Summary: You gotta know, I love a cherry pie & I love some Halloween fun! This is an excellent cherry pie recipe & it’s easy to make it spooky! This pie fits in the standard, deep pyrex pie dish that you’ll find in stores & op shops. Its quite a decent size pie & I managed to eat half of it because it’s so delicious. I had to dig through grandmas hand written recipes for the pastry. So you could say this a recipe from beyond the grave…

INGREDIENTS

• 1.3kg frozen pitted cherries
• 2 tablespoon lemon juice
• 3/4 cup castor sugar
• 30g cornflour
• 1/4 cup reserved cherry juice

PASTRY

• 560g plain flour, plus more for rolling
• 100g castor sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 lemons, zest only
• 340g cold butter, cut into small chunks
• 2 free range egg yolks
• 4 tblsp ice water, plus more if needed
• Egg wash, for brushing pastry

1. Set cherries in a strainer over a bowl to thaw, reserving juice. They don’t need to completely thawed, you just want to remove excess liquid. Set aside. Or you can let the cherries defrost overnight in the fridge, just in their bags & strain at this point.
2. Combine the flour, sugar, salt and lemon zest in the bowl off a food processor. Pulse to combine the dry ingredients. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the egg yolk and pulse till combined. Add in the ice water, a little at a time, pulsing in between additions. Check the consistency of the dough by squeezing a small amount together between thumb and forefingers: You want there to be just enough moisture to bind the dough so that it holds together without being too wet or sticky. If it’s still crumbly, add a little more ice water, 1 teaspoon at a time.
3. When you get it to the right consistency, move the dough mix to a bowl or counter and bring together with your hands. Shape the dough into two even disks and wrap them in plastic. Put it in the refrigerator and chill for at least 30minutes.
4. Meanwhile, combine cherries, lemon juice and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring, for 5 minutes until cherries are completely thawed or until sugar is dissolved. Blend cornflour with reserved cherry juices in a small bowl. Stir into cherry mixture. Cook, stirring, for 2 to 3 minutes or until mixture boils and thickens. Cool completely.
5. You can either leave everything in the fridge overnight at this point or continue on. Preheat oven to 180C before continuing.
6. Roll out one of the dough disks between two pieces of baking paper until it is larger than the pie dish you are using. Using one of the pieces of baking paper, drape the pastry over the pie dish, lifting the edges up to help it settle into the corners.
7. Spoon the pie filling into the pastry line pie dish.
8. Roll out the second dough disk as above. Use a small paring knife to cut out a scary face. Using the baking paper to centre the face over the pie. Crimp the pastry edges with a fork & slice of excess pastry with a sharp knife. Brush pastry with egg wash.
9. Place the pie on a lined tray, in case of spillage and bake for 1hr 10 mins. You’ll know it’s ready when the pastry is browned & filling begins to bubble out. If the edges begin to brown too much, cover just the edges with foil.
10. Allow to cook for 4hrs before serving