I imagine most of you are enjoying this prolonged stretch of hot weather, but I am one of the few that doesn’t particularly enjoy the heat. I have to confess, I am relishing the thought of autumn.

There is one thing that summer has that is welcome however, and that is summer fruit! Before the glut of autumn berries and apples, we have cherries! Sweet and juicy, they are at their best right now. Like any fruit, they are quite versatile, but one dessert particularly screams summer for me – and that is cherry pie.

Anyone who enjoys making fruit pies, is probably, like me, always afraid of the dreaded soggy bottom. It’s easy to avoid if you can pre-cook your crust, but if your filling is baked with a raw crust, and it is particularly juicy, then it’s a risk. I have found that with cherry pie, one way to avoid this is by an old-fashioned method of pre-cooking your cherries into a compote.

A compote is a method of cooking fruit in a sugar syrup. In the case of cherries, you don’t need much sugar as they are pretty sweet already. Once you have your compote, thicken it up with some cornflour and you have a rich fruity mixture that isn’t too wet.

You can buy ready-made pastry, or follow my sweetcrust recipe here.

Oh! And one more thing – save yourself a lot of mess and stained fingers, and buy a cherry stoner. Trust me. *stares at red fingers*

Old-Fashioned Cherry and Vanilla Pie

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Ingredients

• 1kg Fresh Cherries (any type)
• juice Half a lemon
• 125g Caster Sugar
• 3 tablespoons Cold Water
• 2 tablespoons Cornflour
• 2 tablespoons Cold Water
• 1 Vanilla Pod

Directions

1.	Stone the cherries, then place in a bowl and squeeze over the lemon juice and toss. Put to one side
2.	Put the caster sugar and 3 tablespoons of water in a large heavy-based pan and heat gently over a low heat until the sugar melts
3.	Without stiring, turn the heat up and cook until the mixture browns to a rich caramel colour
4.	Add the cherries to the sugar mixture. The sugar will seize and turn into brittle toffee, but keep stirring. As the fruit releases its juices, the sugar will dissolve again
5.	Slit the vanilla pod down one side, and scrape out the seeds and add to the cherries. Cook the mixture, stirring occasionally, until the fruit is softened and you have a rich dark coloured compote
6.	Mix the cornflour with 2 tablespoons of water until you have a runny paste. Add this to the cherries and continue to cook until the mixture thickens to a soft jam consistency, then turn off the heat and leave to cool
7.	Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 6 / 200°C / 400°F
8.	Roll out your pastry crust and line the bottom of a 8"(20cm) or 9"(23cm) pie dish, and trim the edges
9.	Put the filling in the pie dish, then cover with the rest of the pastry or form a lattice
10.	Brush the crust with a little egg wash and sprinkle with demerara sugar
11.	Bake for 30 - 35 minutes. If necessary, cover the top with some greaseproof paper to prevent from burning
12.	Serve warm with some good vanilla ice-cream or chantilly cream

Note

If you want to make this extra decadent, you can add a tablespoon of kirsch or cherry brandy to the cherries.