; and one teaspoon of butter. Soak the tapioca, sugar and salt in the cherry juice and let them stand while the pastry is being made, or about fifteen minutes. Then mix well with the cherries, add the butter, and put into the pie dish. Bake the pie for ten minutes at 450°. Then reduce the temperature to 350° and bake for twenty minutes. Then turn the oven off and let it stand in the oven heat for twenty minutes before removing from the oven,