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Chocolate Cherry Pie with CHOCOLATE PIE DOUGH!!!

CCP finished slice

It’s pretty clear by my excessive use of capitalization what my favorite part of this pie is. I woke up in the middle of the night (I know, overly dramatic for a food blog post) with the idea of a chocolate pie dough crust. After a quick google search I wasn’t able to find a recipe for inspiration, leading my to wonder if my midnight dessert vision wasn’t even possible. By only modifying my go-to pie dough crust, It turns out that it is VERY possible, and super tasty.

CHOCOLATE PIE DOUGH!!! Ingredients:

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa

2 2/3 cup of all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

3 tbs sugar

8 tbs butter (1 stick), cut into cubes

1/2 cup shortning

1/4 cup vodka

1/4 cup cold water

Pie Filling ingredients:

1 1/4 cup sugar

3 tbs cornstarch

5 cups of fresh bing cherries

3 tbs lemon juice from a real life lemon, none of that squeeze bottle crap (about 1 large lemon’s worth)

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup chocolate, broken up into chunks (I used 56%)

3 tbs butter

1 tbs light corn syrup

2 tbs butter (for crust assembly)

plus 2 tbs white sugar to sprinkle on top before cooking

I did some pretty extensive research on pie dough over the past few years and I’ve learned a few things that I’ll pass on to you all. First, food processors are great at getting the job done as quickly as possible, and we all know that the more you mess with dough the tougher it becomes. So break out that food processor and add the cocoa, 2 cups of the flour, salt and sugar and give it a quick pulse until it’s combined.

ccp-crsut-fp-dryAdd the cubes of butter and the shortening and pulse until combined, about 1 1/2 minutes. A mix of shortening and butter gives a good flavor and texture.

ccp-dough-in-fpNow, if you have a larger food processor that mine, then add the remaining flour and pulse until it gathers around the blade. MINE is tiny and I need a new one. So if you are in the same boat as I am, just transfer it to a bowl and add the remaining flour by hand. (if you have a nice big guy food processor, transfer to a bowl after you add the remaining flour)

ccp-crust-bowlThen add the water and the vodka and squish it into the dough until its all combined. Vodka is another tip I picked up during my dough research. It cooks off completely (unlike water) creating a super flakey crust. Your dough will be very moist, but you can add a bit of flour if it is too moist to hold together. Then split into two evenly sized disks and wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for AT LEAST AN HOUR, super important, don’t skip this step.

ccp-dough-circles-wrappedYou can chill it for a few days if you need to, in that case, put the wrapped circles in a zip lock bag.

Before you get to the cherries, combine the sugar, cornstarch, salt, lemon juice and vanilla in a large bowl and set aside.

ccp-sugar-cs-lemonNow, get out those beautiful cherries

ccp-cherries-asYou’ll have to pit them, so I hope you have a pitter. You can buy them for about $8 and its totally worth it.

ccp-cherry-pittinTo pit 5 cups, it should only take about 10 minutes. Unless, your daughter needs a nap and she won’t sleep and you can hear her jumping in her crib throwing bedtime bunny, sleepy time bug, and her sippy cup across the room and you have to go in and lay her down and tell her that she is a tired lady and she needs to go nigh night….in that case, it may take longer.

Add the pitted cherries to the sugar mixture bowl and stir until the cherries are well coated. Allow to rest for about 30 minutes.

ccp-cherries-bowl-restingGet your cold dough out of the fridge and place it on a well floured surface. I’m not gonna lie to you, this is not the easiest dough to work with. It’ll need a lot of flour on both sides, flour the top to make sure it doesn’t stick to your rolling pin. roll out into a circle large enough to fit into your pie pan with only a little over hang. If it breaks apart, just smoosh it back together with your fingers.

ccp-crust-rolledTransfer to your pie pan, if it breaks, again, just push the cracks back together.

ccp-crust-in-panin a microwave safe bowl, add your chocolate chunks, butter and corn syrup.

ccp-chocolate-ingredients-premeltMicrowave for 20 seconds, stir and repeat until all melty. Pour the chocolate into the crust and smooth out to make an even layer.

