cranberry walnut pie

Alright, I confess: I don’t like pecan pie. (!) It’s too damn sweet. Sure, if you roast the pecans, that’s helpful in deepening the flavor, and I guess you could brown the butter, and add some bourbon, but that’s about as far as it goes. The only caveat is if there is also dark chocolate involved. Then I can party. But otherwise, hard pass. 

Cranberry nut pie has been on my radar for a long time, but I always wrote it off as something an old person would pick out of a pie lineup. I know, that was very ageist of 16 year old me, but I am here to say that I have changed, and so has my taste [in pie]. Yep, that’s right, I might be more open minded and maybe even more sophisticated than I was half a lifetime ago. Back to the pie-

I have mentioned this before, but I often suffer from insomnia. When I lie awake at night, I’m not consumed by what I haven’t crossed off of my ‘to-do’ list, but things like, ‘What if pecan pie were mixed with cranberries? Would it actually be palatable for me then?’ Earth-shattering thoughts. Come to find out, I’m not the only genius with this idea. Enter: cranberry walnut pie. It is known that cranberries and nuts are good friends, but it finally struck me that a pecan/chess style pie really could benefit from the tartness/acidity of cranberries, and maybe exist as a well balanced pie! 

Behold: a new fall (cough cough, Thanksgiving) favorite, and it doesn’t lack in flavor at all. Instead of using all corn syrup, I subbed half out for maple syrup. This does make the filling a bit softer, but I don’t mind because it makes the flavor really shine. I found that using lots of cranberries and nuts was the key to success, and you’ll want to chop up some of the berries for textural/cooking reasons. If you accidentally drop a tablespoon of bourbon in, I won’t tell, but don’t up the liquid too much. We want this baby to set properly.

Let’s start with our base: pie dough. I recently was making a single crusted pie and was too lazy to take out my food processor (I know, super lazy) so I decided to make my dough by hand. I realized that I’ve been doing it wrong my entire life. No matter how hard I try, the food processor always overworks the dough, and I always add too much liquid, making the dough very tough. This comes out so flaky and tender mixed in a bowl. I should have known better! Everything is better when it’s made by hand. Better late than never, as they say.

all butter pie dough

yield: dough for 1 single-crust pie. *double the recipe for double-crust (top and bottom), or to keep one on standby in the freezer (always the right move)

1 stick (½ cup, 113 g) unsalted butter
1 ¼ cups (150 g) all-purpose flour
1 tsp Kosher salt
½ cup ice water (you won’t use all of it)
1 Tb. apple cider vinegar or white vinegar

First, take your stick of butter out of the fridge and cut lengthwise down the center in half. Push the halves together, turn onto its side, and repeat. You’ll have 4 long blocks of butter. Push these together and cut down the stick into small cubes, following the tablespoon marks on the butter wrapper. This doesn’t have to be super exact, but you want fairly uniform cubes. Pop into the freezer for a moment. 

In a medium bowl, add your flour and salt. Add your butter cubes to the flour and toss, coating the surface of every piece in flour. Using a pastry cutter or your fingers, cut the butter into the flour until you end up with pebble- or pea-sized pieces of butter. (You’ll see in the pictures below that I didn’t go far enough because I was in a rush. This is what NOT to do!) Remember, pebbles are in between stones/rocks and sand in texture.

Once you achieve the right texture, add 1 Tb vinegar and 2 Tb water to start. Use a light hand to prevent the butter from warming up. Scoop from underneath the mixture over onto itself until the liquid feels evenly dispersed. This helps to prevent overworking the dough. Add another 1 Tb water at a time now, and repeat (I used a total of 4 Tb water ). Once the dough starts to feel hydrated, you’ll want to press the mixture onto itself and see if it forms a mass of dough. Do this a few times. If it doesn’t hold together, add another Tb of water until it does. Dump the dough onto your clean counter and fold it over itself a couple of times and form a flat disc. Put into a zip top bag or wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least one hour and up to two days.

Once the dough has chilled, remove it from the fridge. If it was in the fridge for a long time, it will be quite hard and you’ll need to leave it on the counter for a bit to warm up, maybe 15 minutes or so. Once you’re ready to roll your dough, flour your counter and your rolling pin well. Put the unwrapped dough on the counter and lightly flour the top of it. With your pin in the middle of the dough, apply some weight and begin rolling outward, focusing on the middle in small back-and-forth motions. This will get your dough moving. Rotate your dough 90 degrees and flip over, making sure there is enough flour underneath to prevent sticking. Keep rolling and adding flour as needed, rolling out to the edges, until the dough is about 12” in diameter (you will want some overhang in the pie plate). Fold your dough in half and transfer to your pie plate, and unfold onto the plate. Fold any excess underneath the edge of the dough. If there is a lot of extra hangover in one spot, trim it off with a knife, but be sure to leave a little bit. Using your thumb and pointer fingers, press your other pointer finger in between the two, creating a nice crimp design. Once you’ve done this all around the edge, place your pie plate in the fridge while you prepare your filling.

cranberry walnut pie

yield: 1 9” pie

1 ¼ cup walnuts, whole or pieces (pecans work, too)
1 ½ cups cranberries, fresh or frozen
3 eggs
3 Tb melted and cooled butter
½ tsp vanilla
1 tsp salt
⅔ cup brown sugar
⅓ cup corn syrup or golden syrup
¼ cup maple syrup

Preheat your oven to 350 F. On a sheet pan, place your walnuts and toast until fragrant and lightly browned, about 5-8 minutes. Don’t step away- they will burn. Mine did. Transfer hot nuts onto a cutting board and allow to cool. Once cooled, roughly chop the walnuts unless they are already in small pieces. On a separate cutting board, roughly chop half of the cranberries. Set aside.

Turn up the oven to 375 F. In a large mixing bowl, add the eggs, melted butter, vanilla, salt, brown sugar and both syrups. Whisk well until filling is homogenous. Add all of the cranberries, chopped and whole, and the chopped cooled walnuts to the mixture. Stir together to coat. Remove your pie dough from the fridge and pour the mixture into the prepared pan.

Bake on the bottom shelf of your oven for 15 minutes, then lower the temperature to 350 and bake for another 40-50 minutes, until the center of the pie is slightly set and has browned a little. Remove from the oven and cool completely. The filling will set as it cools. Cover and store at room temperature up to two days, or in the fridge for longer.