ON THIS WEEK’S episode, senior test kitchen editors Shilpa Uskokovic and Jesse Szewczyk are back with a perfect late summer bake: Shilpa’s cardamom-laced Peach-Blueberry Crumb Pie.
You heard it here first, we think summer is actually peak baking season. (Apologies to your AC.) The produce! The fruit! As a result, we felt it was only appropriate to bake a pie in August, highlighting peak-season fruit in all its glory. This pie has three components: a very flakey pie crust, the filling, and a cardamom streusel. Shilpa also walks us down memory lane with how she ended up developing this incredible pie crust recipe, and the magical ratio that ended up cracking the code for her. They walk us through every step of the recipe.
Shilpa and Jesse share why pre-cooking your fruit is the secret to a tender, crispy crust and perfectly-set filling, go on to answer listener questions, and introduce Bake Clubbers to pie expert Erin Jeanne McDowell, author of multiple cookbooks including The Book on Pie.
Listen now to hear more about why this month’s bake is the sweetest end to summer, and what to expect next month!
Shilpa Uskokovic: I am Shilpa Uskokovic.
Jesse Szewczyk: And I'm Jesse Szewczyk.
SU: We're both senior test kitchen editors at Bon Appétit.
JS: And this is BA Bake Club.
SU: Bake Club is Bon Appétit's book club, but for baking.
JS: We're creating the nerdiest and most wholesome corner of the baking internet.
SU: Every month, we publish a recipe on Bonappetit.com that introduces a baking concept we think you should know.
JS: And then you'll go bake. Send us any questions you have, or pictures every finished creations.
SU: And we'll get together here on the podcast to talk about the recipe.
JS: So the September Bake Club recipe, which is my banana pudding Paris-Brest, is live now on Bonappetit.com, and we'll tell you a bit about it at the end of the episode. But today we're going to be talking about Shilpa's excellent late summer peach and blueberry pie. Shilpa, can you tell us a little bit about this pie?
SU: Listen, first, I think we need to establish that summer is actually the time that most of us should be baking because there's so much-
JS: The good stuff.
SU: Exactly. There's so much produce, all of the fruit is out there. I know we normally think of baking season as fall and winter, which I get it, it's cold outside and most of us want to be at home baking cozy things. But summer has so much fruit and so we felt it was really appropriate to feature a fruit pie in August. And I know that was asking a lot of readers, but Jesse, I mean, it was lovely to see so many people made this pie.
JS: No, so many people did. They looked beautiful, they looked great.
SU: Way more successful than any of my very early attempts at pie many years ago. Okay, what can I say about the pie? The pie is essentially three components. It has a pie crust, a very flaky pie crust, a recipe that I actually developed a couple years ago and a recipe that I'm very proud of and which has gone on to be very popular with a lot of colleagues and readers. Then there's a filling, which is a peach and blueberry filling. It has lemon juice and cardamom, and it's thickened with a little bit of cornstarch, and it's precooked, we'll get into that and why. And then it's topped off with a cardamom streusel. A streusel top I think is one of my favorite ways to finish a fruit pie. I think it's the best of both worlds, you get a flaky crust and you get this nice streusel on top. And also, my dad always made apple crisp growing up, so it's very reminiscent of that.
JS: I love that. Okay, so we'll get into that topping and then we'll get into the filling later. But let's start with the base, the crust, which I know developing this pie crust recipe was a journey for you and it's made quite an impact on several people.
SU: Yes, yes. I mean, I always like to precede the recipe by stating how much of a pain in the butt pie crust was for me many years ago. Most of my earlier pie crusts were, they would shrink, they would be weirdly tough and greasy. The butter would leak out. I never really had success with pie crust, and maybe that's part of the reason why I said pie is my least favorite thing to make and eat. But I have since changed my mind and it was all thanks to being commissioned to work on a deep dive, like an explainer piece, all about pie crusts for Thanksgiving, I think it was 2022. So, I really dove deep into pie crust mechanics. I did a lot of experiments. I made many pie crusts, followed many techniques. And this, which we ended up calling actually perfect pie crust, this turned out to be the distillation of everything that I learned in that intensive course that I taught myself.
JS: So, what did you learn, Shilpa?
SU: Okay, my understanding about pie mechanics completely blew apart when I read this, a book I found on Kindle Unlimited, I think it was called Southern Pie. But I searched high and low to find it for this recording and I cannot find it for some reason. But in that book, Jesse, I read that all pie crust is essentially a simple ratio of two to one, which meant equal parts flour and fat, and half of that of a liquid.
JS: Which in my mind is already like, that's a lot of liquid.
SU: That's a lot of liquid, right?
JS: Because you're always told just add just enough so it barely holds together.
