SOUR CHERRIES ARE ALMOST HERE!!

Well, it's time to renew my love of sour cherry EVERYTHING!  Having such simple yet delicious treats like cherry pie, cherry cobbler, cherry cake, and a new one for me...Apple and Sour Cherry Cake...means I can use up some of last year's frozen sour cherries, and get some fresh ones.  It is such a wonderful family memory, picking sour cherries at Markley's Cherry Orchard (in Lehighton, PA), which is long gone.  As a kid, my brothers and I would take huge buckets, and have one of the most fun days of the year.  In early July the sour cherry  trees would yield their precious fruit.  We would then spend hours picking and subsequently pitting the cherries.  My Mom would bake a couple pies with the fresh cherries (as a reward for all the picking and pitting), and the rest we froze for later in the winter...especially around the Holidays.  The tradition was so ingrained, we would schedule any other summer activies around the cherry harvest.

Well, today that orchard is no more, but fret not!  The wonderful family owned and run little Scholl's Orchard in Bethlehem is my source of...or should I say my 'fix'...for the cherries.  I think I make a fool of myself when I go there and repeatedly buy sour cherries by the ton.  Well, not literally, but I do buy so many that the owners know me as the 'guy who buys SO many cherries.'  One customer asked me what in the world I do with all those cherries.  Truth be told, I eat them!  Of course my Mom still wants some which I gladly get her.  The rest are pitted and frozen and turned into yummy pies, cakes and other creations I can come up with.  I have included my Gluten Free Cherry Pie recipe below.  It's a simple yet delicious version.

Hope you enjoy, and please send me any cherry recipes you think I might enjoy.  I love trying to convert new ideas/recipes from fellow bakers into gluten free treats I can enjoy and share.

Remember try out Scholl's Orchard!!  They have the most wonderful fruits and vegetables AND they are so very friendly.  

Scott's Easy Gluten Free Cherry Pie

I really can't get enough sour cherry pie.  I've tried many combos of recipes, but always come back to this one...easy AND tasty!

Pie Pastry:

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons gluten free flour mix  (I use Bette Hagman's Featherlight Rice Flour blend)

2 tablespoons sweet rice flour

1 tablespoon granulated sugar

1/2 tsp. xanthan gum

1/4 tsp. salt

6 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into 6 pieces

1 large egg

1/2 tsp. apple cider vinegar

2-3 tsps. milk or water

Mix flours, sugar, xanthan gum, and salt in large mixing bowl.  Add butter and mix with pastry cutter or fork until crumbly and resembling coarse meal.

Add egg, vinegar and milk/water.  Mix with fork until your dough is together and workable.  Shape the dough into a ball and rest in fridge for 20 minutes.  

Remove dough to a large sheet of plastic wrap.  Roll dough out with rolling pin to desired round.  **Use additional sweet rice flour when rolling out dough.

Turn dough into 9-inch pie plate, and form edges as desired...I like fluted or crimped edges.

Filling:

1 1/3 cups sugar

1/2 cup gluten free flour blend

6 cups sour cherries, pitted

2-3 tablespoons butter

Mix sugar and flour.  Stir in cherries.  Pour into unbaked pie crust.  Cut the butter in tiny pieces and drop all over the top of the cherries.

**You can make a second pie crust (double recipe) if you like a top on your pie.  Or, you can make gluten free crumbs and sprinkle on top of pie.

Bake at 425 degrees F about 35-50 minutes or until your shell is golden brown (gluten free crusts tend to be lighter in color even when overbaked!!)

Cool the pie and then enjoy!!

Happy Piitting!!

-Scott