As soon as I learned about the Pie Party for July 5th, 2011, I counted myself in and started trying to narrow down my pie-options. The more options I have, the faster I melt into indecision and confoundedness, so I limited myself to summertime essentials which around here runs to blueberries, blackberries, and peaches. Not that we don’t absolutely love and dote on every kind of pie throughout the summer, from buttermilk and chess to lemon meringue and pineapple-coconut — but I limited myself to the ones that particularly say “Summer is here!”. My wonderful cousin Libbie’s kind invitation to join her and her family down in Holden Beach sealed the deal — I knew we’d be driving home on Saturday before #PieParty day, with frequent opportunities to stop off and buy some fresh ripe peaches from the sandhills of North Carolina.
We stopped along US Highway 17 for peaches, okra, corn, ‘maters, creamers, ‘lopes, cukes, and homemade ice cream to sweeten the drive home. We got white peaches as well as regular peachy-peaches. They have a lovely flavor, but for pie making, next time I would leave them out, because they cook up looking like apples rather than peaches and don’t soften up quite as much.
Nancie's Delightful Peach Pie
Pastry for one double-crust pie
Ingredients
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup flour, cornstarch, or tapioca flour
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/2 teaspoon ground mace or grated nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3 1/2 pounds fresh peaches, peeled and cut into chunks
- 2 tablespoons cold butter, cut into bits
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 425 degrees F. Line a deep 9-inch pie pan with pastry, leaving at least one inch hanging past the rim for sealing the crust. Combine the sugar, flour, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, mace or nutmeg, and salt in a medium bowl. Stir with a fork to mix them well.
- Pour this mixture over the peeled, chopped peaches, and gently tumble and stir to coat them fairly evenly. Turn the peaches into the prepared pie crust and even them out, so that they are mounded up toward the center of the pie pan.
- Dot with butter, as they used to say --- meaning dib and dab the butter bits around the top of the pie in an effort to ensure that no peach quadrant is neglected in the baking process. No worries --- it will all come out fine.
- Place the top crust over the peaches, press to seal it to the bottom crust around the edges, and then turn the bottom crust up and over to enclose the edges of the top crust. Pinch and press and crimp, using any method you like to seal most of the peaches and juices inside the piecrust. Going around with the tines of a fork is one way I love that always does the job.
- If possible, line a big baking sheet with aluminum foil and place the pie on this baking sheet. Put the pie in the 425 degrees F oven and bake for 20 minutes. Lower the heat to 350 and bake for another 45 to 60 minutes, until the crust is golden brown on top and underneath and the pie is bubbly and juicy.
- You may need to put foil or another cookie sheet underneath the pie, as peaches are extremely juicy and may want to bubble up and out onto the floor of the oven.
- If the pie is browned beautifully on top but still not done on the bottom, cover the top with foil and continue baking at 325 for another 20 to 30 minutes.
- A glass pie pan allows you to see the crust and judge whether it is done. Cool on a folded kitchen towel or a wire rack for 30 minutes or longer, and cut while warm or at room temperature.
Nutrition Information
Yield 6 Serving Size 1Amount Per Serving Calories 389Total Fat 5gSaturated Fat 3gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 2gCholesterol 10mgSodium 122mgCarbohydrates 87gFiber 5gSugar 56gProtein 3g
Wonderfully plain, but vanilla ice cream gives this Delightful Peach Pie’s peachy juices somewhere to show off even more!
Happy Pie Day! Happy Cooking! Happy Eating!
Gratitude to all my Pie Pals who got this party started, and I’m delighted to have my post here ready to put out on the virtual windowsill, so I can zoom across the worldwide web and check out all the pies that everybody else has been making and sharing around this sweet ol’ world.
I was surfing the net for a good peach pie recipe and guess where I land? Here on the blog of you, my dear good friend. How wonderful and easy your peach pie looks like. Baking this today. Thanks for a great recipe, Nancie. Yours are always the best 🙂
That is a beautiful pie! It brings forth non-existing memories of a Southern summer fair and peach pies cooling off on the window sill (is it possible to be haunted by “memories” that happened to someone else, in some other time period? I don’t know, but I felt nostalgic just looking at it:)
I am a novice at making American pies, but I am so tempted to run to the kitchen and cut up 5 peaches from the fruit bowl in hope that my pie might one day look like yours:)
Lana, I know just what you mean about ‘memories’ and nostalgia. There’s our personal, lived experience, and then there’s …comparable? …equivalent? where the object brings to mind a feeling, a sensation that is real and true. I think of getting lost in a book about a completely different life and world, and feeling that I’ve been there, I know a place that isn’t even real to anybody, it’s a gift from a writer’s mind. And a delicious one.
Nancie, that pie looks beyond delicious. I haven’t made a peach pie in a long while. It’s time. Cheers & belated happy Pie Party!
Thank you, Domenica! I’ll keep my eye out for it, or something else sweet and fine.
I am in love with the bowl of juicy peach slices! Wow! Love your pie, it looks delicious!
Many thanks, Nelly. Some photos call for thinking/framing/skills that I’ve not yet mastered, but a sight like that? It’s just haul off and click. Natural beauty, natural goodness. Grateful for your comment and since my paternal grandmother was named Ellen Nora but went by Nellie, I smile to see your beautiful name.
Nancie, I’d give my eye teeth for one of your pies!
Sally, please know that you’ll get pie without the surrender of a single eye tooth, much less the pair. You’ll need them for the substantial buttercrust anyway, and all your future pie-pleasures. Thanks for reading and for this delightful compliment.