"Sploosh" Pie

This weekend I baked a "Sploosh" Pie for my darling Rohan, and I wanted to share it with you.

"What is a Sploosh Pie?" you ask.

"Sploosh" comes from the Newberry Award-winning novel, Holes, by Louis Sachar. If you have not read it, I recommend that you should! Rohan and I just listened to the audio version on our trip down to Orlando for the Christy Awards, and it kept us laughing and entertained even at the dragon-eaten hour of 3 am when we were on the road. An important story facet is a certain woman and her brilliant knack for canning spiced peaches . . . which, through a variety of circumstances I hate to give away, end up being known as "Sploosh."

So this is a Sploosh Pie . . . otherwise known as a Spiced Ginger-Peach. I invented it based off a can of amazing spiced peach preserves my lovely sister-in-law recently gave us, and I think it turned out well.

If you'd like to give a whirl, here's the recipe.

Crust: Use your favorite pie crust recipe. I used my mum's recipe which is:
2 cups flour
2/3 plus 1 Tbls shortening
1 tsp salt

Cut with two forks or pastry cutter until dough resembles course meal.

For this pie, I also added:
Add 2 tsps cinnamon,
2 tsps ground ginger
2 Tbls sugar

Once your mixture resembles course meal, add 4-5 Tbles water. (This time of year is so humid in NC, I actually only used 2 Tbls and it was plenty)

Roll into a ball and refrigerate until ready.

Filling:

2/3 cup (packed) golden brown sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1/3 cup minced FRESH ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

3 pounds medium peaches

Mix sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice and spices in large bowl. Bring medium saucepan of water to boil. Drop in 3 peaches at a time; blanch 1 minute. Transfer peaches to bowl of cold water. Using small sharp knife, peel 1 peach. (I found the longer I let the peaches sit in the cold water, the easier the peel came off.) Cut peach in half; discard pit and slice thinly. Stir peach slices into sugar mixture. Repeat with remaining peaches. Let filling stand until juices form, at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 375°F. Roll out larger dough disk on lightly floured surface to 13- to 14-inch round. Transfer to 9-inch-diameter deep-dish pie dish. Spoon in peaches and ginger filling.

Preheat oven to 375°F. Roll out smaller dough disk on lightly floured surface to 11-inch round. Using ruler as aid, cut dough into 1/2-inch-wide strips.

Roll out larger dough disk on lightly floured surface to 13- to 14-inch round. Transfer to pie dish. Roll out smaller dough disk on lightly floured surface to 11-inch round. Cut dough into 1/2-inch-wide strips.

Arrange some of dough strips atop pie, spacing 3/4 inch apart. Form lattice by arranging more dough strips at right angle to first strips, spacing 3/4 inch apart. Trim overhang of bottom crust and lattice strips to 3/4 inch. Fold under and crimp edge decoratively.

Bake pie until crust is golden and filling bubbles thickly, covering edge of crust with foil if browning too quickly, about 1 hour 20 minutes. Cool pie to room temperature before serving. 

 The most important part of this recipe is the FRESH minced ginger. This was what my sister-in-law recommend based off her experience with her peach preserves. You want the little chunks of ginger in your pie, not ground ginger.

This pie just supplanted my Apple Caramel Cranberry pie for the coveted honor of My Husband's Favorite. And I have to admit, I think I might prefer it myself . . . it truly was amazing! Next time, I plan to add a tsp of nutmeg and a half-tsp of allspice, possibly leaving out the cinnamon altogether, just to see what happens.

Let me know if you make it and how it turns out! A delectable, summery treat.