Strawberry Jam Cornflake Pie

Flaky pastry, fruity strawberry jam, sweet sugary cornflakes and a soft whipped cream. A slice that tastes like a big bowl of fruity cereal and milk. She’s fancy with her frilly piping but still a wholesome and humble pie. I made this in my extra deep 9-inch pie dish because I wanted her to be T-H-I-C-K. She’s exactly what I envisioned. And my big fat slice of pie craving has well and truly been satisfied.

Ingredients - makes one 9-inch pie dish (extra deep)
Pastry: *
200g plain flour
1/2 tsp salt
150g unsalted butter, cubed - cold
80g cold water (plus more as needed)

Filling:
175g Strawberry jam
90g unsalted butter
215g golden syrup
45g soft dark brown sugar
175g cornflakes
1 1/2 tsp flaky salt

Whipped Cream:
300ml double cream
1/2 tsp vanilla paste
15g caster sugar

*pastry recipe originally from Erin McDowell

Method
To make the pastry; place the flour, salt and cubed butter into a mixing bowl. Toss the butter in the flour to coat and, using your fingertips, press them down into flat pats. Continue until all of the butter has been flattened. Continue to work the butter in a little until you have a little butter which looks like breadcrumbs but mostly flattened pats. Make a well in the middle of the flour and pour in the 80ml of cold water. Using a knife, mix the water in. Continue to add in a tbsp of cold water at a time until the dough starts to come together. Use your hands to mix the dough and lightly knead it into a ball. It should have enough water that the flour is hydrated but not be sticky. It can have some dryer parts which will hydrate during resting. Pat the pastry into a rough rectangle, clingfilm and refrigerate for 30minutes - 1 hour.

Roll the pastry into a cm thick rectangle. Dust off any excess flour from the surface of the dough and fold one third of the dough over onto the middle third. Then fold the last third of the dough on top. If your pastry is still cold, repeat this step. If it’s getting too warm, refrigerate it for 30 minutes before repeating. Fold the corners of the dough under so that you have a rough circle. Cover the pastry and refrigerate for at least 1 hour (or up to 2 days.)

Lightly grease your 9-inch pie dish. Roll the chilled pastry so that it is an inch bigger than the base and sides of your dish. Roll the pastry onto your rolling pin and unroll it over the pie dish. Ease the pastry down into the dish and push into the corners. Trim off any overhanging pastry so that you have an edge of 1cm. Fold the edge under itself and crimp around the whole pie. Prick the base and sides with a fork and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Pre-heat your oven to 200°C. Crumple a piece of baking parchment big enough to cover the inside of the pie, plus a bit of overhang. Take the chilled pastry from the fridge and place the baking paper inside. Pour in your pie weights (I just use rice) until it is completely full. Bake for 15-20 minutes until lightly golden. Remove the weights and baking paper (bake it for a little longer if the base isn’t baked enough to remove the weights.) Bake for another 10-15 minutes until golden. It won’t bake much more when you bake the cornflake layer so make sure it’s fully baked. Remove from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes. Once cool, spread the strawberry jam in the bottom and leave to one side.

For the cornflake layer, turn the oven down to 160°C. Bring the butter, dark brown sugar and golden syrup to a simmer. Have your cornflakes and flaky salt in a large mixing bowl ready. When simmering, pour the mixture over the cornflakes and mix. Continue to mix the cornflakes thoroughly as they cool so that the mixture fully coats all of the cornflakes. Spoon the mixture on top of the strawberry jam. Spend some time gently pressing the cornflakes down with the back of a spoon, to make sure they are well compacted and in all the little nooks (be careful not to break/chip your lovely flaky pastry.) Bake for 10 minutes. Leave to cool completely.

To finish, whip all the ingredients for the whipped cream together until you have soft peaks. Flip the pie upside down on you hand to remove it from the tin (it’s very sturdy) and place onto your serving plate. Pipe the whipped cream around the edge of the pie and serve. I found that this pie is lovely on the day its made but I love it just as much on day 2 and 3 when it’s had a chance to sit. Make sure cut it with a large sharp knife.