SU: Okay, if there's one myth in pie making that I would hope that everyone can just give up, it is how much water a pie crust can hold. And we'll come back to that in a moment, but I just want to talk about why this ratio is so magical. Because once you understand that with minor permutations to this formula, you can make a pie crust no matter what fat you have, if you stick to this ratio. So let's say if I want to put a recipe to it, I would say 100 grams flour, then I would use 100 grams butter, so two to two, and then the one would be half the amount of water, so I would use 50 grams, a maximum of 50 grams of water. And learning this really opened up my basic understanding of pie crust.
And the second revelation came to me when I was reading Rose Levy Beranbaum's book.
JS: Who was on our podcast recently.
SU: Who was on our podcast explaining why you simply cannot substitute eggs. And in her recipe, she uses cream cheese.
JS: Oh, interesting.
SU: In her crust. And I think I've said this millions of times on the podcast before, which makes me realize I do use cream cheese in a lot of my recipes.
JS: You do use a lot of cream cheese.
SU: It's such a magical ingredient, though.
JS: You should sponsor us at this point.
SU: I know. Krafts, please listen to us. Cream cheese is essentially 50/50 water to fat. So I basically split my fats that I need into two, cream cheese and butter. And then the cream cheese part, I rub into the flour, so it almost coats the flour. And I always like to say that the flour is wearing a raincoat of cream cheese because it's rubbed into the flour so thoroughly. And what this does is it tenderizes the pie crust. And then the later addition of the secondary fat, which is butter, I leave those in slightly bigger chunks and fold it through. And what that does is it creates flakes. So by using this two-fat method and incorporating them in two different ways, rubbing in the cream cheese and leaving the butter in bigger chunks and folding it in, I essentially created a crust that is both flaky and tender.
JS: Interesting. We had several questions specifically about the cream cheese, from our new Substack. Jen asked precisely what you just answered of, what is it replacing? So, you're saying both fat and part of the liquid?
SU: Both fat and part of the liquid. So when you go back to this actually perfect pie crust that this recipe calls for, I think I call for 208 grams of flour, and then I call for 60 grams of cold water. And then there's a certain amount of cream cheese, which if you account for the fact that cream cheese is half water, when you add the 60 plus half of the liquid from the cream cheese, it equates to that golden ratio of pie crust. I want to point out that the ratio isn't that you have to have everything exactly in two to one, it's a margin, essentially.
JS: Sure, it's close. Yeah.
SU: Yeah.
JS: We had another question about the cream cheese from Tim. Tim Szewczyk.
SU: Oh, Tim Szewczyk.
JS: Not related.
SU: We always have to put this writer in the podcast.
JS: Okay, he says, "There's no block cream cheese where I live. I ended up using the spreadable tub and it seems like it turned out okay still. So I have two questions." He asks, "What effect do the stabilizers in the spreadable kind have on the crust? And two, is it better to substitute a different soft cheese?" Interesting, "That comes in a block, or just go with the spreadable tub? I expect the answers are probably different for use in a crust versus the Basque cheesecake," which is an episode we talked about several months ago.
SU: Yes. First of all, thank you for always being an involved participant in our Bake Club. And as you clearly said in your comment, you've baked the Basque cheesecake before where we call for cream cheese. And you've made the relation that it's probably not the same substitution in the pie crust. And you're right, you can't substitute any other soft cheese, mainly because other soft cheeses like I'm thinking of, I'm wanting to go crazy and say, Brie.
JS: I know. I was like, what about like a chevre?
SU: Yeah, those while they might mimic the texture, the spreadability of cream cheese, they have different levels of fat and liquid entirely different from cream cheese, and it would greatly affect the way your crust performs.
So, I'm sorry to say that unfortunately you cannot substitute the cream cheese with anything else. However, what you could do is you could simply make an all-butter pie crust. And this is again, a good time to revisit that magic formula. What I would do is make an all-butter pie crust, and then if you start with 208 grams of flour as you do in this recipe, then you would use 200 grams of butter. And I would use half that amount, 100 grams of water. And I would simply make the crust with all butter and you would get the same results. And I would also approach the mixing in the same way. I would still keep the leavener, I would still keep the salt. And what I would probably do is I would split that 200 grams of butter, I would split it into half. Half I would rub in until it's finely incorporated, and half I would keep in bigger pieces and fold so I can mimic the same flaky, tender texture of this pie crust.
JS: And you think it would behave similarly to the one with cream cheese?
SU: It would. I think the one difference you might find is might be a tad drier. I think the crust with cream cheese hydrates in a slightly more different way, and it's much easier to handle. It's a very easy dough to handle.
JS: It's very pliable, yeah.
SU: Yes, it's a very pliable dough. This actually perfect pie crust is very, very pliable. And a lot of readers make comments saying, "Oh, the dough is much more wet than I'm what I'm accustomed to."
