I made two of these for July 4th and they were delicious. I found the lemon quantities to be a bit vague and probably used more than intended but it was perfect. The crust was beautiful and flaky – a bit harder to work with than my usual recipe but still good. I ended up using some frozen blueberries in the cooked part and they worked fine in a pinch! This was a winner for me!
Fabulous pie: easy and delicious. I too made it for the 4th of July and would make it again. The recipe is a keeper.
Lisa
I love blueberries. But, in a pie, not so much…strange…i know. please don’t judge ;) However, the addition of nectarines was a good balance. Next time, I will cut the nectarines in larger pieces, not small.
I washed the blueberries and drained them of water in a colander, then added them in a pan to cook. Next time, I will DRY the blueberries with a paper towel, then cook them. I should have realized the process of cooking fruit produces water. Had to drain out all the excess liquid.
A BLUNDER which I made…I made the full dough recipe. But, forgot to use only half of the dough when putting the pie together. As a result, had to cook the pie for a lot longer.
PRO of baking mistake: baking lesson learned.
CON of baking mistake: wasted ingredients.
End result was good. Enjoyed the pie with vanilla bean ice cream.
I found the pie too sweet. I would recommend cooling completely before slicing – half an hour is not long enough – very runny.
Cathleen, I completely agree with you, my pie was about an 1 1/2 hours out of the oven before it was sliced, and it was runny, I made another and let it sit for a good 8-10 hours before slicing, and its much better, a slight run of liquids, but nothing like the first time!
I was impatient and cut into my pie 45 minutes after taking it out of the oven. Silly me! It was pie soup! very delicious though :-)
My pie was also runny- I read these comments and dried the blueberries first and waited overnight to cut the pie- but it was still very juicy! I’d like to make it again but need to add something to firm it- cornstarch? tapioca? I’m not an experienced pie maker so any tips would help. I also reduced the sugar to 1 cup and it was plenty sweet.
Ups! I forgot to put the butter over the fruit-filling… Maybe this will save me and the pie will have less juice? Who knows? It will be cut this afternoon.
2 1/2 h after…. still runny! We ate 1/2 of it – the rest goes in the fridge for tomorrow’s test!
I like it, however the filling is much to sweet. Next time I’ll reduce the sugar by 1/2.
here’s a really dumb question to those who are better bakers than me. . . Did/ do you peel the nectarines? I have no idea. Thanks for the patience and go ahead and have a good laugh! I’m thinking yes???? to this obvious questions? Kristine (louisawalter)
Kristine,
There’s never a dumb question when learning. You’d be surprised who else thought of this…great question actually. No need to peel.
~ Carmen
I left the skins on. :)
I left the skins on too and cut back on the sugar.
Lisa
I dip them in boiling water for maybe 30 seconds…then the skins peel off nicely.
Thank you for asking this question!!
Ahahah! I made the filling last night and when I had the nectarine in my hand “that was the question that jumped to my mind” (I hadn’t read this post yet)!
I’ve started peeling but decided to leave the peel on.
We are going to eat it this afternoon!
My particular fruit guru is Russ Parsons, a food writer and former editor of the Food section of the Los Angeles. For nectarines and plums, he says the peels can be left on, while for peaches he recommend the skins be removed.
Parsons covers selecting and storing fruit in his 2007 book “How to Pick a Peach: The Search for Flavor from Farm to Table”
Paul
BTW, for peaches and nectarines, the fruit’s background color (ideally a gold to orange tint) is more important than the red blush. And of course smell.
fresh blueberries and nectarines are too expensive here… :(
so was thinking of substituting the blueberries with frozen ones. Am hoping that will not affect the quality of the filling. Also, what do you think would be good substitute for the nectarines?
I think peaches would be nice.
Peaches would be great!
Lisa
Ditto on that; we had a little peach tree that produced rampantly this year! I managed to freeze quite a few of them.
What’s in season OR reasonable where you live?
How about pears or apples?
thanks! I live in the tropics so maybe pears and apples may be a good substitute is I go with something fresh.
I used frozen berries, I had to cook the filling for longer than the book suggested
I also froze the pie, I’ll be baking it off this Tuesday, I hope it works!!!
