According to Instagram, it’s been rhubarb season since about January, judging by all the gorgeous rhubarb baked goods that have been showing up in my feed since then. I guess spring comes a lot later here in the Far North (ha) because even now that it’s mid-May, the rhubarb in my garden is not quite ready to harvest yet. But it has finally been showing up in the grocery store, and when I snapped some up a few weekends ago I knew exactly what to do with it: I had just seen a delicious looking rhubarb and marzipan cake, and my first thought was, “That would make a good pie.”

I chopped up some marzipan and tucked it into a rhubarb filling based on Anne Dimock’s simple and straight-up rhubarb pie, reducing the sugar a bit to make up for the sweetness of the marzipan. The tart rhubarb against the perfume of the almonds is pretty wonderful, with the almond flavour holding its own against the rhubarb, and the marzipan giving the filling a bit of creaminess, sort of like frangipane. It is excellent.

I’m 100% onboard with the current trend of pies with intricately decorated tops, so I took this opportunity to experiment. This one is inspired by the gorgeous pies made by Karin Pfeiff Boschek, and was pretty simple to execute (no complicated weaving – all you need is a paring knife!) for such a stunning end result.

Pies sometimes don’t come out of then oven as pretty as they were when they went in, but I was super pleased with how this one turned out

Ultimately though, pie ain’t pie without vanilla ice cream (as Nate reminded me), so in the end it doesn’t matter what the pie looks like – just top it with a scoop of ice cream and it will be delicious regardless.

Rhubarb and Marzipan Pie

Based on Anne Dimock’s Straight-Up Rhubarb Pie on Food52. Makes one 9″ pie, about 8 servings. Click here for a printable PDF of the recipe.

Preheat the oven to 425˚F (400˚F convection) with the rack in the lower third of the oven.

You will need pastry for a double crust pie (that’s a top and bottom crust). I used my favourite flaky and tender all-butter pastry. Make sure your pastry is well-chilled so it doesn’t shrink too much in the oven.

Roll out one half of the pastry to between 1/8″-1/4″ thick and line a 9″ glass pie plate with it (glass pies plates are best for preventing soggy bottom crusts!). Trim the edges of the pastry to a 1″ overhang and set aside.

Roll out the second half of the pastry again to 1/8″-1/4″ thick, large enough to cover the top of the pie.  Place the pie plate on top of it and gently mark its outline.

Remove the pie plate and transfer the rolled-out pastry to a cutting board. With a paring knife, cut a filigreed flower pattern on top, staying within the outline of the pie plate. Make sure none of the cuts touch each other, so you don’t end up with holes in your design.

Place both the lined pie plate and the pastry top in the fridge while you prepare the filling.

In a large bowl combine:

5 cups sliced rhubarb

1 cup granulated white sugar

4 tbsp cornstarch

good pinch kosher salt

2 pinches ground cinnamon

Toss together with your hands.

Add 1 cup chopped marzipan (chopped into 1/2″ cubes) to the rhubarb filling, and gently toss with your hands, breaking up any clumps of marzipan.

Scrape the rhubarb-marzipan filling into the lined pie plate, again breaking up any large clumps of marzipan that you come across, and spread everything out evenly.

With a pastry brush, lightly brush some water around pastry at the edges of the pie. Place the chilled filigreed top pastry oven the filling, centring the pattern in the middle of the pie, and press firmly around the edges to seal. Trim the pastry right to the edge of the pie plate and use a fork to crimp the edges of the pastry tightly.

Brush the top of the pie with an egg wash (1 egg + 1 tbsp water) and sprinkle lightly with granulated white sugar.

Place the pie on an aluminum baking sheet (this will help the bottom bake better and also catch any overflowing rhubarb juice) and place in the lower third of the preheated 425˚F (400˚F convection) oven. Bake for 15 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 350˚F (325˚F convection) and bake an additional 40-50 minutes, until deeply golden brown and the juices in the middle of the pie are bubbling (this is how you know the cornstarch in the filling has been fully activated to thicken the pie juices) – watch the pie carefully and if any of the top bits start to look overly browned, cover with foil.

Let the pie cool to room temperature (or a little warmer is fine too), then cut into slices and serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.