Night Sky Blueberry Pie

This a beautiful and delicious pie that is not difficult to make. Serve it up with some vanilla ice cream or whipped cream, and guests or family will be delighted and impressed.

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Step 1: Pate Brisee (the Crust)

This recipe is for one double-crust 9" pie. To get a flaky crust, the key is COLD. You could take it to the extreme and chill all of your ingredients, the bowl, and the work surface (marble is best). If you have naturally cold hands, you'll have even a better advantage. In this case, I only used very cold butter and ice cold water and tried to work quickly.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
2 Tbsp. granulated white sugar
1 cup unsalted butter*, cold and cut into small pieces
1/4 - 1/2 cup ice water

Combine flour, sugar and salt in a food processor (or bowl, if that is what you have to work with). Add butter and pulse to combine until resembles course crumbs, about 10 to 15 seconds (if using bowl, cut the butter in with a pastry blender). Add ice water in a steady stream, starting with just 1/4 cup. Process just until the dough pinches together (crumbs about the size of peas now). If necessary add a little more water until you get to this state. You should not need more than 1/2 cup nor require longer than 30 seconds processing.

Turn the dough out onto your work surface and divide in half. Shape into flattened discs, wrap each into plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour. (The dough can be frozen for up to a month; thaw overnight in the refrigerator before using.)

Take one disc and roll it out onto your floured work surface until about 12" in diameter. Roll from the center out and rotate your crust quarter turns occasionally to avoid sticking. (As you can see in the pictures, mine is cracking and crumbing because I did not add enough water. I remedied this by wetting my hands with cold water and patching it together. If you have to do this, do not forget to re-flour the rolling pin to avoid sticking.) Transfer the crust to a 9" pie pan. (Because my crust turned out cracky and crumbly, I had to do a little patchwork. It turned out fine though.) Trim the edges, and fold them under. Cover with plastic wrap, and place in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

Take the second disc and roll it out as above. (Again, mine is cracking. It is not a big deal, however, as I'm going to be cutting small shapes out of it.) Cut your moon out with a circle cookie cutter. Move this piece to the side, and use the same cookie cutter to cut off part of the circle to form a slivered moon. Use a small star-shaped cookie cutter to cut out as many stars as you can get out of the rolled-out crust. Place your moon and stars on cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Cover with plastic wrap, and place in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

In the meantime, continue on to the blueberry filling.

* A note on the butter: Here is an opportunity for a little experimentation. For this pie, I'm using cow butter, but for the best pie crust I ever made, I used sheep butter. However, it is somewhat difficult to come by, unless you or someone you know raises sheep. Goat butter is easier to find, but I've not tried it -- yet. I hear duck fat results in an exceptionally tasty, flaky crust but have not tried that either. A lot of people use frozen shortening, but I simply prefer butter.

Renee! says: Aug 30, 2012. 6:54 PM

This pie looks amazing! I used the crust to make a chicken pot pie and it gave it a great, buttery flavor. It's important to add enough water. Thanks for the great recipe!