I recently made a peach pie. When the pie had cooled I cut it and found that after I took out the slice a lot of peach juice was in the pan amking a soggy base crust. How can I avaoid this in the future?
People have different preferences for thickeners. For fruit pies, I prefer tapioca (either tapioca starch or instant tapioca ground to a powder). Conversion would be 2 tsp tapioca to 1 Tbsp flour - so 8 tsp tapioca instead of your 1/4 cup of flour. Tapioca will also stand up to acidic fruit better than cornstarch. It is also somewhat more forgiving than flour if you add more than the necessary amount (to a point of course). Flour can be pasty if you overdo it. Another alternative thickener would be ClearJell. You can also sugar your peach slices, let them sit for a while and then drain off the excess juice to reduce the moisture content.
The starches make a clearer filling over the flour. The acids in fruit will eventually break them all down. Tapioca I find is better in berry type pies. Guava gums and modified food starches are also pretty good. Pectin will work to.
I would imagine he same. Also brush the bottom inside crust with slightly beaten egg white as this forms a barrier between crust and filling and will keep crust from getting soggy. Its almost like putting a layer of shellac on wood.
Ok, yes, sugar them and let them sit but don't throw away the juice - that is pure flavor! Reduce it a little bit, cool and then mix with your thickening agent, put your fruit in the pie and then pour it over the fruit.
I use Instant Clear Gel from King Arthur Flour. It's $5.95 for 8 oz. You use a couple of tablespoons mixed in with your sugar. It works very well.
You can also consider a few other options: blind bake your crust for a few minutes before adding your filling; placing your pie at a lower level in the oven; turning up the heat a few degrees (say, 15 or 20); using a glass or ceramic pan if you're using a metal one. I've also boosted browning by putting my pie tin on a black baking pan which I let preheat in the oven. That gave the crust a boost of heat. I do like glass and ceramic pans better than metal.
I've not had success painting the crust of a fruit pie with egg wash. That's only worked for me if I was blind-baking the crust before returning the filled crust to the oven to finish baking.
I am reviving this old thread. Use of ground tapioca in peach pie sounds interesting and I may try it tomorrow. Or maybe pectin, also mentioned above.
What do you guys think? Also how much of whichever per peach or pound of peach?
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