My pursuit of pie perfection began over ten years ago at my first class in culinary school. In our Introduction To Bakery Arts course, we made apple pie using shortening pie dough. For the first time, I learned to look for the subtle marbling of fat and flour that flakey pie crust hails from. I learned to seal my pies with care so every drop of fruit juice stays within the confine of crust. I learned to identify that delicate balance when you slice into the pie and the filling is so juicy that it threatens to spill onto your plate yet it doesn’t as if by magic. And I learned to be discerning and ruthless when it comes to evaluating the bottom crust. On one hand, I’m glad that I learned the finer details that set a pie apart from its mediocre brethren. On the other hand, I had never been satisfied about my own handiwork since.
I often insist that recipe is merely guideline and advices from more experienced cooks. Ultimately it’s up to my own hands to carry out the execution and my own tastebuds to judge the result. In the case of pies, it is even more so. Try as I may to divine the secret to pie perfection from a recipe, it is my technique that matters. I had almost given up hope on ever achieving the pie of my dreams until my passion for pie-making was rekindled last year. I came close a few times but close to perfection is not the same as attaining perfection. That is until last Friday’s happy coincidence.
I came across a fantastic deal on wild blueberries at the market. Obviously it was not in my nature to let the opportunity slip by. I took home a 3L basket of Ontario wild blueberries and immediately set to work on an all-butter pie dough. I had great success with Melissa Clark’s recipe last year but this would be my first time using this all-butter pie dough for a double-crust pie. The recipe can be found in her cookbook In The Kitchen With A Good Appetite. I recall the dough was very well-behaved. I made the pie dough twice for the top and bottom crust as I lack a supersize capacity food processor. I did not want to overload my regular size food processor at the cost of uneven result.
Looking back, I was a little too cautious about minimal handling of the dough. There was not as much marbling as I would like. I took great care to ensure there was absolutely no weak points in the bottom crust and the crimped edges for filling to burst through during baking. I carefully sealed in 6 cups of wild blueberry filling I made according to the recipe in Regan Daley’s In The Sweet Kitchen. I set the assembled pie on a hot baking sheet in a 400F oven for 20 minutes and then continued baking at 350F for what seemed like eternity.
My house quickly filled with aroma of butter and blueberries. It was way past my bedtime but I was focused on the success of my pie. After all, everything went according to plan and I was anxious to see the result of my effort. By the time the blueberry filling bubbled vigorously between the slits of the top crust and my pie turned a glorious golden colour, I could barely keep my eyes open. Through my bleary eyes, I started noticing something odd. There was much sizzling between the glass pie plate and the bottom crust. In fact, the sizzling got so violent that liquid started escaping and flooding my baking sheet. I was annoyed by the extra clean up but I couldn’t care less. I was sleepy and cranky and that pie better finish baking so I could go to bed!
When I had a chance to take a good look at the pie in the morning, it had sufficiently cooled off and ready to be sliced. The liquid that flooded my baking sheet turned out to be butter and it had solidified at that point. I got even more annoyed at myself knowing that I probably did not work the dough correctly so all that butter sweated out of the crust.
I sunk my knife into the pastry and the top crust shattered beneath the tip of the knife. The filling strike the delicate balance I sought after and the smell of wild blueberries was absolutely irresistible. The bottom crust was completely browned which was a good sign. Then I took a bite. Crispy! I achieved the holy grail of double crust fruit pie! What happened? What did I do? I went from annoyed to surprised to curious.
Then it dawned on me. You know how pan pizza has a ridiculously crispy bottom crust because the pan was saturated with olive oil before baking? Same principle. The bottom crust of my blueberry pie practically deep-fried to crispy golden when all that butter sizzled out of the dough. I can’t believe I perfected my pie after all these years due to one happy coincidence.