JS: And it is even for me, it's like rugelach, dough almost.
SU: Yes.
JS: Or like tart dough even kind of, yes.
SU: Yes, actually I like that you brought up rugelach dough, because I think that is one of the other pastries or pie doughs that do have-
JS: Cream cheese.
SU: That does have cream cheese in it.
JS: Yeah.
SU: Yeah, that's a good point, thank you. And Tim, to your question about the differences between cream cheese in a tub, which I think is often whipped, in comparison to block cream cheese. It has a lot more liquid because the premise of tub cream cheese is that it's soft and spreadable, even when it's cold. It has a different makeup of fats and it generally has a lot more stabilizers added to it just to keep all of this extra liquid still contained and not just running around. So it really, the combination of extra stabilizers and extra liquid will end up yielding a very gummy, tough crust if you use cream cheese in a tub.
JS: Well, I will say, besides the cream cheese, which is definitely an interesting addition, I find your addition of leavener even more interesting.
SU: The leavener was just a little bit of insurance for pie bakers like me who might not get the folding process correct, or might over incorporate the butter. The leavener was just there to sort of provide a little bit of lift in case you (beep) things up along the way, yeah.
JS: Sure, and it's just baking powder.
SU: It's just baking powder and I think it's-
JS: And barely any.
SU: It's like a quarter of a teaspoon.
JS: One more question about, okay, this is from Becca. "The crust was fairly easy, but mine still fell on some of the sides. So I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. Maybe not crimping as much on the ends or maybe rolling the dough too thin? Everything tasted great still, but maybe one day I'll get the crust right."
SU: Okay, Becca, I know what the listeners, Jesse, aren't privy to is the picture that we saw of Becca's pie crust and pie rather, which was lovely. But Becca had baked it in a glass pie pan, which okay, we'll get into the whole glass versus metal argument later. But the thing I want to point out here which relates to Becca's problem, is that a glass pie pan has a slightly bigger surface area than an equivalent metal pie pan. So, Becca probably had to stretch her dough a lot thinner and it didn't quite go up the sides of the pan, is what I reckon. When you roll your dough too thin and it's almost like stretched to the max, it sort of rubber bands back on itself.
JS: Yes.
SU: It only wants to be stretched that much.
JS: It slumps.
SU: Yes.
JS: Yes.
SU: If you push it beyond its limit, when it goes in the oven and it's baking, it is upset and it shrinks back down. So, that's one thing about why the correct pan size matters.
And the second reason why the crust might have slumped is that when Becca put in the weights to blind bake the crust, maybe the pie weights didn't go all the way to the top.
JS: Oh, sure, sure, sure.
SU: And that is something quite essential, which is why I like to call for rice or beans as pie weights, because you really need a lot of pie weights to fill up your pie crusts, a lot more than you think you might need. And it can get very expensive very fast if you try to use ceramic or metal pie weights. And it is essential to use enough pie weights to come all the way to the top. And essentially what that does, is it's pressing the crust and holding it against the sides of the pie dish until it's set.
JS: Sure, okay. And on that note, so blind baking for those listening, is when you bake your pie shell before anything goes in it. And this is maybe less common for fruit pies and more common for things that the filling is cooked on a stove top or cooked separately, say like a custard pie, or perhaps even some pecan pies I think utilize this technique. But it's less common in a fruit pie, I would say.
SU: Listen, the thing that bothered me most about a fruit pie is that often, especially a double crusted one, is that often the bottom crust would be soggy, because when you're working with fruit, that's the nature of fruit.
JS: It's wet.
SU: It releases liquid. Yes, it's wet. It releases liquid, which means it would sit on that bottom crust and turn it soggy. And one way to prevent that is by blind baking-
JS: Sure.
SU: ... as I do in this recipe. And when I say blind bake, I mean you blind bake this crust.
JS: You fully bake it, yeah.
SU: I pretty much fully bake it. And I think that's a good takeaway when you're blind baking pies, I would say simply bake it almost the color that you want the finished pie to be.
JS: Sure.
SU: Because in the case of a fruit pie, when you put the fruit filling in there, it acts as an insulator. And the pie crust, the blind bake pie crust doesn't really brown all that much more. So I would say take that pie crust, blind bake pie crust, almost to where you want the final color to be. That's the best way to make sure the crust remains flaky.
JS: So, we're going to take a quick break.
SU: When we get back, we'll talk about the cardamom spiced peach blueberry filling, assembling your pie, and more.
Welcome back to BA Bake Club.
JS: Okay, Shilpa, we have some questions about the filling. But before we dive into those, do you want to briefly explain what's going on with the filling?
