TWD - Blueberry Double Crusted Pie

The TWD recipe this week is blueberry double crusted pie and is chosen by Amy of South in Your Mouth. This was an exciting challenge as in my mind blueberry pie is quite American – not something we think of making in NZ, so it was something different. Also, apart from apple pie, I’ve never made a deep dish double crust pie before! I didn’t want to make a whole pie because it would have been a waste with just the two of us to eat it, so I decided to do a third of the mixture and make little pies.



The pastry called for shortening – not something we really use in NZ. I used kremelta (a solidified coconut oil) which I happened to have in the fridge. I wasn’t sure what to make the little pies in. The majority of my dishes etc are still packed away – they got packed away last year when we moved into our house which we are going to re-build (by the way we are on track to start building in the Spring, so this time next year hopefully I will have a brand new kitchen and scullery!!) – so I had limited dishes to choose from. I decided to make the pies in large muffin tins I have that are more straight sided than usual muffin tins. I was a bit nervous though that they wouldn’t turn out that well, but I went with it anyway.

I used frozen blueberries for the filling (being the middle of winter here, it’s not exactly blueberry season). The berries were tossed in a mixture of flour, sugar and lemon zest and then piled into the pies with a layer of dried bread crumbs between the pastry and the berries. There have been some comments that breadcrumbs are a funny thing to put into blueberry pie, but I think that they did a really good job of making sure that the berry juice didn’t seep into the pastry.



I was so pleased – the pies turned out beautifully and tasted delicious! I made two little pies, but wish that I had made more. The nice thing about making little pies is that the ratio of pastry to berries was higher and that pastry is so yummy! We had the pies with natural yoghurt. Dorie calls the pastry “good for everything” double crust pastry, and she is right – the pastry would be good with most things!



See what the other TWDers thought here.