Fruit Pie

About the dish

Fruit pie with a puff pastry lid was autumn's great dessert, made from whatever the garden gave. Erken describes precisely how the edge should be "scalloped" and decorated with puff pastry leaves – a decorative tradition that shows how ornamental the dessert was meant to be at the table.

How to make it

1. 1

   Prepare the fruit

   Peel the apples, cut them into 2–4 pieces and remove the cores. Treat the pears the same way. Remove the stones from the plums.

2. 2

   Arrange the fruit

   Mix the fruit and pile it high in an ovenproof, oblong dish with a smooth, protruding rim. Sprinkle sugar between the fruit layers to taste. You can also use only apples or rhubarb.

3. 3

   Roll out the dough

   Roll out the puff pastry, not too thin, into the same shape as the dish.

4. 4

   Lay the border

   Moisten the rim of the dish with cold water. Cut a strip of dough as wide as the rim, lay it around and press it lightly in place.

5. 5

   Lay the lid

   Lay a dough lid over the whole dish, moisten the edge a little and press together lightly. Divide or mark the edge with a floured knife and form scallops by pressing the dough out a little with your left thumb while drawing the dough toward you with the back of the knife.

6. 6

   Decorate with leaves

   Roll out the rest of the dough somewhat thinner, cut it into 2–3 finger-wide strips and then into pointed diamonds. Mark veins in the leaves with the floured knife and set 5 leaves, gently curved toward each other, in the middle of the pie.

7. 7

   Brush

   Brush the lid and leaves – not the edge – with beaten egg.

8. 8

   Bake

   Bake in a hot oven, about 200–210 °C (410 °F), for 30–45 minutes until the pie is golden and baked through.