ccp-crust-with-chocolateThen add your beautiful cherries

ccp-crust-with-fillinOK, so by this point I was a little fed up with my crust, so the double crust plan was altered a bit. If you want to roll out circle #2 and make it a double crust, be my guest. I decided to roll out #2 and cut him up with two mini cookie cutters. You can also cut strips to do a lattice top.

ccp-crust-cut-outsI then layered them on the top to create parallel lines, brushing each cutout with melted butter to help them adhere to each other

ccp-top-butterI then filed in a bit of the blank spaces with randomly placed cutouts and sprinkled the top with sugar

ccp-oven-readyBy this point you may be thinking, “Why didn’t she ask me to preheat the oven? Did she forget? should I just set it to my go-to 350?” Nope. This is one of those pearls of pie dough wisdom that I am passing on. Ice cold dough cooks better than room temp dough. SInce we have worked this pie dough over pretty good, it needs to rest and chill before going into the oven. SO now, turn the oven on and set it to 475 and place your pie in the fridge to chill. Wait about 20 minutes and then bake your pie at 475 for about 15 minutes. Then, turn your oven down to 375 and finish baking for about 45 minutes or until the filling is thick and bubbly. If your crust looks like it is browning too much, cover it in foil.

ccp-finished-whole
ccp-finished-in-pan-cut

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Comments


sheryl June 1, 2011 um 3:49 pm

Chocolate & cherries my all time favorite combination! Congrats on the chocolate pie dough, that was brilliant.

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Coreen June 1, 2011 um 4:06 pm

Outstanding recipe! I love the chocolate pie crust!

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Tina@flourtrader June 1, 2011 um 4:23 pm

This is delicious times ten-loving the flavor combo. Thanks for sharing this one. Buzz!

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chinmayie@lovefoodeat June 2, 2011 um 2:01 am

Beautiful beautiful pie! Those cherries look gorgeous!
I don’t think I should bake this! I will end up the whole pie! lol

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fat pig in the market June 2, 2011 um 9:21 am

You pretty much had me at the title…chocolate pie crust…thank you! The cherries look gorgeous against that chocolate dough.

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Tiffany June 3, 2011 um 9:10 am

Chocolate and cherries is a match made in heaven!

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Jaxie June 3, 2011 um 4:37 pm

Tiffany, I just tried to "like" your comment! Too much time on Facebook?!

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Ramona June 4, 2011 um 4:57 am

Wow! This is such a great idea! I love the combo…tart and sweet. Great Job! 🙂

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Bessie June 11, 2011 um 2:57 am

wow! That’s really wonderful. In fact, i am into sweet fond and give my preferance to chocolate and cookies. But it seems that i am overweighted now and have to make up my mind to set aside those kind of food. Frankly speaking, i appreciate your devotion in making combo.

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muds June 13, 2011 um 10:27 am

wow i love it.maybe it taste good…….yummy

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Lauren April 10, 2012 um 11:46 am

I’ve been wanting to make a cherry pie with a chocolate pie crust for a while… Finally decided to search for a recipe and found yours. It sounds delicious, can’t wait to try it!!!

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Meg July 27, 2012 um 8:39 am

I just made this recipe and it turned out beautifully! I do have one question. For the cherry filling, slat is not listed in the ingredients, but it is listed in the instructions. How much would you use?

Also for anyone fearful of attempting this crust, I must say I didn’t find it too hard to work with after all! I had to use a little extra water and vodka when processing it to get it to a good consistency and I did let it chill overnight. I don’t know if that made a big difference, but it worked for me!

