Transform Store-Bought Fruit Pies Into This Classic Southern Dessert

Baking a pie from scratch requires real dedication and being a stickler for details and precise temperatures. Luckily, there's an easier way get the warm, bubbling fruit dessert often associated with Southern kitchens and it's right in your grocery's bakery display (or freezer aisle). Surprise! It's a fully baked store-bought pie. But hear us out: Take this pie, mash it all up into a baking dish, and bake it again. The transformation will reveal something between a cobbler and a crumble, with plenty of jammy fruit, buttery pastry, and golden crispy edges.

This idea works because you're essentially deconstructing a finished pie and giving it a second life. Fruit cobblers and crumbles are famously flexible desserts that can vary depending on what part of the country you're in — we won't even get into the sub-regional differences of desserts like pan dowdys, slumps, grunts, and Betties. Traditional cobblers feature fruit topped with dough or biscuits, while crumbles have their fruit topped with a mix of butter, flour, sugar, and oats. This shortcut takes advantage of the already-there crust and turns it on its head (quite literally). 

Here's the easiest part: start with an already baked pie. You can use a refrigerated bakery pie, a frozen pie you've previously baked according to its instructions, or even a leftover pie that's losing its freshness. Just grab that apple, cherry, peach, or mixed berry pie and get ready to tear it up. 

Once it's cooled, feel free to take out any personal frustrations on that pie. Whether you want to use your bare hands, a potato masher, or a steel spatula is up to you, just chop it all up into bite-sized chunks. Some folks simply flip the entire pie upside down into a buttered baking dish and get to work spreading it out. Be sure to have plenty of pastry exposed so the edges can get nice and crispy during the second bake. 

If you want to mix it up further, add dashes of cinnamon or grated nutmeg to apple or peach pie. If the pie feels too crust-heavy, you can always add in canned pie filling to get the fruit-to-crust ratio exactly where you want it. Introducing an acid like lemon juice, zest, or even a small splash of balsamic vinegar can cut through the extra-sweetness of commercial pies. Chopped pecans, almonds, or walnuts can add a pleasing layer of crunch, especially if they're coated with butter beforehand. 

Bake the crumbled pie at around 350 degrees Fahrenheit, until the filling is bubbling and the crust is golden brown. This can take around 20 minutes, depending on the size and moisture of pieces. It's a surprisingly effective transformation, as the second bake crisps up portions of the pastry while the fruit filling grows hot and syrupy. You'll end up with a dessert that's full of textures all in one spoonful: buttery, flaky, jammy, and gooey.