hope you’re not tired of pie yet.

You guys! Pie Day is almost upon us. My whole office has been swept into excitement over potential pastry victories, so we’re all making pies to share and constructively critique, so we can all kick butt next weekend at the DC State Fair pie competition.

Today, I made a fruits of the forest-ish pie.

I’ve been chasing this flavor since I had a “fruits of the forest” pie in Port Austin, Michigan, like, five years ago. I like berries, I like apples, I even like to SAY “fruits of the forest.” It sounds like a fairy tale food, like something Little Red would bring to her granny, but scarf on the way there. I boosted the recipe for the crust by one quarter so I could make mini vegan pielettes for my friend Jessie. This was my first foray into shortening, and I have to be honest, the stuff grosses me out a little bit to touch but OH MAN FLAKY CRUST AHOY.

To make enough crust for just one pie (not extra cuplettes), you’ll need:

2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 cup shortening

1/2 cup water

Blend ye olde drye ingredientes. Cut in little bits of shortening at a time until you get a nice, crumbly texture. Pour in water slowly until you have a ball of dough. Halve the ball, wrap up, toss it in the fridge, forget it for a while. Note! You may recall my issues with blending dough before. I got one of those pastry blenders; for five bucks or so, it is the right call to make. You should use one so your crust doesn’t suck.

Now, you can use this filling recipe, or you can just throw in whatever fruits are available/you think you might find in a wooded area. For instance, I really like rhubarb in here, but rhubarb is sadly not in season. So I went without. Also, the blackberries at the grocery store looked a little funky and there weren’t any at the farmers market so I just doubled up on my intended blueberry input. Cherries might be nice. Currants would be delicious. This is what I used.

2 medium apples (gala, I think), peeled and thinly sliced

Half a container of strawberries, thinly sliced

1 container (pint size?) of Michigan blueberries

1 container (half pint?) of raspberries

About half a cup of sugar (follow your heart on this; only you know what’s sweet enough for you)

4 heaping tbsp starch

Mix your powdered ingredients. Pour ‘em over the fruit and toss gently to coat. I threw a little cinnamon in there but hey! That’s your call to make. Line your pie tin (or “good Pyrex”) with your pie crust, then pour in your filling. I did another cross-top because I think it looks a little more quaint and less like I screwed it up when I do, in fact, screw up. I also dotted the top of the big pie with butter because I roll with Paula Deen.

Line the edges with tin foil, bake at 375 for about 25 minutes, then unwrap the edges and bake another 20-25, or until you’re getting some nice golden brown action happening.

Do you have leftover dough? Do you have leftover filling? Make little pielettes! Line a cupcake tin with the dough; pour in your excess filling. You can even do another criss-cross thingie on top, but it’s gonna look a little silly. Bake until it looks done-ish (about 20 minutes for me).

We’ll see how well fruits of the forest fairs against the great Southern Peach at tomorrow’s office showdown, but as far as I’m concerned, this guy is a success.

-Lindsey