Friday Pie-Day: Bumbleberry Pie

I have to be honest – when I saw this recipe in my Taste of Home pie book, I decided to make it only because of its quirky name. It turned out to be a favorite though, despite a few mishaps!

Why is it called bumbleberry, you might ask? There is no such berry as a “bumbleberry,” after all. But after a little research (and the reading of a cute little story), I can give a few answers…

Our grandpa said, "It looks like someone went waterskiing across this pie!"

“According to Grandpa, bumbleberries are burple and binkel berries that grow on giggle bushes, so named because they giggle when the berries ripen and the bush begins to quake, and at the precise moment that they ripen, they giggle. If you were to eat a berry while it was giggling, you would spend the rest of your life giggling!”

Bumbleberries refers to a random mix of berries that are in season – ones you might “bumble” upon, ones that need to be used up. (We used some frozen raspberries.) Many times bumbleberry recipes also include apples and rhubarb (we used those too).

However, the original bumbleberry recipe was invented over 50 years ago in a little restaurant, also called Bumbleberry, which still exists in Springdale, Utah. The actual recipe is a closely guarded secret, but you can still buy jams and jellies made from the original recipe.

I’ve never tasted that original recipe, but this was pretty awesome – and not too difficult either. We used these ingredients…

The first thing to do is thaw the fruit, if you’re using frozen. That tends to be cheaper (and actually fresher in the long run, since it was frozen when it was fresh), and when it’s baked into a pie, you can’t even tell it used to be frozen. (See the note at the bottom of the recipe about frozen rhubarb.)

Cut up all the fruit (I love my nifty apple corer-peeler-slicer!)…

…and combine!

Add sugar and cornstarch.

This time, we took a break from our tried-and-true recipe to experiment with a new no-roll pie crust recipe, using milk & oil instead of Crisco. Ummm… it wasn’t as successful as we had hoped. It tasted great, but the consistency was difficult to work with – we had to shape it to fit the pan.

Then we filled it up with our yummy bumbleberry filling!

The top crust ended up needing to be rolled out after all.

And then it crumbled apart when we tried to pick it up... So this is what we ended up with! Not the prettiest, but at least it would taste good!

It was kinda soupy inside, since we didn’t let it set long enough, so we served it in bowls and ate it like a cobbler!

First pie of the month eaten with spoons!

Bumbleberry Pie (recipe from Taste of Home)

1 ¾ cups sugar

5 T. cornstarch

3 cups chopped fresh or frozen rhubarb, thawed*

1 medium tart apple, peeled and chopped

1 cup fresh or frozen raspberries

pastry for 9-inch double-crust pie

1. In a large bowl, combine sugar and cornstarch. Stir in rhubarb, apple, and raspberries; toss gently to coat. Let stand for 15 minutes.
2. Line a 9-inch pie plate with bottom pastry; trim to 1 inch beyond edge of plate. Spoon filling into crust. Roll out remaining pastry to fit top of pie. Cut slits in pastry. Place pastry over filling; trim, seal, and flute edges. Cover edges with foil.
3. Bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake 30-35 minutes longer or until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbly.

* If using frozen rhubarb, measure rhubarb while still frozen, then thaw completely. Drain in a colander, but do not press liquid out.