For the month of February, nine bloggers got together for a group post called “Love and Food”. That pretty much says it all! I guess it’s true that I tend to show my love by nurturing – especially through cooking and baking.
My husband loves cherry pie. I don’t! (I picked cherries one summer long, long ago and have never felt the same about them since) At least, I didn’t like cherry pie.
But I found that an unbaked cherry pie is pretty darn good, especially when the cherries are enrobed in chocolate! The cherry filling sits in a rich chocolate pie crust and is covered with a layer of chocolate cream, then is topped with cherry liqueur-spiked whipping cream. Now that, I love! And I really love it frozen, too. I guess you can say I’m a convert.
The chocolate crust isn’t sweet like a cookie crumb crust. It’s basically a regular crust with a deep cocoa flavor. The cherry filling is canned. Yes, you heard me! I didn’t grow, pick, pit, and can these cherries, I went to the grocery store and bought two cans of cherry pie filling. Surprised you, didn’t I? You’ll need a deep-dish pie pan to hold all of this goodness. If you don’t have one, just use one can of pie filling, otherwise there won’t be enough room for the chocolate, and we can’t have that!
The chocolate topping is one-half of my filling recipe for Sumptuous Chocolate Cream Pie.
I bought a bottle of “Cherry Pie” liqueur this year and feel honor-bound to use up as much of it as possible (it’s been showing up in lots of recipes), so I flavored the whipping cream with some. It’s slightly tart, so it adds a wonderful touch to the cream. You can use a little cherry flavoring and food coloring or some maraschino cherry juice if you’d prefer.
I wanted the whipping cream to last for a day or two (there are only two of us eating this) so I stabilized it. If you’re serving this to a group of diners, you won’t need to bother; it’ll get demolished right away.
If you’re thinking this recipe looks hideously long, that’s because it really should be separated into three recipes…one for the crust, one for the chocolate layer, and one for the whipping cream. But the recipe widget will only let me create one recipe per post, and I want you to be able to print it out easily. It’s really not as complicated as it looks!
Here’s how the whole thing gets created:
| Chocolate Covered Cherry Pie | Print |
- 2 cups flour
- ¼ cup unsweetened cocoa
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 cup shortening, chilled
- ⅓ cup buttermilk
- 2 cans (21 oz each) cherry pie filling
- ¾ cups sugar
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1½ cups bilk
- 2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped coarsely
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 tablespoons butter
- ½ teaspoon unflavored gelatin (if you are stabilizing your whipped cream)
- 2 teaspoons water
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- ¼ cup powdered sugar
- ¼ cup cherry liqueur (or substitution...see below**)
- Heat oven to 375 F.
- You will need a deep-dish pie pan. If using a regular pie pan, reduce the cherry filling to one can.
- In a large bowl, combine flour, cocoa, salt, and sugar. Work shortening into dry mixture with pastry blender or two knives, until the size of small peas.
- Add the buttermilk slowly, stirring lightly with a fork. If the dough isn't coming together into a rough ball shape, add cold water 1 teaspoon at a time. You just want it to stick together and not be crumbly.
- Roll out approximately ⅔ of the dough between sheets of lightly floured parchment paper. This should be a little thicker than a normal pie crust.
- Remove the top layer of parchment and cut a circle larger than your pie pan, with an extra 1" all the way around.
- Slide a flat baking pan under parchment beneath the circle of dough. Place your pan upside down on the dough, centering it, and flip the pan, dough, and baking sheet over. Remove the baking sheet and carefully peel off the parchment.
- Ease the dough into the pan and fold the excess dough under. Flute the edge and poke a fork evenly all over the pie crust. To help keep the dough from collapsing, place in freezer for 10 minutes.
- Carefully line the crust with foil and fill at least one third full with beans or pie weights. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove from oven, carefully take out the foil and beans, and return to the oven to bake for an additional 10 minutes.
- Allow the crust to cool completely.
- Fill the baked shell with 2 cans of cherry pie filling. (One can for a standard pan.)
- Place the pie in the refrigerator while you make the chocolate layer:
- In a small bowl, beat the egg yolks lightly.
- In a medium pot combine sugar, cornstarch, salt, milk, and unsweetened chocolate. Turn burner to medium-high and stir until it reaches a low boil. Turn the temperature down to medium and continue to cook and stir with a whisk for 2 minutes.
- Pour about ¼ cup of the hot mixture into the eggs, stirring well, and then add the egg mixture to the pan, whisking well. Cook for an additional 2 minutes, whisking continuously.
- Remove from heat and whisk in vanilla and butter.
- Allow it to cool slightly, then pour over the cherry mixture in the pie.
- Chill the pie until you are ready to add the whipping cream. For best results, let the pie chill for 5 or 6 hours.
- To make stabilized whipping cream, sprinkle unflavored gelatin over water in a small dish. Let it sit for 5-10 minutes. (If you aren't using stabilized cream, just skip the gelatin and water step.)
- In a medium bowl, whip the cream until soft peaks form. Slowly whip in the powdered sugar. Place the dish of softened gelatin in the microwave for 5-7 seconds, just until it starts to foam. While whipping, slowly drizzle the melted gelatin over the whipped cream. Whip until firm peaks form, and then add the liqueur.
- **If you don't wish to use liqueur, maraschino cherry juice will work well. Or you can add 1 teaspoon of cherry flavoring and a drop of red or pink food coloring, if desired.
- Spread or pipe the whipped cream over the pie and serve!
And, because I know that many of you have limited free time, I like to give you shortcuts. You could:
- Use a pre-made chocolate cookie crust.
- Use instant chocolate pudding for the chocolate layer
- Spray on your whipping cream from a can.
The idea will be the same, though you will sacrifice a little of the flavor and texture.
making the pie crust
Cut at least 1 inch larger all the way around pan.
Flute edges, poke holes evenly around crust.
Add foil and beans (or pie weights) and bake.
Add cherry pie filling.
Adding butter and vanilla, then ready to spread on cherries.
spread hot chocolate mixture on cherries.
You’ve got to try a slice of this!
To see what the other passion-inspired bloggers have made, just click on the following links. Please show them some love back, and leave a comment. We all just live for comments.Well…nice ones.
Limoncello Cream Dream Cake by Crumbs in my Mustachio
Nutella Frangelico Love Cheesecake by Tampa Cake Girl
Cherry Blossom Chocolates by Hun, What’s for Dinner?
Cookie Cutter Chocolate Bark by Lemony Thyme
Chocolate Pound Cake with a Chocolate Glaze by Moore or Less Cooking Blog
Dark Chocolate Raspberry Fudge by Baking in a Tornado
Sex and Candy Cake by Cooking from a SAHM