I used to hate Cherry Pie.
Seriously.
Hated it.
This is because, during all my formative years, the only cherry pie I ever met contained canned cherry pie filling.
Gloppy, cornstarch thickened, sickly sweet, canned cherry pie filling.
Blech.
Then I met two things.
1) A friend with a tree bearing fantastic sour cherries
2) The 1950 Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook with a great fresh cherry pie recipe.
Betty offers 3 real cherry pie recipes and 1 "mock cherry pie" (More on that one later.)
All use the standard piecrust recipe from pages 298-299 - if you don't own the book here are some links to crust recipes:
For Betty Crocker's vintage crust click here.
For Anne's Personal Piecrust recipe click here.
1) Fresh Cherry Pie - pictured above and found on page 304. (Look down to the bottom left of the page under the master recipe.)
This is the recipe I've been using for years now but I do NOT add the cinnamon. It competes with the almond extract. You might think it's odd to add almond extract to a cherry pie but it strangely brings out more of the cherry flavor.
Just as not every apple makes a good apple pie, not every cherry makes a good cherry pie. Please note that the recipe calls for SOUR cherries.
With the right cherries this is a FANTASTIC pie.
The only negative thing I will say about making fresh cherry pie is that pitting the cherries is a royal pain - even with a cherry pitter it is time consuming - and you should always check the cherries for bugs as you pit them. No matter where the cherries came from - market or home tree - bugs like to live in them :-)
2) Canned Cherry Pie. Found on page 303 I have never made this pie because A) I never read the recipe closely and thought it used canned cherry pie filling (see previous rant) when, in fact, it uses canned cherries packed in juice. B) I never really noticed that you can actually buy canned cherries packed in juice here and now in 2020.
In the full spirit of the Back To Betty project I am now armed with two cans of cherries and plan to make and review this recipe.
3) French Glace Cherry Pie. This is a single crust pie found on page 321.
"Glace" is French for "glaze" and French Glace pies all require you to make a sort of jam glaze out of half of the fruit you will use in the pie. I have to admit I've never been a huge fan of glace pies and also that after reading the recipe thoroughly it sounds as though the end result will be a lot like a pie using canned cherry pie filling. (Again - see rant above.)
If you decide to try it yourself please note that this recipe uses sweet cherries and that you have to boil half of them instead of mashing them the way the master recipe says to do.
4) "Mock Cherry Pie" - page 309
I'm rather suspicious of this recipe - the 1950 edition of the Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook has a number of "mock" recipes where the chief requirement seems to be that the resulting food looks like something else but does not actually taste like it.
It's hard to imagine what the raisins add to this recipe in terms of "cherry pie imitation essence."
However I may try the recipe someday because fresh sour cherries are hard to find where I live.
As Always: If you own a copy of the Betty Crocker Picture cookbook (1950 edition) I hope I've inspired you to take another good look at it. If you don't have a copy they are pretty easy to find on ebay and other sources for old used books.
If you are just finding the blog for the first time you might want to explore the other articles on pie and Betty Crocker's 1950 Picture Cookbook. You can find them by clicking the "All About Pie" and "Back To Betty" categories in the right hand side bar.
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