Episode 10 – Blackberry Pie

Episode 10
Blackberry Pie
July 29, 2010

Blackberry pie is one of the once a year pies that you make when the blackberries are perfectly ripe and you can afford to mash them up into pie filling.  Any other time of the year and it would almost be crazy since blackberries (as well as raspberries) are so pricey.  I like to think of blackberry pie as the celebration of the last month of summer.  Of course, you could always use frozen fruit which would significantly reduce the price – though I don’t know how easy it is to find frozen blackberries.  Frozen raspberries are readily available though.

This episode didn’t go as smoothly as I had hoped.  I made two or three blackberry pies last summer, and of course I didn’t write down the recipe I developed – or change the one I was using to be more correct, so I figured it would come back to me as I was making it.  Yeah, no such luck.  I do remember last year I used a very little amount of blackberries and the pie was really flat so I thought to myself this year that I probably needed a lot.  Well, as most things in pastry, a little goes a long way.  I probably should’ve used only two strawberry containers full of blackberries which should be about 2 pounds – since that’s about all that’s going to fit.  Since I used such a high amount of blackberries the flour’s thickening ability was greatly reduced resulting in a runny pie – plus the sugar didn’t balance out the tartness of the blackberries as much as I would’ve liked.  All good things to note for the next blackberry pie – should I go blackberry picking again.

Ah yes, and my Julie and Julia moment!  I totally fell asleep when the pie was in the oven.  I put the pie in earlier, at a normal time, and pulled it out when I thought it was done.  I’m glad I took pictures at that point because color-wise it looked great.  I’m not sure if I really hadn’t baked it long enough or if it was because the flour ratio was off, but the pie wasn’t really ready.  I let the pie cool down to see if it would thicken at all when it cooled but it didn’t.  So around 11:30 pm I popped it back on the oven.  Next thing I knew I was waking up at 2:30 am.  The pastry was pretty scorched, as you can see in the video, but the filling was fine.  So, after the episode was shot I tore open the pie and have been using it for various things such as ice cream topping, pancake topping, filling for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and a mix in for yogurt.  So I guess the bonus lesson for this episode (as there tends to be) is try to be flexible when things go wrong.  Salvage what you can and think creatively if possible.  The product is only ruined when you let it be ruined – or if it’s charcoal.  That’s pretty bad too.

Anyway, I’ve updated the recipe with the proper ratios and amounts and included the original recipe for the blackberry pie which was made using unpureed blackberries.  Enjoy the video below and my raging embarrassment in the last scene : )