SU: So the filling is pre-cooked. To make the filling, I cut peaches into chunks, put them in a pan along with some lemon juice and zest, sugar. I cook that until the sugar fully dissolves and the peaches release liquid, and I smash some of the peaches as they cook just into smaller bits. And then I introduced a cornstarch water mixture, like a slurry to thicken up the whole thing.
And at first when I was working on this filling, I kept the peaches as wedges. And what was happening was when I added the cornstarch and then the filling cooled, the cornstarch thickened the juices, but the peach wedges remained whole and almost distinct from that cornstarch goo. So in almost my final round of testing, it was then that I was like, okay, why don't I smash the fruit down a little bit? And it was amazing, because now we have this peach jam sort of filling that was thickened with cornstarch, rather than whole chunks of peaches in cornstarch goo.
JS: And then Shilpa, you also chill that cooked mixture, right?
SU: Yes. I chill that cooked fruit mixture. I think it is an essential step, because when you chill the mixture, the starch sort of recrystallizes.
JS: Like leftover Chinese food.
SU: Like leftover Chinese food.
JS: Exactly.
SU: Exactly like that, yes. It does have that similar tight texture once it's chilled. And I also like that it builds a little bit of flexibility into the recipe. That way you can make the filling the day before and then the next day if you have your pie shell also blind baked, the next day really all you're doing is chucking your fruit filling into your pie shell, topping, and baking. So, it kind of simplifies things. But really, I think chilling the pie filling even just enough to bring it to a cool room temp really makes a difference in the final result.
JS: Okay, Shilpa, are you ready for some more listener questions?
SU: Yes, I am.
JS: Okay. From Bano, "Do we have to peel the peaches before cooking? And what would the textural difference be with versus without peeling?"
SU: Okay, in this recipe, no, you do not have to peel the peaches before cooking. I will admit, I don't know if offended is too strong a word, but I'm a little bit hurt that one would assume if I'm meant for the peaches to be peeled that I wouldn't write those instructions down. So in this particular recipe, no, the peaches aren't peeled, and that's because multiple rounds of testing, I didn't feel the need for peeling the peaches.
JS: I kind of didn't perceive the skin that much.
SU: Not at all.
JS: Yeah.
SU: Yeah, and I use different varieties of peaches.
JS: Also, peeling a peach is a pain.
SU: Peeling a peach, you have to... How to peel a peach I think is the type of the cookbook.
JS: It sounds like a beautiful-
SU: It's lovely.
JS: Yeah, like a novel. You make an X.
SU: Yes, you make-
JS: You put it in boiling water, you put it in cold water, then you use your fingernails to dig under it and peel it.
SU: Just like how you peel a tomato.
JS: Yeah.
SU: I didn't think it's worth it. And also, as Jesse said, if you have to go through all of those steps to peel the peach, you're already kind of cooking the fruit and it kind of turns out soggy. So no, I don't recommend peeling the peaches. I didn't feel the need to. The skin is not perceptible, as Jesse said.
JS: All right, well Bano, you have offended Shilpa, but don't worry, I offend her every day in the test kitchen. So, there's nothing new here.
SU: We still remain friends though.
JS: Yeah, no, she's still in the club. Okay, another peach question is from Sarah. And Sarah is asking, "As we are getting it later into the season, I am nervous I won't be able to find, 'barely ripe peaches.' Any tips if I have to get riper ones?"
SU: Okay. Okay, let's give a little backstory for Sarah's question.
JS: Yeah, what's going on here?
SU: And in the recipe I say to use barely ripe peaches. And I think this, besides pre-cooking the filling, I think this was another revelation in making this pie. And that's because slightly under ripe fruit often contains a bit more pectin than very ripe fruit, and pectin helps things set and gel. It's what gives jam its body. And the higher pectin in a fruit, the more form it'll set, all good things when it comes to a fruit pie. If you use very ripe peaches, I would say your pie filling would be mushy because-
JS: Jammy.
SU: Jammy, but jammy is a good thing.
JS: Sure, sure. Okay.
SU: Jammy is what we want, but I think which you will get when you use slightly unde ripe fruit. But if you use overripe, I think it becomes like-
JS: Past jammy.
SU: Yes.
JS: Okay. Okay.
SU: Whatever the word is, kind of like egg salad texture.
JS: Okay. Well, Sarah, you're going to get egg salad, but it's going to be tasty.
SU: Yes, it'll still be good, just a little bit more wet.
JS: Sure. From Christina C, "The recipe calls for fresh blueberries, but the ones in my store are always expensive and not that good. Can I use frozen? And if I can, do I thaw them first?"
SU: That's a great question. Yes, you certainly can use frozen. I would simply use the equivalent weight. I wouldn't thaw them first. After the peaches come off the stove, just throw your frozen blueberries in there. You will notice when you use frozen blueberries that they leach a little bit more liquid because the freeze-thaw cycle compromises the skin of the blueberry and it's more likely to leach liquid. This won't affect the texture of your pie but your filling will look darker and deeper colored than if you had used fresh.