Also since I made the pie for the 4th of July, I used a star cookie cutter on the top crust and placed stars all over the top instead of an entire layer of crust.
. Very cute.
Lisa
Can’t wait to see that! I did three hearts. :)
we were all on the same page… I did stars on one and flags on the other, on top of the top crust. (never can have too much crust in my opinion!)
I loved this pie! It was my boyfriend’s first experience helping to make pie, and he said the crust was far superior than other pies, even though the top didn’t turn out too pretty. I hadn’t refrigerated the crisco ahead of time, so the dough didn’t come together quite as nicely as I hoped. But the method of cooking the fruit really brought out more flavors. Yum!
Did anyone else think the pie crust was a little salty?
Not at all. :)
I made my own never fail pie crust but followed the filling part exactly ..It was so good and gone in one day !!
This is my first recipe for TWD, yay! :-) I just put the pie in the oven but I just realised I forgot to add the lemon juice – oops!
Welcome NickkiT!
Cooling the crisco is such an obvious move, and yet, despite the thousands of pie crusts I’ve made in my life, I’d never done that before. Butter was always straight from the fridge, but crisco was stored in the pantry. From now on I will chill the Crisco as well. It allows the dough to become much more pebbly, and ultimately more flaky.
My bottom crust could have been a bit less soggy. I think next time I will put the foil on the bottom of the oven instead of putting the pie on a sheet pan. That might help the bottom crust.
I am always wary about putting foil under a pie, so I just put a parchment-lined sheet pan on the rack underneath it. No foil — I tend to have bad luck with that (heat deflection and all). My bottom crust turned out fine, and the pie actually never dripped!
My oven is so out of whack! It took almost 1:20 to get it browned like I wanted. Delicious though. it’s holding together well.
How much ice water did you have to add to the pastry? I only used about half a cup so I’m wondering if I did something wrong. I just put the crust in the refrigerator.
I had 2 goes with the pastry using different shortening brands (because I ran out halfway). The first time round, using the drier shortening, my pastry turned out dry, even with 1 cup of water. However, the second time round, I made it with a more malleable shortening, and it turned out a bit wet even with only using half a cup of water.
Sorry. Can’t be of much help except to say pastry is a little finicky?
What kind of shortenings did you use? I didn’t know shortening brands would be that different.
not sure why either… one was a locally made one and one was crisco. the crisco one was the more malleable one.
Visiting family in Santa Fe…. High altitude baking…. What to do?
Dear Lauren, This is probably too late but I don’t think you need to do anything different with a pie. However, here are some high altitude baking tips from my blog: http://praycookblog.com/high-altitude/
Really enjoyed this recipe…tender, flaky, buttery crust and the filling wasn’t too sweet. I used blueberries I had frozen a while ago and they worked really well. I also used white nectarines that I peeled and cut in to small pieces.
To ensure that that filling thickened I added a tablespoon of finely ground minute tapioca, a trick I learned from Cook’s Illustrated.
Did anyone else find the pie dough almost too tender and delicate to work with? Maybe it’s because I used pastry flour instead of ap flour? I made a lattice top crust but the dough kept breaking. The edges of my pie browned nicely but the rest of the top crust didn’t get as brown as I would have liked.
Thanks for the reminder about minute tapioca. I’ve previously used that for blueberry pies from a 60s era copy of Joy of Cooking.
I also used pastry flour, albeit the ad hoc mixture of 3 parts AP flour and 1 part cake flour. My pie dough was much softer than I would have reckoned, and resembled pie dough I’ve made previously prior to adding any water. Still I pressed ahead, and the baked results turned out well. Though the edges also browned more as well.
The pie crust dough was very soft, it has much more fat in the recipe than my favorite and always successful pie dough. I had to chill it after rolling. My pie is out of the oven, looks beautiful. But I’m waiting for Tom to come home before I cut it. Then I’ll find out if this is a better tasting crust.
My blueberry pie was waaaay to runny. Should have cooked ALL the fruit and added more flour, cornstarch or tapioca. Just saying ….
Catherine, I agree with you…a thickener would have worked nicely here.
