Freeform Peach Pie

This past week, I bought a 3L container of peaches from T&T which were unexpectedly good (I associate this Asian grocer with produce variety, more often than produce quality). My family really wanted a pie, but I kept procrastinating until finally I had to bake something. It turned out to be a hit with everyone, and was pretty easy to make.

The recipe is by Stella Parks, and is technically a galette. On Labour Day, I made the old-fashioned pie dough with my 4-year old daughter, satisfyingly squishing the butter cubes by hand. Having used Kenji Alt’s food processor easy pie dough for the past few years, I welcomed the opportunity to make one by hand.

Making and chilling the dough is the most time-consuming part, as the fruit filling is a no-brainer: peach chunks tossed with tapioca starch, sugar, and salt. I baked this open-faced pie until the glossy crust was golden. My peaches were really ripe, so there was a lot of liquid in the centre, making the bottom crust soft and squishy.

No matter though: my whole family had seconds. Some enjoyed the fruit filling, some enjoyed the flaky pastry. Stella also notes that you can easily make this galette with other stone fruit, and it’s definitely faster to make than a pie, which requires lining a dish, fluting, latticing, etc.