JS: And what about frozen peaches?
SU: Actually-
JS: She's like, Jesse, get out.
SU: No, no. Remember I tested it with frozen peaches?
JS: Oh yeah, you did, you did.
SU: Yes, you can use frozen peaches as well. Again, no need to really thaw because you're going to heat up the filling to pre-cook it. And it might take a little bit longer to get the temp, but just throw your peaches in. You can just do an equivalent weight.
JS: Okay. And actually, another question from Christina. "My pie was perfectly set and had a great texture, but eating leftovers that had been refrigerated, there were some pea-sized clumps of cornstarch throughout the pie that were unpleasant. Next time, can I add more water to my slurry?
SU: Okay. There's many parts to this question. Can we just talk about the positive thing here first for a moment?
JS: Yes.
SU: Because Christina says my pie was perfectly set and had a great texture.
JS: Love it.
SU: And this I think is a great time to talk about pre-cooking the filling, because only that would explain why this cornstarch later on, the problem. So, let's talk the great texture and perfectly set pie. And the reason we get to that texture is because I call for the filling to be precooked. Some fruit pies do employ this technique, but a lot of fruit pies simply have you prepare the fruit in some way, like either cut it up into smaller pieces or slices or smash it down a little bit, mix it with sweetener, spices, and some form of thickener. Usually it's cornstarch, usually it's tapioca.
JS: I've seen flour, even.
SU: Flour.
JS: Yeah.
SU: And then they bung it in the pie crust, either baked or unbaked, top it off, and bake it. I cannot abide that method because here's what happens when you just put raw fruits and sugar and thickener, you're essentially just hoping for the best. You're sending your pie out in uncharted waters, you're not setting it up for success. But when you precook the filling on the stove top, what happens is now you have control, now you have precision. Now what you've done is you've forced the fruit to give up its moisture and you are making it evaporate a little bit, which then concentrates the flavor and makes everything much more intense and tastier. And then what you're going to do is you're going to add cornstarch or I use cornstarch as my thickener, but certainly you could use others, to bind all of that extra liquid. So now you know exactly what texture your final filling after baking will be.
And by precooking the filling, there's two things. One, there's not a lot of moisture weeping out onto your pie crust. So your pie crust can be flaky. Two, you end up using a lot less thickener.
JS: Interesting.
SU: And by using less thickener, it really allows the flavor of the fruit to shine. And Jesse, as you said, it loves it to be jammy.
JS: Yeah.
SU: It's a really good jam inside. That's how you really want, ideally that's what a fruit pie is. It tastes like a fresh fruit jam inside of a flaky pie crust.
JS: Yeah, like a textured jam.
SU: Yes. Okay. So, that was all of the good parts taken care of. As for the problematic parts. When Christina says there was some pea-sized clumps of corn, God, pea-sized is rather large.
JS: It's pretty big, yeah.
SU: I'm like Christina, maybe they were blueberries. No, that's me being-
JS: You're just bullying the Bake Club today. I get bullied every day, it's fine.
SU: Jesse, stop. Okay, pea-sized clumps of cornstarch, you can add more water to your slurry mixture. I tried to give it at a minimum, I wanted to limit the amount of liquid that you're adding because here you are driving away the moisture from the filling, and simply to add back more water seemed counterintuitive, which is why I called for a measured amount of water. But if for whatever reason you feel that is too little water to get your cornstarch nice and dissolved, certainly feel free to add a tablespoon or two more.
JS: Perhaps also she is scooping her cup into the cornstarch and packing it and you end up with more versus weighing it.
SU: You tell them, Jesse.
JS: I don't know.
SU: Jesse-
JS: It's my answer to everything.
SU: Jesse wants to write an article about measuring flour.
JS: I do.
SU: Or anything, any dry.
JS: But I can't even think about it, it's too much to even start. One more from Leanna. "If I wanted to do pie bars, do you think I could get away with a single batch in a quarter sheet pan?"
SU: Okay, I will say this. I think my answer was, proceed with caution. And I think Leanna did make it in a quarter sheet pan and looked successful.
JS: Yeah, I feel like it makes sense in my mind that you could just reconfigure these components.
SU: Yeah, I was just worried about the proportions of, would there be enough pie dough to fill the quarter sheet? But I suppose you can. I would say just make sure you bring that pie crust all the way up, I think to the rim of the-
JS: Yeah, to house it all in.
SU: Yeah and then blind bake. Your blind baking would probably need slightly less time.
JS: So before we wrap up talking about this pie, we should probably talk about the streusel also. So, what's the technique, what's going on there? Is there anything that bakers need to pay attention to there?
