While I love peaches; I can’t remember if I have ever had a peach pie. If I had a slice, it must have not been a spectacular one–because I can’t remember. Still I have had my share of fruit pies with soggy crust, mushy fruits, and artificial flavor. I was a little bit worried about how well this pie would turn out. I love eating fresh peaches; and the thought of potentially ruining perfectly delicious fruits in less than successful pie was a bit daunting.  But I had bookmarked this recipe a couple of years ago, and I knew that I had to make it. The process itself was a bit time consuming: the pie had to be prepared, frozen, and thawed. And then, the fruits had to be peeled and sliced. And everything just took a little bit of time to put together.  But at the end, this pie was everything that a perfect pie should be: buttery crust, firm enough to not turn soggy, but still buttery and delicious. The peach slices were soft, but not mushy. It cut beautifully. What else can I ask?  Jade from the Mess Pot is the host of our August’s What’s Baking Challenge, with a theme of “Celebrating summer”; and I thought that this was a perfect recipe to celebrate summer. Head on over to her site to check out what other delicious goods that everyone else baked up this month!

Adapted from The America’s Test Kitchen Cookbook

Ingredients
1 recipe American Pie Dough, recipe followed
6-7 ripe fresh medium-sized peaches (~7 cups when sliced)
1 tbsp lemon juice, from 1 lemon
1 cup plus 1 tbsp sugar
Pinch ground cinnamon
Pinch ground nutmeg
Pinch salt
3-5 tbsp potato starch, or grounded tapioca (that’s what I used)

Directions
Remove dough from refrigerator (if refrigerated longer than an hour, let stand at room temperature until malleable). Roll larger dough piece to 11×15-inch rectangle, about 1/8-inch thick and transfer dough rectangle to baking sheet lined with parchment paper. With a pizza wheel, trim to even out long sides of rectangle then cut rectangle lengthwise into eight strips, 1-1/4 inches wide by 15 inches long. Freeze strips on cookie sheet until firm, ~ 30 mins.

Roll smaller dough piece on lightly floured work surface or between two large sheets of plastic wrap to 12-inch disk. Transfer dough to pie plate by rolling dough around rolling pie and unrolling over 9-inch pie plate or by folding dough in quarters, then placing dough point in center of pie plate and unfolding. Working around circumference of pie plate, ease dough into pan corners by gently lifting dough edges with one hand while pressing around pan bottom with other hand. Leave dough that overhands lip of pie plate in place; refrigerate dough-lined pie plate.

Remove dough strips from freezer; if too stiff to be workable, let stand at room temperature until malleable and softened lightly but still very cold. Form lattice top and place in freezer until firm ~ 15 mins.

Meanwhile, adjust oven rack to lowest position, place trimmed baking sheet on rack, and heat oven to 500 degrees. Bring 3 quarts of water to boil in a large saucepan and fill large bowl with 2 quarts of cold water and 2 trays of ice cube. With paring knife, score small X on the base of each peach. Lower peaches into boiling water with slotted skimmer or spoon. Cover and blanch until their skins loosen about 2 minutes. Use slotted skimmer to transfer peaches to ice water and let stand to stop cooking, about 1 min. Cool peaches, then starting from scored X, peal each peach, halve and pit, and cut into 3/8-inch slices.

Toss peach slices, lemon juice, 1 cup sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, and potato starch in medium bowl.

Turn peach mixture into dough-lined pie plate. Remove lattice from freezer and place on top of filled pie. Trim lattice strips and crimp pie edges. Lightly brush or spray lattice top with 1 tbsp water and sprinkle with remaining 1 tbsp of sugar.

Lower oven temperature to 425 degrees. Place pie on baking sheet and bake until crust is set and begins to brown, 25-30 minutes. Rotate pie and reduce oven temperature to 375 degrees; continue baking until crust is deep golden brown and juices bubble (~25 to 30 min longer). Cool pie on wire rack for at least 2 hrs before serving.

American Pie Dough

Ingredients
2-1/2 cups (12.5 ounces) unbleached all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoon sugar
8 tablespoons all-vegetable shortening, chilled
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, chilled, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
6-8 tablespoons ice-water

Direction
Pulse Flour, salt, and sugar in a food processor fitted with steel blade until combined. Add shortening and process until mixture has texture of coarse sand, about 10 seconds. Scatter butter pieces over flour mixture; cut butter into flour until mixture is pale yellow and resemble coarse crumbs, with butter bits no longer than small peas (about 10 1-sec pulses. Turn mixture into medium bowl).

Sprinkle 6 tablespoons ice water over mixture. With blade of rubber spatula, use folding motion to mix. Press down on dough with broad side of spatula until dough sticks together, adding up to 2 tbsp more ice-water if it will not come together. Divide dough into two balls, one larger than the 2nd and flatten each into 4-inch wide disk. If you can, weigh both dough balls, one should be about 14 oz and the other 16 oz. Wrap each in plastic and refrigerate at least 1 hour or up to 2 days before rolling.