Fruit and Almond Pie

Serves 8.

I make this pie with a different fruit depending on the season. So far I’ve tried rhubarb, apricot and strawberries. All highly recommended.

Ingredients

Put the fruit chunks in a pot and mix with the sugar, then let them rest for 10–15 minutes.
Cook on low heat until the chunks start falling apart. Depending on the fruit, this can take a while.
Put aside and let it cool down.

In a bowl, combine the flour, almond powder, sugar, salt and xanthan gum. Add the butter chunks and mix everything with your hands. The dough should be crumbly.
Inside a glass, dilute the corn starch in the water, then pour the contents into the bowl and mix together. Repeatedly fold and crush the dough onto itself, until everything is combined properly. You should end up with a solid ball of dough.
Wrap the ball in a plastic film and place it in the fridge. Depending on the temperature and how long you worked the dough, it might take 30 minutes to a couple of hours to cool down enough.
Pre-heat the oven to 180 C. Take the dough out of the fridge and slowly flatten it with a rolling pin. If it’s hard to pull off the surface without breaking, the dough is probably still too warm.
Once the dough is 4–5 centimeters larger than your pie pan, butter up the pan and transfer the dough into it. The easiest way to do this is to wrap the dough around your rolling pin, and unwrap it over the pan. When fitting the dough in the corners, make sure not to pull on it (it would break), and instead raise and lower it into the corners. You can leave up to a centimeter of dough beyond the edges of the pan, as it’ll shrink when cooking.
Stab the bottom of the dough with a fork, then pre-bake it in the oven for about 10 minutes.

With a wooden spoon or a spatula, combine together the butter, icing sugar and almond powder until reaching a creamy texture.
Incorporate the veggie cream in three steps, mixing between pours. Add the corn stach and mix again.

Spread the fruit compote into the pre-baked crust. Carefully cover it with the almond cream, making a smooth surface. Top everything with the larger chunks of fruits. If you wish, feel free to sprinkle some sugar over the pie.
Bake in the oven for 20–30 minutes, depending on the fruits. The pie is done when the toppings are soft to the knife.
Let it cool and serve lukewarm or cold.

The pie can be stored in the fridge and remains good for about a week.
When using strawberries, I take small ones for the compote, and larger ones cut in half as toppings.