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The organic peaches that I bought at the Farmer's Market for jam were so good that I began dreaming of peach pie. Many years ago, when I was in college, my family's peach tree in southern California had two years of bumper crops (then the tree promptly died, either because of the effort to produce all that fruit, or maybe there was a cold snap in the winter, which can happen even in southern CA). To avoid waste, I marshalled my siblings into an assembly line--and the first year, I made peach pie after peach pie (using store-box pie crust mix) and we froze most of them and baked them during the year. (I have a hazy memory that there were around 20.) The next year, having grown in wisdom, and having realized that freezer space, even with a large standing freezer, is at a premium, we instead froze bag after bag of cut peaches with the sugar and lemon already mixed in, and my mom used them throughout the year for pies and cobblers.
The tree has been gone for many years. My mom passed away last year, and my Califonia siblings have been clearing out the house in preparation for selling it. As we were discussing it, my sister Sharla said, "Remember when we did the peaches?" I think that set me on the road to baking a peach pie yesterday.
My cookbooks here are limited. I know that years ago, I used the Betty Crocker Cookbook--the thin, large-paged orange one from the 1970s, which is still one of my basic references--but it's in Texas and won't move until I do. I didn't like the recipes on the KAF website, and a basic baking book here did not have a peach pie recipe, nor did the KAF anniversary cookbook. I whipped out my late mother-in-law's 1964 edition of The Joy of Cooking. It said for sliced peaches to follow the apple pie recipe and use the lesser amount of sugar, so that is what I did, but I added 1 Tbs. of lemon juice, because I remember lemon juice in the other recipe. I paired the filling with that buttermilk crust I've been raving about (recipe is now posted here), used 6 cups of peaches instead of 5 cups, and baked it in an Emile Henry deep-dish pie plate. I brushed the crust, before putting it in the oven, with some half and half (love that stabilized half and half Mini-Moos from Land of Lakes) and sprinkled with sugar. I set the pie plate on a wonderful baking item that was left in this house when we bought it. The pan is the size of a 13-inch pizza pan with a rim, but it is made with a center, rimmed hole 4 1/2 inches in diameter. It had been well-used over the years by the previous occupant, Mrs. Hockman, who was clearly a baker. The pie sits on it, and it helps equalize the center's baking with that of the outer part of the pie. It also catches drips, which inevitably happen with a bubbling fruit pie. I like it so much that I bought a modern version for my Texas kitchen.
The aroma last night as the pie baked was wonderful. I'm looking forward to dessert tonight. Even my husband--who thinks that any pie other than blueberry, cherry, pumpkin, or apple--is a waste of good pastry, has perked up at the thought of tonight's dessert.
The pie was delicious. Next time, I will use more than 1/4 tsp. cinnamon and 1/8 tsp. nutmeg--maybe double that amount for six cups of peaches, since the spice disappeared. I will also check the original recipe, and maybe follow it. The filling holds together, which is nice after my two soupy (for two different reasons) blueberry pies. Eating a piece does remind me of all those pies--although this one has much better crust than those I baked years ago in California.
As for my husband, I think that he would have preferred a peach-blueberry pie, but he enjoyed his serving.
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