SU: I think the streusel is the easiest part about this pie.
JS: She's like, no.
SU: Yeah, I really want to be like, no. I mean, streusel is probably one of the easiest things a baker can make. Once you figure out the ratios, you literally just smush everything together. The good thing about streusel is that sometimes depending on your butter temperature, sometimes it can be crumbly. And if your butter is too soft, then your streusel could be one giant clump, but it really doesn't matter. When you put it on the pie on the filling, you're going to break it apart into little clusters anyway. So the initial texture of your streusel doesn't really matter, and may vary based on your butter temperature, whether it was cold or warm.
JS: Sure, sure. So, no sweat here.
SU: No sweat. Yeah, easy. Easy-peasy.
JS: Okay, cool. So we're going to take another quick break.
SU: When we get back, we'll introduce you to a baker you should know.
JS: Stick around.
SU: Welcome back to BA Bake Club.
JS: It is one of my favorite parts of the show, it is time for us to introduce you to a baker whose work we think you should know about.
SU: And this month, we are joined by a baker and a recipe developer and a friend, who is a pie expert. She's written a book, well, the book on pie called The Book on Pie. And it's Erin Jeanne McDowell, welcome to BA Bake Club.
Erin Jeanne McDowell: Ah, thank you so much for having me.
SU: We are actually very, very thrilled that you're here.
JS: We're excited, yeah. Truly, Erin is the expert on pie.
SU: Yes.
JS: Yeah, we got the big guns in.
SU: I will have to say, anything that I know about mixing pie dough, I learned from Erin. So, we're very, very excited to have you here.
EJM: Oh, thank you so much. I mean, and obviously, we had the pleasure of working together on The Book on Pie.
SU: Yes.
EJM: I was so lucky to have you in my kitchen for some of those days. But I do think that it's so much about muscle memory and I think so much of baking is like that, but I think especially pie.
SU: Absolutely. And maybe we should take this moment to tell our listeners a little bit about who you are and what you do. You're the author of several cookbooks, including this wonderful Book on Pie. Tell us a little bit more about yourself.
EJM: Sure. I started baking when I was about 14 years old. I mean, I guess that's not true, I had baked all through my childhood. But I started seriously baking around 14 years old with my grandma and we were very interested in pie, specifically. And so I would go to her house, we'd practice baking pie together. I didn't quite realize it at the time, but I was definitely learning to develop recipes in her kitchen, and it ended up being the start of my life's work. I went to pastry school and have been studying things ever since. And of course, we all went to the same pastry school and as you guys know, they didn't spend a lot of time talking about pie at said school. So, I just always wondered why people weren't diving into that at the same level that we dove into cakes.
So pie has been a passion for a long time, but all baking is special to me. My first cookbook was called The Fearless Baker, and it covered all different baking. Chapter on cakes, cookies, all sorts of things. Then The Book on Pie was next and is really made to be a mix and match book to help people understand pie better. And then Savory Baking, which was my most recent one, came out in 2022. And that's another real passion point of mine, because savory baked goods are just, I mean, where it's at. I think there's so many wonderful-
JS: I'm aligned.
EJM: ... savory baked goods. Yes, I'm aligned. And then I just finished a new one that'll come out next fall in 2026.
SU: Oh my gosh.
JS: Congrats.
SU: Congratulations.
JS: Casual.
EJM: Thank you. Just a little plug there.
JS: Love it. So, I think a lot of people are intimidated by pie. What do you find that people are intimidated about pie? Why does pie specifically scare people so much?
EJM: I think the first thing is the time factor, that I really do think good pie takes patience. And I think it scares people the same way that bread sometimes scares people, is even though a lot of the time is hands-off time, it still feels like, oh my gosh, there's so much time. And sometimes you don't know if you've really nailed it until the pie is completely baked, cooled, and sliced. And that I think is scary and frustrating for people at times, that they really don't know if it's turned out perfectly until the very end of the process.
SU: And what about the process do you think is the hardest thing to master?
EJM: Getting your dough right is really the key to everything. If your dough is too wet, it's going to be really difficult to work with, it's going to bake up crispy and crunchy like a cracker and a fork's not going to go through it. And if it's too dry, it's going to rip and tear at the edges. You're going to be fighting it every step of the way.
So when you really get the handle of the dough, which is why what you said, Shilpa, means so much to me, because I do think sometimes, especially old cookbooks and recipes for pie, I call it the grandma effect. So many people who really knew how to make pie weren't necessarily great recipe writers. So, a lot of the techniques that they were using weren't written into the recipe. So, I think giving people better visual cues is the key to helping them get past that dough fear and to their next successful pie.
SU: And you really dive so deep in your book, and I think there's a reason why. Erin, how many years has it been since that book came out?
