Last Wednesday I drove to Berry Blossom Farm near Rathdrum, Idaho, to pick strawberries. It was perfect weather: not too warm, not too cold, not raining. I came away with 5.6 pounds of lovely strawberries.
After washing and hulling them, I made a batch of jam using less-sugar pectin. It turned out great! I didn't take any photos of the process because I was too busy doing it.
Enough strawberries were left to bake a pie. I used this recipe because I had recently made strawberry rhubarb desserts and a strawberry glace pie, so I wanted a baked strawberry pie this time. I used my Pampered Chef egg slicer to slice the strawberries. It worked great!
Next, I made two pie crusts, using some of the lard my sister and I rendered some time ago. It keeps well in the freezer.
The strawberries went onto the bottom crust after mixing them with the flour, sugar, and cinnamon. I used erythritol and monkfruit sweetener instead of sugar, however. The flavor was slightly different from sugar, but quite acceptable.
I don't know how people roll out a beautiful, perfect, round pie crust. This is as good as it gets, for me. The bottom crust was so pathetic, I just covered it up with the berries and didn't take a photo of it. After I took this photo of the top crust, it actually slipped out of my hands and tore, resulting in an odd top crust to go with the odd bottom crust. Oh well!
I brushed the crust with egg and almond milk, not moo milk, since one family member has a dairy allergy. I used a coarser monkfruit sugar substitute to sprinkle on top. You can see how the top crust ended up with a big split in it. Fortunately, I wasn't planning on entering it into some contest. It tasted just fine, even if it wasn't perfect.
And here is the finished product. I suppose the egg mixture on top caused it to get so brown. Or maybe I didn't tent it with aluminum foil soon enough.
I did let the pie cool for at least 30 minutes, as suggested, before I cut a piece. It still ran all over. But after it had sat all night, it held together just fine. This is a recipe I would definitely make again.