It’s almost of the Fourth of July, so for the next few days I’m going to try to focus on foods that would be perfect for your holiday cookout or get-together. Today: Pie. Because what’s more American than fruit pie?

Though many of you might guess that I favor cake or cookies, pie is actually my favorite baked dessert. Toby’s favorite is cherry pie, my favorite is Key lime, and raspberry-blueberry is amazing and pretty perfect for Independence Day. But for something slightly unexpected and still incredibly delicious (and red), why not rhubarb?

 

I actually hadn’t even tasted rhubarb pie until last year, and woah (Joey Lawrence style). It is amazing, y’all.

You have a few options for the crust. I made my own (recipe below), but I am not very adept at making a top crust look pretty, so I found a new way that looks really cool and is much easier (for me, anyway): cutting shapes out of the top piece of crust and scattering them on top of the pie. I obviously used hearts here (a tiny cookie cutter — 1 1/2 or 2 high), but little stars would be perfection for July 4.

You can certainly use a frozen pie crust if you’d prefer, but I don’t think this cut-out method would work very well for that. The refrigerated pre-made crust would probably work, but I’m not 100% sure since I’ve never tried. Oh, and as an added bonus, all those cute hearts or stars can distract everyone from the fact that you failed to properly crimp the crust edges.

One more thing: Fruit pie is totally appropriate and totally delicious for breakfast. Try it.

Rhubarb pie (Adapted from Food52, makes one 9-inch deep-dish pie)
6 cups sliced rhubarb (you’ll need several stalks — like 6-7 giant stalks or a dozen smaller stalks. Make sure you buy a lot)
1 1/2 cups sugar
6 tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon to 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 tablespoons butter

First, make and chill the pie crust. Once it is chilled (but before you take it out of the fridge), preheat the oven to 425F.

Rinse and slice the rhubarb. You don’t want enormous chunks, but you don’t have to slice it super thin, either. (Maybe around 1/2-inch or 3/4-inch?) Place the rhubarb in a mixing bowl, add the sugar, flour and cinnamon and stir to combine. Set aside.

Roll out pie crust and place gently in pie pan. Pour the rhubarb filling into the crust. Cut the butter into small pieces and scatter over top of pie filling. Cover the filling with small pieces of crust you’ve cut into shapes (like stars) or just with a second rolled-out crust with a few slits cut on top.

Bake the pie for 15 minutes, then turn the oven heat down to 350F. Bake for another 25 to 30 minutes, until the pie filling is bubbling. Allow to cool for at least an hour before cutting and serving.

Pie crust(makes enough for one double-crust pie, like rhubarb. Adapted from Epicurious)
1 cup (2 sticks) COLD unsalted butter
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (or pastry flour, or a combination of both)
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup ice water (you may not need this much, but might as well ice extra!)

Cut the butter into small cubes and set aside (or stick in fridge). If you have trouble cutting the butter up, place a little bit of flour on the cutting surface you’re using.

Whisk the flour, sugar and salt together, or, if you’re using a food processor to make the crust (recommended), put them together in the bowl of the food processor and whirl them together for a few seconds. Add the butter pieces to the mixture and press the “pulse” button a few times (or use a pastry blender to cut the butter into the flour). If the butter pieces aren’t distributed, press the pulse button 2-3 more times (or keep cutting with the pastry blender). The butter pieces should be about the size of small peas, but a bit larger is fine as long as they are distributed throughout the flour.

Pull the tube thingy out of the top of the food processor lid and pour 3 tablespoons of ice water down into the dough. Pulse a few times. If the dough still seems very dry, add another tablespoon or so of water and press the pulse button a few more times. Continue until mixture starts to come together as a dough — although it’s OK if there are still some floury bits. You don’t want it to be wet and sticky.

Gather the dough together in your hands and divide into two equal-ish balls. Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for an hour or more, or place in the freezer for 30 minutes.

Once dough is chilled, lay down some parchment paper or a silicone mat and lightly sprinkle flour over the paper/mat. Rub a little flour on your rolling pin. Take one dough ball out of the fridge/freezer (if one is a bit larger, start with that one) and place it on the floured surface and sprinkle a little more flour on top (you don’t want to add a ton of flour to the dough here, so if you have problems with dough sticking your the rolling pin, put another piece of parchment paper on top of the dough to roll out).

Roll out the dough into a circle, changing the direction of the rolling pin as you go (e.g. don’t just roll back and forth in one direction). Once the circle is large enough that it will hang over the edge of the pie plate, loosely roll the circle around the rolling pin and unroll into the pie plate, making sure you don’t pull and stretch the dough as you settle it in. Cut off any edges that hang more than 1/2 inch or so beyond the edge of the pie plate. Crimp or smoosh the edges into a ruffle pattern.

After you’ve added the pie filling to the first crust, put some more flour on the work surface and take the second dough ball out of the fridge/freezer. Roll out into a similar circle, if desired, or just roll out to desired thickness and use a small cookie cutter to cut out as many hearts or stars as possible, then scatter the shapes around the top of the pie, making sure some of them overlap. You can gather the extra scraps together an re-roll them out to cut more hearts/stars.