Pie perfection

When it comes to Thanksgiving dinner, pies are as traditional as turkey and cranberry sauce. But while many cooks step up to the challenge of roasting the Big Bird, they often shy away from baking pies.

Pies don't scare Susie Berges of Kennewick. She was one of about a dozen women and young girls working a few weeks ago in the kitchen at Columbia Community Church in Richland. They were peeling golden delicious apples, mixing pie dough and measuring out cinnamon and sugar for apple pies to sell at the church's annual Favorite Things Holiday Bazaar on Saturday.

Berges' fingers flew as she fluted the edge of the pie curst.

"My mom taught me how to flute when I was a girl. I don't even think about it anymore, my fingers just do it automatically," Berges said.

"We've been making pies for the bazaar for 21 years now," said Shirley Lacey of Kennewick. She's in charge of the volunteers who turn out more than 100 pies -- frozen and fresh -- every year.

A majority of the pies they make in the weeks before the bazaar are frozen so that when people bake them at home "you get that delicious smell too. That's all part of baking a pie," Lacey said.

Each of the frozen desserts is wrapped in heavy duty plastic wrap and finished with a sticker giving baking instructions.

The pies are all made with a dough recipe Lacey discovered decades ago in a magazine.

"It's called Foolproof Pie Crust and it is. It works like Play-Doh and I think it's delicious," Lacey said. "It's different from others because it has a beaten egg and some vinegar in it."

"It's a fluke when the crust doesn't hold together, we rarely have a failure," said Gina Richey of Richland.

Richey and Berges were rolling out the dough, fitting the rounds into the pie plates and scooping generous amounts of sliced and sweetened apples into each.

"You don't want to be skimpy with the filling, it tends to bake down," Berges said.

Before rolling out another round of dough to top a pie, Richey paused to dust the metal countertop and rolling pin with more flour.

"Use tons of flour, otherwise the dough sticks," she cautioned. "And every so often stop and scrape off any dough stuck to the counter or rolling pin. That makes the dough stick and tear too."

As Berges passed her rolling pin over another mound of dough, flattening it, she gave it a quarter turn after each pass.

"That's what makes it round," Berges said. "And as soon as you get your dough mixed up, get it rolled out. Don't let it sit or it dries out."

For baking, Berges recommends lining a cookie sheet with foil and setting the pie dish on it to catch any juicy overflows. And Richey always covers the edges of the pie with foil to keep them from browning too much.

Richey also slips her pies into the freezer for about an hour, even if she's going to bake them that day.

"It firms up the edges," she said.

This year the ladies of Columbia Community Church made pies in two sizes, 9 inches, which sell frozen for $7, and 6 inches, which sell frozen for $3. Want a freshly baked pie? It will cost you a dollar more.

They also made pans of apple dumplings, baked four to a pan, for $5.

w Loretto J. Hulse: 582-1513; lhulse@tricityherald.com