Cooking question: chewy blueberries [food]

[rebeccmeister]

annikusrex already knows this story, but I've got to ask.

The friend who drove Emma and me to her last appointment also gave me a sweet and thoughtful consolation gift: a blueberry pie.

Somehow, the blueberries in this blueberry pie are really chewy, and because it's a storebought pie it's also way too sweet. Hard to eat. I'm left wondering: what might have happened to have caused the blueberries to be so chewy?? The pie filling may have a lot of cornstarch in it, in case that's a clue. Other thoughts or ideas welcome. Could that be a product of how the pie was baked? Or working with freezer-burned or rehydrated berries?

At this point, I've scooped out all of the filling and the crumb topping. I think I'm going to try putting the mess in the food processor to see if I can produce something with a more appealing texture. I'm also going to add some peaches, methinks.

What would you do, if you were faced with a similar pie dilemma?

Edited to add... After putting the filling in the food processor and trying a few things, I've concluded this cannot be salvaged. It will feed the worms. I hate to see food go to waste, but it's hard to call this substance food at this stage.

Comments

[threemeninaboat]

rehydrated berries.

[graydon]

About the only way to make the berries themselves chewy, yeah; dry them first.

[twoeleven]

Yep. While I kinda like dried blueberries, the jerky-like texture is off-putting.

[bluepapercup]

What would I do? I would throw it out, personally. It's really hard to un-sweeten. However, you could mix it with some cooked cranberries that have some lemon or orange added to them, which will tarten the whole mixture up and perhaps make it palatable for putting on yogurt or an english muffing.

My guess on the texture is way too much thickener, and likely more than one thickener - so cornstarch but also another gelling agent such as agar. It's always possible there's corn syrup in it too.

[rebeccmeister]

You are right about the un-sweetening being hard. I turned it into a slurry and added in a bit of alcohol and line juice, and then added some to yogurt, and it was _still_ too sweet! Bleah.

I have a feeling that you're spot on about corn syrup, and that's probably also why this filling is fairly gross.

I just hate to see almost a whole pie go to waste, so I'll probably keep using up the filling by adding dollops to my yogurt.

[rebeccmeister]

...thinking about this further, I think you might be correct in your conclusion about throwing this one out. Or in my case, composting it, at least. I have a lot of other delicious things to eat and it will take too much work to fix this one thing, and then there will be a lot of it lying around and it will take me forever to eat it.

To the worms it goes.

[(Anonymous)]

For no apparent reason this reminds me of the time my roommate, Ken, called up to me while I was in my room.

“You gotta come help me finish off this cheesecake, it’s getting rubbery!”

Ken, you see, had purchased an enormous cheesecake at Costco a few weeks prior.

I declined.

Ken spent a week afterwards, groaning on the sofa.

[rebeccmeister]

Oh geez, regrettable desserts are regrettable!

[jameswatriss]

Well, he certainly regretted that one…