Tuesdays with Dorie 
I made two of these for July 4th and they were delicious. I found the lemon quantities to be a bit vague and probably used more than intended but it was perfect. The crust was beautiful and flaky – a bit harder to work with than my usual recipe but still good. I ended up using some frozen blueberries in the cooked part and they worked fine in a pinch! This was a winner for me!
Fabulous pie: easy and delicious. I too made it for the 4th of July and would make it again. The recipe is a keeper.
Lisa
I love blueberries. But, in a pie, not so much…strange…i know. please don’t judge ;) However, the addition of nectarines was a good balance. Next time, I will cut the nectarines in larger pieces, not small.
I washed the blueberries and drained them of water in a colander, then added them in a pan to cook. Next time, I will DRY the blueberries with a paper towel, then cook them. I should have realized the process of cooking fruit produces water. Had to drain out all the excess liquid.
A BLUNDER which I made…I made the full dough recipe. But, forgot to use only half of the dough when putting the pie together. As a result, had to cook the pie for a lot longer.
PRO of baking mistake: baking lesson learned.
CON of baking mistake: wasted ingredients.
End result was good. Enjoyed the pie with vanilla bean ice cream.
I found the pie too sweet. I would recommend cooling completely before slicing – half an hour is not long enough – very runny.
Cathleen, I completely agree with you, my pie was about an 1 1/2 hours out of the oven before it was sliced, and it was runny, I made another and let it sit for a good 8-10 hours before slicing, and its much better, a slight run of liquids, but nothing like the first time!
I was impatient and cut into my pie 45 minutes after taking it out of the oven. Silly me! It was pie soup! very delicious though :-)
My pie was also runny- I read these comments and dried the blueberries first and waited overnight to cut the pie- but it was still very juicy! I’d like to make it again but need to add something to firm it- cornstarch? tapioca? I’m not an experienced pie maker so any tips would help. I also reduced the sugar to 1 cup and it was plenty sweet.
Ups! I forgot to put the butter over the fruit-filling… Maybe this will save me and the pie will have less juice? Who knows? It will be cut this afternoon.
2 1/2 h after…. still runny! We ate 1/2 of it – the rest goes in the fridge for tomorrow’s test!
I like it, however the filling is much to sweet. Next time I’ll reduce the sugar by 1/2.
here’s a really dumb question to those who are better bakers than me. . . Did/ do you peel the nectarines? I have no idea. Thanks for the patience and go ahead and have a good laugh! I’m thinking yes???? to this obvious questions? Kristine (louisawalter)
Kristine,
There’s never a dumb question when learning. You’d be surprised who else thought of this…great question actually. No need to peel.
~ Carmen
I left the skins on. :)
I left the skins on too and cut back on the sugar.
Lisa
I dip them in boiling water for maybe 30 seconds…then the skins peel off nicely.
Thank you for asking this question!!
Ahahah! I made the filling last night and when I had the nectarine in my hand “that was the question that jumped to my mind” (I hadn’t read this post yet)!
I’ve started peeling but decided to leave the peel on.
We are going to eat it this afternoon!
My particular fruit guru is Russ Parsons, a food writer and former editor of the Food section of the Los Angeles. For nectarines and plums, he says the peels can be left on, while for peaches he recommend the skins be removed.
Parsons covers selecting and storing fruit in his 2007 book “How to Pick a Peach: The Search for Flavor from Farm to Table”
Paul
BTW, for peaches and nectarines, the fruit’s background color (ideally a gold to orange tint) is more important than the red blush. And of course smell.
fresh blueberries and nectarines are too expensive here… :(
so was thinking of substituting the blueberries with frozen ones. Am hoping that will not affect the quality of the filling. Also, what do you think would be good substitute for the nectarines?
I think peaches would be nice.
Peaches would be great!
Lisa
Ditto on that; we had a little peach tree that produced rampantly this year! I managed to freeze quite a few of them.
What’s in season OR reasonable where you live?
How about pears or apples?
thanks! I live in the tropics so maybe pears and apples may be a good substitute is I go with something fresh.
I used frozen berries, I had to cook the filling for longer than the book suggested
I also froze the pie, I’ll be baking it off this Tuesday, I hope it works!!!
