This week I decided to add another item in our Snack Cake Collection, some cherry pies. I remember my mom putting these in my lunch box when I was in grade school. I was always excited to find them in with the rest of lunch and when I happened to see they were on sale at my grocery store a while back I knew they had to be the next in this series.
The first part of the video we will make the whole pies just like they come out of the package. Then at the end I show you how to add some cherry filling to a couple that are broken open to reveal the pretty inside.
The hardest part of this project was getting the crust color the way I wanted it. At first I was trying to match the crust on the real cherry pie I had brought home. I just did not like that color at all. Frankly, when you look at the real pie the crust color is not appetizing. The color of the crust on the box is much better and much easier to match.
The clay formula that made the best crust color for this project for me was to mix equal parts of Original Sculpey and Fimo in Yellow Ocher. The ocher color clay I have is from the classic line and very hard, (it is also very old and needed a lot of off camera conditioning) but by mixing with the softer clay we get a very nice workable clay. Be sure to mix the two colors until the colors are completely combined with no streaks left.
Once the clay is ready roll out a sheet of clay that is the thickness of a single craft stick. Then cut a 1 ½” by 2” piece of this clay for each pie. We are cutting them just a bit bigger than we need and will end up trimming them again but it is easier to work with the clay at near the final size.
Once you have the rectangles of clay cut roll a snake that is 3/8” in diameter and cut a 1” long piece of this snake for each pie. This will be your filling.
Lay the snake piece in the center of the rectangle.
Fold the rectangle over it. Now work out any air and press the edges together firmly. This will make the clay “grow” a bit don’t worry we are trimming it next.
I like to lay my pie on a piece of 1/8” graph paper for this trimming step. Line the fold at the bottom edge with a line and trim the pie down to be 1 ½” wide by 7/8” the other direction.
Now we need to remove the corners at the edge of the pie. This looks best if the edge is kind of curved when cutting them off. Because of this I use a 1 ½” round cutter to do this step.
Once the pies are trimmed move them to some coarse sandpaper. I used a brush like applicator from hair dye to do the initial texturing but you could use anything that will give a similar texture.
Then I followed up with a toothbrush to mute the texture a bit and add some finer texture at the same time.
Next we do something we do on most baked goods, we are going to add some color with chalk. These are artist chalks and I have an entire video on using chalks on our polymer clay in my clay 101 series on the channel. For these pies we are going to start by brushing on a good coat of a yellow ocher chalk, this won’t show a lot but it makes the rust color that goes on over it look much better.
Now brush on some rust colored chalk over the yellow ocher chalk. Don’t go too heavy with this. If you feel your rust is too dark brush more of the yellow ocher over the top of it to mute it a bit.
Once you are happy with the baked color, mix some water into a small amount of the white chalk and using a soft brush splatter on some drops of the water chalk mixture over the pies. This will become the thicker parts of the final glaze. Allow this to become completely dry before going on to the next step so you don’t smear the drops.
Repeat these chalk steps on the bottom side of the pies. And allow that to dry also.
This is a good time to make sure everything looks the way you want it to. Make sure the edges are pinched really well and the pies are trimmed the way you want them.
Now using a fingertip apply a very thin coat of liquid polymer clay to coat the outside of the pies. This will give the look of that glaze on the pies.
Now bake the pies at the recommended temperature for 15 minutes and allow to cool before handling.
Now we are going to work on the cherry pies that are broken open to reveal the filling. For that make your pie just like we just did for the whole ones stopping once you have the chalk step done and the white chalk/water mixture is dry. Then stick them into the freezer for 15 to 20 minutes or so to firm them up and make them easier to work with to get details.
Carefully starting with your clay knife and ending by breaking open up the pies.
Now using your tools make a small opening at the cut edge to put some filling into. This doesn’t want to be very deep just enough to stick a few clay balls for the cherries into.
Use a pointy tool to text the cut rim to create the crust texture.
Now for the cherries, I mixed some Premo in Alizarin Crimson with about an equal amount of Sculpey III in Translucent. Then I rolled a thin snake, cut small pieces and rolled those into small balls.
You will also need some liquid clay mixed with some Rose Madder oil paint.
Coat the inside of the cavity you made on the cut end of the pies with the colored liquid clay and then roll a few of the red balls of clay in the liquid clay mixture and insert in the cavity. I found that 2 or 3 cherries were about all I could get in there without it looking crowded.
Once the cherries are in place use you finger to apply some more liquid clay (not colored, straight from the bottle just like for the whole pies) Then bake at the recommended temperature for 15 minutes and allow to cool before handling.
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Pies look ok but are not my favorite. Sorry
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