So Bev and her husband Dave have been friends with my parents since (I am pretty sure) the first day we moved to Iowa Falls back in 1989.

I like to think of them as my stand-in, hometown grandparents!

I remember going over to their house on a regular basis after church for Sunday Lunch and Dessert. My brother and I would stay with them when my parent’s went out of town. We loved exploring their old, unique house. We also spent many 4th of July’s watching the parade from their yard.

My brother and I use to always mix up their names when we were little.

Here try it…try saying their names together a few times:

“Dave and Bev”

“Bev and Dave”

“Dev and Bave” haha….

Bev makes THE BEST PIES! Here is the proof:

Ok, apparently Bev’s pies are SECOND BEST

…BUT she told me the lady that won 1st place was visiting Iowa Falls during the Pie Baking Contest (out-of-towners should not count!) AND she made a Key Lime Pie with LIMES FROM FLORIDA!! (totally cheated) haha

I had on my “Summer To-Do List” to learn how to make a pie from scratch (a feat only previously attempted in Foods Lab 101 in college)

I knew Bev would be the perfect teacher

And since she is newly retired I knew she might just have the extra time to spend in the kitchen

So get out your rolling pins and let’s begin……………

Pie Crust

Ingredients

3 cups flour, sifted

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup lard

1 egg

1 teaspoon vinegar

5 tablespoons ice-cold water

Directions

Sift flour into a bowl and add salt. Then measure one cup of lard into the bowl.

Cut lard into flour & salt mixture with wire pastry blender. Mix until lard and flour form crumbs about the size of peas.

Beat egg and vinegar with a fork in a separate bowl. Pour into pastry and mix it lightly with the fork.

Sprinkle the ice-cold water into the pastry mix. (Don’t get ice in the bowl…just water).

With your hands gather and knead the pastry. If you have done it right the pastry should kind of feel like Play-Doh. It won’t stick to your hands, it won’t be dry and crumbly and it will be easy & malleable. Add a tablespoon of water if the pastry seems too dry. Bev said that sometimes you don’t need to add another tablespoon you maybe just need to get your hands kind of wet and work it in while kneading.

Once the pastry has an even consistency push it down into the bowl evenly. Use a knife to mark it into thirds.

Scoop out each third with your hand and roll each third into a ball.

At this point if you don’t want to make a pie right away you can refrigerate each “pie crust” in a plastic bag for up to 2 weeks. When you are ready to use it just warm up in the microwave for about 20 to 30 seconds.

Sprinkle a bunch of flour on the table and on a large rolling pin. Then begin to roll each pastry into a pie circle. Start each “roll” in the middle and push out to form a circle. About halfway through pick up the pastry and flip it over. You want to make sure it isn’t sticking to the table. If it is then you need to put more flour down on the table.

You want to hold your pie plate over the pie crust to make sure you are rolling it out to the right size for the plate.

Once the pie crust is the right size fold it in half and place it in the pie plate then unfold it.

Push down with your fingertips all along the inside edge and in the middle of the plate. This keeps the pie from forming bubbles while baking.

To make the top rim of the crust look nice I would take pieces from parts of the pastry that had too much and then attach them to places that needed more pastry. Then I would pinch it with my fingers at even intervals all the way around….

Then I would press down with my pointer finger so that it looked like this.

I got better at this part as I went. By the time I made the fourth pie I was a pro

Now you can begin the filling and toppings for your pie!

Apple OR Rhubarb Pie with Crumb Topping

Pie Ingredients

1 prepared pie crust (recipe above)

3 cups of apples (we used 3 Granny Smith & 3 Braburn)

OR

3 cups rhubarb, chopped

1 cup sugar

3 tablespoons flour

Dash of salt

Crumb Topping Ingredients

2/3 cup flour

1/2 cup sugar

1/3 cup softened butter

Directions

The only difference with these two pies is the main ingredient. Everything else is the same. Preheat the oven to 450º F

First we went outside and cut some rhubarb right out of Bev’s back yard.

We pulled the stalk down low and then chopped of the leaf. Look at that batch!

Alyssa got some practice chopping!

We washed the rhubarb 2 times to make sure all the dirt was off.

I got some practice cutting the skins of the apple. I am ashamed to say I have never done this with a knife before. I always use a veggie peeler to “de-skin” apples. Look at that concentration! Oh and it helps to hold the knife the correct way (like Bev is)

It took me a bit but I finally got the hang of it and did a pretty good job! Cutting the apple into slices was easy…it was taking the skin off part that was hard

Once the skins were off then we sliced up the apples.

Pour the apples

OR rhubarb into the pie shell.

Mix the sugar, flour, and salt in a small bowl and slowly pour all over the pie evenly. We also took a bite of the Granny Smith apples to see how tart they were….if they were really tart Bev said we would have wanted to put a bit more sugar in.

Bev also sprinkles cinnamon all over the top of the apple pie before making the crumb topping.

For the topping, mix flour, sugar and butter in a bowl with a pastry blender until it forms pea size clumps.

Sprinkle this all over the top of the pie.

Bake at 450º F for 10 minutes. Lower the temperature to 350º F and bake 40 to 50 minutes until the top is a golden brown.

Bev had these sweet pie crust shields. They fit on top so that the outer edge of the crust doesn’t burn. I found these online that I am going to get…because I am obviously now super excited about baking pies on a regular basis!

DONE! Both pies were soooo good!

Cherry Pie with Lattice Topping

Ingredients

2 prepared pie crusts (recipe above)

3 cans pitted cherries

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup cherry juice (from the cans of cherries)

5 to 8 drops of red food coloring

1 tablespoon of butter, softened

Directions

Strain the cherries and reserve the juice from the cans. Place the cherries in the pie shell.

Mix sugar, flour, cinnamon, and cherry juice in a sauce pan. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly.

Add 5 to 8 drops of food coloring into the mixture to make it more red. You can see it was a dull color before.

Once the mixture begins to boil and thickens it is done.

Pour over the top of the cherry pie.

Dollop the butter all over the top of the pie.

Now the exciting part….making the lattice crust! Take the second prepared pie crust and again make sure it is the correct size for whatever size pie plate you are using.

Begin to cut strips to make the lattice. I used my Pampered Chef Pastry Cutter. This thing is awesome it comes with 3 different attachments for different size and styles of cuts.

When placing the strips on the pie you start in the middle and place one horizontally and one vertically. Then you go every other side from the middle out until they are all placed. To close the ends off press them together with the edge of the pie crust.

Done. Beautiful! Ready to bake…

Bake for 40 to 50 minutes at 400º F. I actually had to bake it about 10 minutes longer, not sure if my oven wasn’t working right or what. But I just waited until the crust and the lattice top were a golden brown.

We also made a two other pies. I will just post the pics

Pumpkin

Lemon Meringue