Peaches and Cream Pie (ATK)

• servings: 8
• total time: 2½ h, + 30 m chill, 3 h

Ingredients

1 (9-inch) unbaked pie shell

2 pounds (907 grams) ripe but firm peaches, peeled, halved, and pitted

2 tablespoons sugar, plus ½ cup (3 ½ ounces/99 grams)

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

¼ teaspoon salt

⅓ cup heavy cream

2 large egg yolks

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. Cover pie shell with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 40 minutes, then freeze for 20 minutes.

2. While pie shell is chilling, adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 375 degrees. Place peach halves cut side up on aluminum foil-lined rimmed baking sheet and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons sugar. Bake peaches on upper rack until softened and juice is released, about 30 minutes, flipping halfway through baking.

3. Leaving peaches in oven, line chilled pie shell with parchment paper or double layer of aluminum foil, covering edges to prevent burning, and fill with pie weights. Place chilled pie shell on lower rack and bake until edges are lightly browned, about 15 minutes. Remove parchment and weights and continue to bake crust until bottom is light brown and peaches until they are caramelized, about 5 minutes longer. Let crust and peaches cool for 15 minutes.

4. Reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees. Quarter peaches lengthwise. Arrange peaches in single layer over crust. Combine flour, salt, and remaining 1/2 cup sugar in bowl. Whisk in cream, egg yolks, and vanilla until smooth. Pour cream mixture over peaches. Bake until filling is light golden brown and firm in center, 45 to 55 minutes. Let pie cool on wire rack for at least 3 hours. Serve.

Notes

Before You Begin

* Use your favorite pie dough or our Single- Crust Pie Dough recipe. Be sure to start chilling the pie shell about a half-hour before the peaches go in the oven.

Twice baked peaches:

Eat a peach out of hand and its juiciness is no small part of what makes it so good. But cook the fruit and that same high water content can ruin peach pie, especially when coupled with cream. To evaporate the peach juices and concentrate the peach flavor, we roasted the fruit before filling the pie. A sprinkle of sugar helps the peach halves caramelize.

Save time: While you're roasting the fruit on one shelf of the oven, you can prebake the crust on another.

Why This Recipe Works

Time and again the juicy peaches wreaked watery havoc on our custardy pie filling. Roasting them on the upper-middle rack for about 45 minutes evaporated their excess liquid, and a dusting of granulated sugar encouraged a complementary caramelized coating.

Cooks country June / July 2011