Cherry Pie

By Claude

Made with fresh cherries. Usually the store only carries sweet cherries which works - I cut back the sugar. However most recipes call for tart cherries - both work.
Cherry Pie recipe usually call for 1 cup of cherry juice. Fresh cherries have none so you must adjust. I use the Julia Child approach, use red wine (cherry tart). Comes out great.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup of granulated sugar
• 2-1/2 tablespoons of cornstarch
• 2 tablespoons of lemon juice
• dash of salt
• 1 cup red wine - I used Burgundy (but any sweet red will do)
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• 3 cup fresh cherries - pitted
• 6 to 8 drops of almond extract
• Pastry for 9 inch pie - I usually use the pre made from the refrigerator section of the store.

Details

Preparation time 30mins
Cooking time 70mins

Preparation

Step 1

Pre-heat the oven to 425F degrees.

Pit the cherries and set aside (if frozen allow them to come to room temperature).

In a 2 qt. sauce pan put the first 5 ingredients, sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, salt and wine. Bring just to a simmer and stir frequently. The mixture will thicken. Taste to see if it is sweet to your liking.

When the sauce is thick, heat off, add the butter and almond extract. When the butter has melted mix well remove from heat and let the sauce cool close to room temperature. When cherry sauce is cool add the cherries and mix well. If using frozen cherries it can help cool the sauce.

Line a 9 inch pie plate with pastry. When the cherry mixture is cool pour into pastry lined pie shell and lattice the top crust. Fold strip of aluminum foil loosely around edge of the pie.

Bake for 30 minutes, then remove aluminum foil and bake 10 minutes more.

Let cool so juices will not run when cut.

serve with vanilla ice cream.