Also since I made the pie for the 4th of July, I used a star cookie cutter on the top crust and placed stars all over the top instead of an entire layer of crust.
. Very cute.
Lisa
Can’t wait to see that! I did three hearts. :)
we were all on the same page… I did stars on one and flags on the other, on top of the top crust. (never can have too much crust in my opinion!)
I loved this pie! It was my boyfriend’s first experience helping to make pie, and he said the crust was far superior than other pies, even though the top didn’t turn out too pretty. I hadn’t refrigerated the crisco ahead of time, so the dough didn’t come together quite as nicely as I hoped. But the method of cooking the fruit really brought out more flavors. Yum!
Did anyone else think the pie crust was a little salty?
Not at all. :)
I made my own never fail pie crust but followed the filling part exactly ..It was so good and gone in one day !!
This is my first recipe for TWD, yay! :-) I just put the pie in the oven but I just realised I forgot to add the lemon juice – oops!
Welcome NickkiT!
Cooling the crisco is such an obvious move, and yet, despite the thousands of pie crusts I’ve made in my life, I’d never done that before. Butter was always straight from the fridge, but crisco was stored in the pantry. From now on I will chill the Crisco as well. It allows the dough to become much more pebbly, and ultimately more flaky.
My bottom crust could have been a bit less soggy. I think next time I will put the foil on the bottom of the oven instead of putting the pie on a sheet pan. That might help the bottom crust.
I am always wary about putting foil under a pie, so I just put a parchment-lined sheet pan on the rack underneath it. No foil — I tend to have bad luck with that (heat deflection and all). My bottom crust turned out fine, and the pie actually never dripped!
My oven is so out of whack! It took almost 1:20 to get it browned like I wanted. Delicious though. it’s holding together well.
How much ice water did you have to add to the pastry? I only used about half a cup so I’m wondering if I did something wrong. I just put the crust in the refrigerator.
I had 2 goes with the pastry using different shortening brands (because I ran out halfway). The first time round, using the drier shortening, my pastry turned out dry, even with 1 cup of water. However, the second time round, I made it with a more malleable shortening, and it turned out a bit wet even with only using half a cup of water.
Sorry. Can’t be of much help except to say pastry is a little finicky?
What kind of shortenings did you use? I didn’t know shortening brands would be that different.
not sure why either… one was a locally made one and one was crisco. the crisco one was the more malleable one.
Visiting family in Santa Fe…. High altitude baking…. What to do?
Dear Lauren, This is probably too late but I don’t think you need to do anything different with a pie. However, here are some high altitude baking tips from my blog: http://praycookblog.com/high-altitude/
Really enjoyed this recipe…tender, flaky, buttery crust and the filling wasn’t too sweet. I used blueberries I had frozen a while ago and they worked really well. I also used white nectarines that I peeled and cut in to small pieces.
To ensure that that filling thickened I added a tablespoon of finely ground minute tapioca, a trick I learned from Cook’s Illustrated.
Did anyone else find the pie dough almost too tender and delicate to work with? Maybe it’s because I used pastry flour instead of ap flour? I made a lattice top crust but the dough kept breaking. The edges of my pie browned nicely but the rest of the top crust didn’t get as brown as I would have liked.
Thanks for the reminder about minute tapioca. I’ve previously used that for blueberry pies from a 60s era copy of Joy of Cooking.
I also used pastry flour, albeit the ad hoc mixture of 3 parts AP flour and 1 part cake flour. My pie dough was much softer than I would have reckoned, and resembled pie dough I’ve made previously prior to adding any water. Still I pressed ahead, and the baked results turned out well. Though the edges also browned more as well.
The pie crust dough was very soft, it has much more fat in the recipe than my favorite and always successful pie dough. I had to chill it after rolling. My pie is out of the oven, looks beautiful. But I’m waiting for Tom to come home before I cut it. Then I’ll find out if this is a better tasting crust.
My blueberry pie was waaaay to runny. Should have cooked ALL the fruit and added more flour, cornstarch or tapioca. Just saying ….
Catherine, I agree with you…a thickener would have worked nicely here.
Carmen