Can she bake a cherry pie? How about an apple one?

The 2-hour class had been on my calendar since August, so you can imagine my anticipation when last Friday’s “Pie Making Clinic” finally arrived. Timed perfectly for the week before Thanksgiving, I was going to not just learn how to bake a pie. No, I was going to learn pie baking from The Pie Masters. You know, the nice church ladies who make the Best Pies on the Planet and sell them at the County Fair every year. WHOO HOO!!!

I can’t remember the exact details, but I do remember being severely disappointed last year that I was not able to attend this now 3rd Annual Pie Clinic. I first learned about it via a modest postcard hiding out on the corner of the pie counter at the 2010 Fair. I asked the booth people about it and they confirmed that yes, the class was taught by the very same church ladies that made the scrumptious mixed berry pie I was eating at the time. So I was delighted to discover the class being offered again this year. I called and registered with Lisa the day after the Fair ended in August. I was the second person to sign up.

In the intervening three months, I managed to convince a good friend to join me. Carolynn really doesn’t need a baking class. She is an amazing and happy baker. She actually enjoys all those dry ingredients poofing around her kitchen. And the pies and breads that emerge from it are delectable. But Carolynn was game for a novel afternoon outing, she being newly liberated now that her youngest child has started kindergarten.

Three days prior to the class, Lisa sent out an email reminding us to bring aprons and something with which to cart home our piping hot pie fresh from the oven. Not only that, the email encouraged us to please let her know of any last-minute changes in plans as there was a waiting list for the clinic. WOW! Good thing I had registered early!

So on Friday, Carolynn and I followed the signs to the church’s basement kitchen and stepped into one heck of an amusing experience.

The basement was a beehive of activity. About 40 aproned women…and a couple men…swarmed around several tables later referred to as stations. Among them was a Pie Crust Station, an Apple Peeling Station, and a Roll Out Your Dough Station.  There were also tableclothed tables and chairs set up, seemingly inviting us to sit and be instructed. We never did sit. And we're still wondering about the instruction.

Although we had arrived 10 minutes early, the apple peeling and crust making were well underway. We signed in with Lisa who gave us each a metal pie tin and a gallon Ziploc bag with our name on it. She then asked us which of the three pie varieties we had previously indicated we wanted to bake. I had signed up for apple and Carolynn had signed up for mixed berry. Somehow this turned into about a ten minute debate amongst the pie ladies about how best to accommodate our pie requests AND allow us to make our pies together. The together part was awfully nice of them but it really wasn’t necessary. But by the time Carolynn and I realized that our affirmative answer to the seemingly innocent question, “Would you like to bake your pies together?” was throwing the ladies into a tailspin, it would have been too disruptive to try to back out. In the end, both of us ended up making apple pies. Sorry, Jon.

After several more minutes of confusion, a sweet lady named Kay was eventually assigned to be our Pie Escort. Honestly, I doubt she had that title…or any title, actually…but her job seemed to be to walk Carolynn and me through each stage and station in the Pie Process. So why we started at the “Roll Out Your Dough” Station is still unclear, seeing as we had yet to make any dough. Even Kay was confused.

Actually, Kay was very confused. She told us several times that this was the first clinic she had helped with. She spent quite a bit of time wandering around asking people what she was supposed to do with us. Oddly, nobody seemed to know. For all the 20 or so people helping put on this clinic, this clinic in its THIRD YEAR, it appeared nobody had any idea how the clinic was supposed to work. Each station sort of knew what they were supposed to do but didn’t know anything about any other part of the process. There was absolutely no flow, no organization, no hints about where to go first or next or last. It was a beehive with lots of worker bees, a few drones, and no queen in sight.

And so with as much logic as was present anywhere else in the room, Carolynn and I began our Pie Clinic by rolling out dough that someone else had made. I took some notes including “keep pin floured” and “roll from center out.” Yes, basic to a baker but key to someone whose typical dough instructions are more along the lines of “bring to room temperature, remove from wrapper, carefully unroll on flat surface.”

We rolled out two crusts, placing one in the pie tin and placing the other on a piece of wax paper. The second was done with much discussion amongst the “Roll Out Your Dough” Station ladies. Every baker has her own method, apparently, of transporting a rolled crust from one location to another. I waited patiently while the ladies duked it out, and I watched with amusement as Carolynn adeptly used an entirely different method to quietly transfer her crust during the debate.

Crusts rolled and transferred, Kay suggested we go hang out at the Apple Peeling Station and wait for two spots to become available. As we sat down, the Peeler Lady showed us how she prefers to peel an apple (go around the top, then the bottom, then do long strings for some reason). She then demonstrated halving and quartering and end-trimming and then slicing. As clueless as I am in the kitchen, even I felt this level of instruction was unnecessary. Nevertheless, as I struggled with a dull knife and a firm apple, I confirmed with Carolynn the location of the nearest emergency room.

