The Rhubarb Pie

Made this for Father's Day. To be fair, Dad freakin' loves rhubarb pie, so it'd likely please him anyway, but it came out so well that I'm recording it here as my official rhupie recipe until I rediscover where my mother kept hers.


Ingredients

4 cups chopped* red rhubarb** (about 6-7 thick stalks, 12 inches long; wash before chopping)
1 1/3 cups white sugar
6 Tablespoons all purpose flour
1 Tablespoon butter or margerine
2 pie crusts, pre-made or made before hand, to fit a 9" deep dish pie

RECIPE

* To properly chop the rhubarb, slice each stalk all the way lengthwise into two, then place the flat sliced sides of both down against a cutting board and chop with a sharp knife. If you just start chopping a whole stalk, the tough fiber of the skin will prevent the knife from cutting all the way through against the cutting board.

Line a deep-dish pie pan (or glass; I used glass) with one pie crust. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.

In a small bowl, thoroughly mix together the sugar and flour with a whisk until homogeneous throughout. Sprinkle 1/4 of this mixture evenly over the flat bottom of the crust in the dish. Fill with chopped rhubarb.

** If short on rhubarb or overloaded with strawberries, up to 1/2 cup of the rhubarb can be exchanged for chopped strawberries, or an additional 1 cup of chopped strawberries can be added as a layer on top of the rhubarb when filling the pie.

Sprinkle the remaining flour/sugar mixture over the chopped rhubarb (and/or strawberries) in the pie, shaking a little to encourage the mixture to filter down between the pieces. DO NOT mix the sugar flour mixture with the chopped fruit before filling the pie - this will trigger the fruit to form juices too soon and the pie will flood, causing the crust to fail to bake properly.

Place evenly-spaced pieces of the butter atop the layer of sugar/flour mixture. Cover the pie with the second crust, trimming, rolling, and sealing the edges on the inside of the edge of the pie dish (don't leave the crust hanging over, else the edge will burn). Cut some vents in the top crust.

Place the pie in the middle rack of the oven, with a scrappy pan on a second rack directly beneath to catch any overflow juices. Bake at 450F for 15 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 350 and continue to bake for an additional 40 to 45 minutes. Remove from oven and cool completely before cutting. Serve at room temperature or cold... you can eat it hot, but the flavor becomes increasingly sour with heat.