I recently purchased a case of Fruit Perfect Sour Cherries so yesterday I made Rose’s Cherry Lattice Pie. It had been years since I had made it and my recipe notes noted no issues and rave reviews. In this one, however, the filling is VERY runny. Refrigerating the pie overnight has not helped. Although I followed Rose’s notes for using Fruit Perfect, I was in a hurry so I skipped the lattice and rolled out a regular top crust (poking fork holes in the top before baking). Am wondering if that made the difference or if American Spoon is formulating the cherries in a different way? (The pie tastes great, by the way.) Thank you.

Probably the filling didn’t get done because of the solid top. You could confirm the hypothesis by heating some of the left over filling in a sauce pan. It’s also possible that with the holiday rush you forgot to add the cornstarch? I have done it and it is one reason why I now pre cook my fruit pie fillings.

Yes, the pie will cook differently with a top crust than it will with a lattice.  More of the moisture will evaporate with a lattice, and the center will cook a tad more quickly.  If you feel certain that the center came to a full boil, then it was probably the lower rate of evaporation.  Rose’s pie recipes have just enough cornstarch to flow a little when completely cool- if you don’t cool long enough, or do anything else that changes the amount of liquid in a filling, there isn’t much room for error.

Hi roxann!  I’ve had issues with too much liquid with the cherry pie filling, but I think that is due to the variation in cherry varieties.  The dwarf sour cherries that I have available here will exude up to 1/2 half their weight in liquid!!!  I’m still working on getting the thickening right for them as it is the only fruit pie I make that seems to have this problem.  Good luck!

Another reason I like to precook the filling. One can adjust the thickener if needed.

Hi Gene,
Do you use open faced pies or do you precook, cool and then rebake?  I like 2 crust pies so often I don’t go the route of precooking!

I usually do a lattice because I like the way it looks and I have never quite mastered the art of not leaving a large void under the solid top. I make cherry pie most often and this is what I do.
I put fresh or frozen cherries in a small steamer with a couple of tablespoons of water in the bottom.
I cook that on very low heat until the cherries soften and I have a good amount of juice in the bottom of the steamer 1-1 1/2 cups.
I adjust the flavor of the juice by adding sugar, salt, acid until it tastes perfect.
I measure the amount of liquid and add the proper amount of cornstarch then I cook the it until it begins to turn clear.
It will thicken a bit and I can tell whether the balance is correct by how much it thickens.
Then I fold the cherries gently into the cooked juice and put it hot into a prebaked pie shell.

This method also takes some of the guess work out of apple pies. I have made apple pies with home grown fruit many times and it is difficult to predict when the apple slices will soften properly. By precooking in the steamer you can judge when the apple is beginning to soften.