Vegetable Pie!

A vegetable... in a pie? Yummy. Brittany explained how versatile and easy to use (and make) a rhubarb compote is, and the vegetable itself can be used in all sorts of baked goods. Crumble, bars, ice cream, cookies I'm sure, and of course, pie.

First piece!

Making pies was always little intimidating for me when it said I had to make my own crust, but it's really just flour, fat, salt, sugar and water all combined together and rolled into two crusts.

Every rhubarb pie I've had before this one has been mixed with some other f

orm of fruit. Raspberries or strawberries, most recently. Now I think the only reason I would add strawberries or raspberries to a rhubarb pie is if they're lying around about to go bad (which would hardly ever happen).

The recipe can be altered to whatever you have around the house, but I think it's wonderful as is. Don't be intimidated because you have to make the crust, while it's the longest part of the process, you can eat the excess (who doesn't love crisco and flour mixed together?).

Happy baking!
-Sarah

Recipe: Rhubarb-Only Pie
Crust (can be used for any pie):
2 cups flour (I used half all purpose, half whole wheat) plus some for rolling

1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp granulated sugar
2/3 cup vegetable shortening (Crisco) use more if there's a lot of extra flour in the bowl (I maybe used 1 1/2 more Tbl)
6 Tbl (more or less, I used 4 Tbl) ice cold water: before measuring ingredients put a few ice cubes in a glass of cold water

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
Measure and mix the flour (don't shake the measuring cup), salt and sugar in a large bowl. Add the Crisco and use either a pastry cutter or a knife and fork to combine the Crisco into the dry ingredients. Continue cutting until all or most of the dry ingredients are combined to the Crisco and the pieces are all the same size. While moving the mix around with a fork, add the ice water one tablespoon at a time until the dough starts to come together. If you think it's ready, try to pull pieces apart. If it crumbles, it's too dry. Don't go too far with the water, but over doing it is better than a crumbly dough.

Ready for water!

After adding 4 Tbl water: not too crumbly, not too gooey.

Make two balls of dough, one larger than the other. Flour your work surface and your rolling pin, and flatten the larger ball of dough and flour that as well. Roll out the dough until it's 1-2 inches bigger than the pie pan, flouring the bottom and the top as needed. Carefully roll the crust onto the rolling pin and place in the pie pan, pushing down into the bottom and filling any holes with excess crust from the edges. Put this in the fridge or freezer with the other ball of dough while you prepare the filling!

Ready to be put in the base of the pie pan. (I was in a hurry, try to be more careful than I)

But it still turned out alright!

Filling:
4 1/2 cups of rhubarb (I washed and sliced mine into 1/4-1/2 inch pieces)
1 cup + 1 Tbl granulated sugar
4 Tbl flour (I used all-purpose)
1/2 tsp cinnamon or nutmeg or combination thereof (optional)

Put the rhubarb in a large bowl and toss with the remaining ingredients. (Yes... that's it!)

Yummy rhubarb, waiting for sugar and flour.

Baking:
1 - 2 Tbl butter (in small pieces)

I think this looks delicious.

Place the filling in the pie pan with the butter all over the top. Roll out the second ball of dough in the same way as above. Carefully place on top of the pie and scrunch the top and the bottom crusts together all the way around the edges. (As you can see from my pie, I did not do this carefully. Ah, well. That's the fun of baking. Too bad I already ate the excess crust from the bottom.) Make sure to put vents in the top using a sharp knife so the steam can escape.

All set for the oven!

Then put the pie in the oven for 15 minutes. After that reduce the temperature to 350ish (my oven is wacky) degrees for another 20-30 minutes. Or until you can see pink bubbles coming up the vents (mine took another 24 minutes).