30 things in 30 days for 30 years - DAY 2

Its day TWO of my 30 new things in 30 days adventure and while its still early in the game I am pretty excited about this!

Day two - Bake a Pie (from scratch)

I know some of you are probably thinking 'What?! how is this new since she bakes all the time!!' but what you dont know is that I have a deep fear of the pie. It is like an allusive creature waiting to be completely desecrated by my big cake making hands! There is a lot of science and skill that goes into good pie making. The people that know how to make a good pie have spent years perfecting it and that legacy is intimidating.

There are two types of pies that I have always wanted to make but was too chicken - I know it sounds silly but seriously, making a pie freaked me out! Mostly fear of it turning into a hot boiling fruit bomb in my oven that would explode leaving me to clean up the sweet magma like remains and I hate cleaning the oven - Washington Cherry Pie and Blueberry Pie. I picked blueberry. I did a lot (some might say excessive, I say diligent) googling for recipes, I IMed Lettie a million stupid pie related questions, and called my mom half a dozen times. I also youtubed, if you know me you know I youtube anything and everything. Youtube is a great source of information where you can type just about anything into the search engine and be instantly provided with your own detailed tutorial! It amazes me every time!

I found this great tutorial that I decided to use -
"How To Make Best Ever Blueberry Pie" by LandOLakesKtchn

I went to Freddies and got everything I needed, including a new glass pie pan and a butter/flour smasher thing called a "pastry blender". Blueberries are not currently in season so I had to go with frozen berries. I cannot wait for the U-Pick farms to open up this summer so that I can pick fresh blueberries right off the vines and eat them in a delicious pie that afternoon! I got home and laid out all my ingredients and tools just like I normally do with all my baking. Pre-measured everything and said a little prayer to the pie gods - please don't let me not f**k this up!

I literally just pulled the pie out of the oven a minute ago. The process was all in all pretty easy. There were a few hang ups along the way, particularly with getting the dough to be the right consistency and rolling it out nice and round. This was a super simple recipe though and I literally put my computer on the counter and followed the youtube video step by step, pausing while I caught up. So here is my picture tutorial of my first ever pie baking experience! I hope you enjoy.

The ingredients: Crust - 2 cups flour, 2/3 COLD butter cut into chunks, pinch of salt, and 4-6 tablespoons COLD water. Filling: 6 cups blueberries (fresh or frozen), 1/2 sugar, pinch cinnamon and nutmeg, and 2 tablespoons of flour. Tools - measuring cups/spoons, mixing bowls (I used two), pastry blender, fork, mixing spoon, rolling pin.


Making the crust - everyone and everything I read mentioned the importance of keeping the dough cold during the process, making sure the butter doesn't get to warm. So, thinking up something like a cold double /not/boiler I put ice in a large bowl and all my crust ingredients into another bowl on top of the ice. This worked great! Also - I put a few ice cubes in the water that i used to mix into the crust (see below blue bowl) to help keep that water cold so not to warm the butter during the mixing process.


Mix it like crazy first with the pastry blender than by hand, cut the dough in half reserving one half for the top (wrap and put in the fridge for later)



Roll it out and put it in the crust pan - this is where I found it to be a bit difficult because the dough was a lot more flaky than I am used to so it was a little harder than I expected. A few more tries and I will have it down though I am sure.


Preparing the filling - mix all the filling ingredients in a large bowl until all berries are covered with dry ingredients


Adding the filling to the pie crust


The top crust goes on and cut vents on top - functional and pretty!


Done!
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The smell was indescribable! Divine would be the closest attempt at describing it


So pretty!


I am not kidding when I say that this was one of the best pies I have ever had, I am not being bias either!! It was AMAZING! I had two slices and literally LICKED my plate clean!!!


I am so happy I tackled the pie beast and found it to be so much fun! I am still a cake maker at heart but a beautiful & delicious berry pie on a spring day is hard to beat and I will for sure be making more pies in the future!!!

CLICK HERE TO GO TO DAY 3