The Peeler Lady interrupted us to explain why the peeler she was using was her favorite. Kay and a few other worker bees chimed in and we soon learned the name and location of a produce stand out the Columbia Gorge where you can buy this neat magnetic set of peelers for just $15. And look, they fit together in your drawer just like this! Then, seamlessly, the conversation turned to the pins in Kay’s wrist from the fall she took a few months back. They might have to be taken out, you know. Look, see how one of them seems to be sticking up? Peeler Lady empathized by saying how grateful she was that she herself hasn’t had any problems with her broken thigh. Just as I was about to ask how one goes about breaking a thigh, Peeler Lady, seamlessly, moved the conversation along by announcing to me and Carolynn that she had just returned from a 16-day cruise of the Orient. She described one of her favorite ports (someplace in South Korea) and noted that Ho Chi Minh is dirty and crowded. She really liked Nagasaki, though. “The people there were SO nice even though we bombed them.”

Moving on.

Carolynn was done slicing the four apples for her mixed berry pie and I had sliced my two. We were waiting for more apples to arrive so I could follow the instruction of baking a 4-apple pie. Then it was decided it didn’t really matter, my two apples were fine. Then it was decided, no I didn’t have enough, I really needed two more apples. Then my apples were arranged in my tin like this. But no, that wasn’t quite right, they really needed to be like this instead. And that wasn’t nearly enough. Where are more apples?

Kay then pointed us to the Dry Ingredient Station. The Dry Lady instructed me to put some sugar, flour, cornstarch, and cinnamon in my gallon Ziploc. The sugar and cinnamon measurements could be approximate but the flour and cornstarch were exact. And do NOT put the measuring spoons back into the dry ingredient containers when you are done. They are to remain on the table. Bad, Carolynn!

We added the sliced apples to the Ziploc, did a little shake-n-bake to coat the apples with the spices, and poured the spiced apples back into the tin. Brilliant! So much better than drizzling over the apples in the tin. Carolynn and I agreed we had both finally learned something. Well, aside from Kay needing her pins removed. Kay then directed us to what turned out to be the “Put the Top Crust On” Station.

This station consisted mostly of yet more debate about how to transfer a rolled crust from one location to another. Again, no consensus and again, Carolynn quietly completed her transfer well before the debate was over. We were then shown several crust crimping examples. I really liked one and asked how to do it. The Crimp Master was a drone; therefore, he did not have long thumbnails. This turned out to be key for crimping. Since my thumbnails were just long enough to undesirably puncture the crust, I opted for a spin-and-twist style that ended up looking more like a 4-year-old’s Play-Doh dragon.

We were encouraged to cut designs into the top of our crusts. I was pleased with my asymmetrical diamond pattern…until I saw another one of Kay’s ducklings cutting out leaves from left-over dough and placing them artistically about her pie. Show off.

Carolynn and I stood proudly with our unbaked pies and waited for instruction. Eventually someone (not Kay) told us to put them on a rack for now. They would be baked for us shortly. This gave us time to complete the final step of our Pie Baking Clinic: making the crust.

Carolynn and I both agreed that the Pie Crust Station was by far the best. The woman leading it was prepared, organized, helpful, linear. My two notes from her station were to use a flat bottomed bowl and to put the Crisco on the bottom before adding the flour. I tried not to be horrified by the quantity of solid fat lining the bottom of my flat bowl. Eww and ick. Nevertheless, one advantage of doing the first step last is that Carolynn and I both ended up with enough dough for two more pie crusts. My lump is currently in my freezer.

Finally done, we wandered about and Carolynn discovered the recipes were nicely printed out and hiding on a table. So much for my notes! It sure would have been nice to have had those cards as we went along, especially since they came with lines for note taking. We each grabbed cards for the crust, the apple pie filling, and the elusive mixed berry pie filling. It might very well be that that berry recipe right there was worth the cost of admission ($30, by the way).

Standing awkwardly, reading the apple pie recipe card, Carolynn and I realized that the pie took 45 minutes to bake. Looking at each other, horrified, we both had the same thought: rescue our still unbaked pies and bake them at home!! We quickly went back to the bake rack and asked the Rack Lady pushing it towards the ovens if it would be possible to just take the pies home and bake them there. Thankfully, since nobody was in charge, she didn’t know. So we found our pies, grabbed our purses, thanked Lisa, and escaped to the parking lot.

Although I baked it on Friday afternoon, due to schedules and school plays and chaotic meal times, Rob and I were not able to sample my Church Lady Apple Pie until tonight. We agreed that the apples were a little firm; a bit more time in the oven would have been better. However, after taking one bite, Rob decided he didn’t need ice cream after all. My first bite prompted cutting myself a bigger piece. Also, although I typically don’t eat pie crust and view it simply as a filling wrangler, I didn’t have any extra crust pieces to give to Rob…who offered to eat any that I didn’t want and actually ate the crumbs on the counter left over from my not-so-dainty pie cutting.

So overall, while the Pie Making Clinic was a chaotic, disorganized, bemused afternoon with a scattered kitchen of Church Ladies…the pie and the crust were absolutely heavenly.