EJM: It came out in 2020.
SU: Oh my gosh.
JS: Oh, wow.
SU: It's still an enduring and popular book. You started the Sturdy Pie Challenge on Instagram.
EJM: Yes, that's true.
SU: Tell us more.
EJM: That was really about trying to make properly baking a pie more fun for people, which is, it's asking a lot. Sometimes it's asking for extra steps, sometimes it's asking for a really long bake time, it's asking them to let the pie cool completely before they slice it. It's a lot. So in order to make it as fun as possible, I enlisted the help of my number one party trick, which is the Sturdy Pie Challenge, and was actually my assistant who's a fantastic food stylist, Katie Wayne.
SU: Kaitlin.
EJM: Yes, Kaitlin is the best. And she was the one who said, because I always did this, I always showed how the pie was sturdy. And she was like, "I really think that other people would have so much fun doing this." So it's really because of her. But when a pie is properly baked, it should pop right out of the pie pan, and a lot of people don't realize that. And there's a number of wonderful things about that. The first is that you don't have to worry about scratching your pan when you go to slice it. You can remove it and put it on a cutting board and it makes slicing it so much easier, like slicing a loaf of bread.
And yeah, the key to knowing if you, you've passed this Sturdy Pie Challenge, first you just rotate your pie. You see if it'll turn in the pie plate and if it will, that's usually a good indication that it's not stuck in any way, and then you can just lift her right on out of there. And is the best party trick, it is so triumphant. I've been doing it for like, I don't know, 12 years now, and it still makes me giggle with delight every single time.
JS: You get really clean slices that way too.
EJM: Yes, absolutely. It makes slicing so much easier. And I actually think slicing pies is one of the trickier things about it as well because you're dealing with so many contrasting textures, I think.
And I do want to clarify this, sturdy does not mean that it's hard. This should still be a tender, light, flaky crust. Sturdy just means properly baked. So for me, the key to the Sturdy Pie Challenge is proper baking. For a single crust pie, that typically means par or blind baking, depending on what your filling is. And for a double crust pie, that means sufficient baking. I'm not alone in this, lots of great pie bakers out there will attest that double crust pies just takes so much longer than most people think to get that bottom crust fully, fully done. So yeah, proper baking is the key to getting the sturdiness, for sure.
SU: Give readers an estimate of how long a well-baked double crust pie might actually take.
EJM: Well, it will depend a little bit on your filling, but the browning of the top crust is not a sufficient indicator that it's browned on the bottom too. So for me, I usually start it at a really high temperature, like 425 Fahrenheit or 400 Fahrenheit. And then once it starts to show some browning on the top crust, I usually kick the temperature back down for the remainder of baking. So 375 Fahrenheit is usually kind of my sweet spot, and I let it bake at that lower temperature for the rest, and that longer amount of time really helps.
There's other things you can do that help. The right material pie pan for a double crust pie can help. Metal is especially great. Cast iron is actually really wonderful, or using your pizza stone or a baking steel and placing your pie on top of that while it's baking, that'll help drive a lot of heat to the bottom crust and it'll help ensure that it's browning a bit faster in the baking process. So, I would say, the longest way to answer your question ever, but I would say it's like at least an hour 15 minutes, if not longer, for a standard double crust pie.
SU: Thank you. I wanted everybody to hear it from you.
JS: Thank you.
SU: On that note, we wanted to do a little rapid fire game to hear your pie hot takes.
EJM: Okay, okay.
SU: Are you ready?
EJM: I think so, I think so.
SU: Jesse's going to ask you a few questions.
JS: Okay. Ceramic, glass, or metal pie pan?
EJM: Metal.
JS: Are you keeling off one of them?
EJM: Down with glass entirely, and glass is the worst material for pie pans.
JS: Oh, well, we endorse.
EJM: We do endorse.
JS: Lattice top, full double crust, streusel, or no pie topping?
EJM: That's like asking me to pick a favorite child. I don't know. I guess because I love being pretty with pie. I would say lattice. Lattice wins that round.
JS: I love lattice too. I do. Okay. Favorite type of pie?
EJM: Fruit pies for me, I love fruit pies and I feel like they are the flex of a good pie baker. If you can bake a good fruit pie and it can hold a slice and all of those things, that's the best. I would say the favorite pies of people who make my recipes, it's cream pies, all the way.
JS: Interesting. Interesting. I do love a cream pie. What is the worst fruit pie?
SU: Oh, Jesse, you're asking some tough questions.
JS: Oh, I'm going there. It's going to get harder.
EJM: Bam. You know what? I'm going to kind of cheat with this. I think typically, the worst fruit pie is a strawberry pie, because strawberries are so watery. That said, I have a recipe for strawberry pie that I really love and think is really special, so. But I would still say that if I'm out and about, that's probably the last fruit pie you're going to see me ordering because I'm not trusting anybody else's strawberry pie.