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Meg July 27, 2012 um 8:39 am

That was supposed to be "salt" not "slat" 🙂

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Jackie July 27, 2012 um 3:58 pm

Thank you so much! I love that pie, glad you did too. I just use a pinch, probably about 1/8 of a tsp. I’ll update the recipe to show that. Thanks 🙂

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Minda February 14, 2013 um 7:57 pm

Thanks for such a great Valentine dessert – was exactly what I was looking for, didn’t think I’d find such a perfect recipe! Made the top crust with heart cutouts – too cute 🙂

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Jackie February 15, 2013 um 8:34 am

Oh good! Glad you like it. Heart shapes sound adorable 🙂

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Sara Burke July 29, 2013 um 9:31 am

Just made this and SO appreciated the pie crust recipe (especially the bit about the vodka). One thing I would suggest is not to use sugar with the cherries mix, or perhaps cutting it down would do as well. This is an extremely decadent pie and I think it would do well with a little less sweet, especially if you are not using pie cherries. With that in mind, I’ll be making this one again 😀

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Sharon August 4, 2013 um 6:45 am

Have had this pinned for a while waiting for a perfect opportunity to make it and chose my birthday picnic. The crust worked perfectly and made a double crust. I even shaped some dough cherries for the centre 🙂
The filling was perfect and the pie was a big hit. Thank you!

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Christel January 1, 2014 um 3:04 am

Wonderful recipe; chocolate crust was so tasty and actually a lot less challenging than I thought it would be. Nothing better than a delicious recipe that is deceptively easy! I’ve never tried the vodka part either but I think it made a difference. I probably could’ve pulled my pie out after 35 mins (at 375, after the initial 15 at 475) but with the dark color I couldn’t tell it was browning so much…oopsies. Still, except for the outer edge, the top crust and especially the bottom crust were deliciously moist and very flavorful.

Just curious, is it specifically vodka that has that ability or can other alcohols be substituted? (I almost used rum because it was all I had but decided to get the vodka just so I didn’t accidentally ruin the pie- that would be unforgivable…)

Great post- thank you!

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Christel January 1, 2014 um 3:09 am

Also, for anyone curious, I chose to try this recipe in the dead of winter…couldn’t get my hands on fresh cherries so I used dark morello cherries from the jar (I know I know but I was desperate for chocolate pie!). The only modification I made was to use just a quarter cup of sugar with the filling. Turned out great, tart and flavorful without being too sweet.

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Jodi February 14, 2014 um 8:13 am

You’re right, this is the only chocolate pie crust recipe to be found! I made a similar thing with a brownie crust, but it seeps into the filling too easily.
I know this is cooking blasphemy, but I made my crust by adding the cocoa to two pre-made pie crusts. I did need to add a little butter and water to blend in the powder in, but it worked surprisingly well! I didn’t try the vodka, but I will next time.
I would recommend also, using your extra dough to make little cherry flower accents; make a cone or cuff with the scraps and cook put in with the pie on a cookie sheet for the last 10 min. Then sugar and add a cherry. You can also dip some in any extra chocolate/butter.
Great recipe, I can’t wait to try it from scratch!

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M June 16, 2014 um 1:14 am

I’m going to be honest, I made some serious adjustments to your recipe because of what I had on hand, but I had to comment anyway because the basic idea is pure GENIUS that I’ve never seen anywhere else!!! I had some leftover pie crust that needed to get used, so I didn’t get to try your version, and I only had canned cherries – but godDAMN, the chocolate layer is the best thing! It, mixed with the cherries, makes this pie absolutely decadent even with the crappy ingredients that I had lying around. EVERYONE SHOULD TRY THIS RECIPE. It adds a whole new dimension to cherry pie and turns it into one of the best pies I’ve ever had. And if you want to make it extra grown-up, add a couple of tablespoons of rum to your cherry filling. Mmmmmmmmm. Thank you for posting this!!

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KH January 7, 2015 um 1:23 am

I have made this pie with cherries from a tree in our yard. HOLY COW! Pie barely lasted two days between my husband, 4year old daughter, and myself. I could just eat the crust dipped in chocolate and I am contemplating making mini pies. The crust is sooooo easy! I used 65% chocolate because that’s what I had, but it was still fabulous! Now that I see cherries on sale at the local grocery store, I may be making it again soon…

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Caterina Platt November 20, 2017 um 8:34 pm

Wonderful recipe!! We did the top crust in leaf shaped cut outs and it brought $155 at a fund raiser pie auction. 🙂

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Doxa December 16, 2023 um 6:11 pm

Can’t wait to bake one of these Could I use frozen cherries?

Thanx!

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