JS: Interesting.
SU: That's a great answer.
JS: I don't think I've had a strawberry pie.
SU: Yeah, me neither.
EJM: You guys have to try the roasted strawberry pie from The Book on Pie. It is so special because it doesn't have any thickener in it.
JS: Oh, wow.
SU: Wow.
EJM: So you roast the strawberries low and slow and they get kind of jelly and juicy and jammy, and then you put them with the juices into your par baked crust. And in the second bake, then they just concentrate even more. It tastes so purely of strawberry because all you've done is remove all the water content, but it's really only delicious when you have really good, fresh, in-season strawberries. So, set a calendar reminder for next May and make this pie.
JS: Honestly, I will. Is there a pie trend that you'd like to see banished forever, ever?
EJM: I'm not as big of a fan of those cutters or something where you press the dough in to make a pretty edge and then you just lift it out of the silicone mold and put that on the edge of your pie. I feel like that I don't really like.
JS: Shilpa's staring at me so perplexed.
EJM: It's, you can make it look so pretty.
SU: Yeah. I really had to think about what you meant.
JS: I know what you're talking about. I know exactly.
EJM: It's not that they don't work, they do, but they're unnecessary. So I feel like-
JS: Sure.
EJM: ... when people are starting to learn a pie, they should just really start with the basics and have fun crimping with your fingers or whatever. And then yeah, eventually if you want to get real fancy, go for it.
JS: Sure, sure. What is the best season for pie baking?
EJM: Live every week like it's Shark Week. All year round you can be baking pies. But I guess summer is a wonderful time because so much is in season, I think late summer is really special. But for me, the time that I am busy and my phone never stops buzzing is starting about mid-October to mid-December.
JS: Oh, I bet.
EJM: But when the summer bounty is at its peak, there's nothing like baking a really good peach pie or a really good blueberry pie when they're ripe and in season.
JS: I love that.
SU: Thanks for coming on here and espousing all of this knowledge.
JS: Spewing pie facts.
SU: Yes, we are so glad to see many of our beliefs endorsed by you.
EJM: We're definitely all on the same page, I think.
SU: Erin, where can people find you on the internet?
EJM:You can find out a lot more about me and my books and my YouTube channel and all kinds of things on my website. Eringmcdowell.com.
JS: Love it.
SU: Love it.
JS: Yeah, thank you so much for chatting with us.
EJM: Oh my gosh, thanks so much for having me. It's always special to talk pie, but especially with good pie friends.
SU: Oh, thanks, Erin.
JS: That's it for this month's edition of BA Bake Club.
SU: Jesse, tell everyone about your September Bake Club recipe.
JS: Okay, we're ready for a challenge, I feel like.
SU: Yes, yes.
JS: This is an old school bake. It is a Paris-Brest, and it is a banana pudding Paris-Brest. And for those who don't know, this is an old school French dessert that is essentially one giant choux pastry ring. So the same formula that you make like a cream puff or an eclair with, that then you slice in half. And this one is filled with a banana diplomat cream, and it gets these candy nuts, slices of banana, and dusted in powdered sugar.
SU: And I don't want to give too much away, but the banana cream.
JS: There's a little trick in there.
SU: There's a little, yes. It's crazy. I cannot wait for everybody to discover this trick. Any other special equipment or ingredients that bakers should have on hand?
JS: A piping bag.
SU: Oh, yeah.
JS: I think that would make your life a lot easier. If you don't have a legit one, you can buy the disposable ones, like a roll of them. And also a star tip, I guess, yeah.
SU: Yeah, A large star tip.
JS: A large star tip.
SU: Yeah, amazing. Bake lovers, once you bake through the banana pudding Paris-Brest, send us your pictures and questions. There are so many different ways for you to get in touch with us.
JS: You can comment on the recipe on the Epicurious app, or on the Bon Appétit website. You can comment on our Substack thread or email us at bakeclub@bonappetit.com. And always, if you've made it and loved it, you can rate and review the recipe on our site.
SU: We're your hosts, Shilpa Uskokovic.
JS: And Jesse Szewczyk.
SU: Michele O'Brien is our Senior Producer.
JS: Pran Bandi is our Studio Engineer.
SU: Research editing by Rebecca Gorena.
JS: This episode was mixed by Amar Lal at Macro Sound.
SU: Chris Bannon is Condé Nast's Head of Global Audio.
JS: If you liked the show, leave us a rating and review and hit that follow button so you never miss an episode.
SU: And if you're not already a part of the club, head to Bonappetit.com/BakeClub to find all the information you need to join.
JS: Thanks for listening to BA Bake Club, and we'll see you next month.