Instructions

1. Prepare the pie crust first, so that it can chill in the fridge while you make the filling. Combine the flour and crisco in a large bowl. Use your hands, or a dough cutter, and crumble the crisco pieces with the flour. Once the flour mixture is combined enough so it resembles little pebbles, it's time to add a dash of salt.
2. Add the hot water 1/4 of a cup at a time. Using a wooden spoon, stir till the water has been absorbed. Keep adding the rest of the water in this way till the mixture forms a dough.
3. Take the dough and work into a ball. Knead a few times, but don't overwork it.
4. Split the dough into two even balls, and flatten a bit into discs. Wrap them with plastic wrap and place in the fridge.
5. Now it's time to work on the filling. You will need to take the pits out of the cherries, which is a time consuming and messy process. If you have a cherry pitter, this process will be much quicker. I have yet to get one, but I'm definitely going to get one soon.
6. Pit all the cherries and put them into a large bowl. I advise wearing an apron, cause the juice gets everywhere.
7. Take a couple of stalks of rhubarb and dice them up. I used about a cup of the diced rhubarb, but if you want a tarter pie, feel free to add a bit more. Add the rhubarb to the bowl of cherries.
8. Add the cornstarch, sugar and lemon juice to the cherry mixture.
9. Set aside.
10. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
11. Take one of the dough balls out of the fridge. Spread some flour on a flat surface and place the dough disc on the flour. Put some flour on a rolling pin and roll the disc out into a large circle. The circle should be large enough to make the bottom of the pie. Use your pie pan to measure as you go, so you know how large the circle needs to be. This pie calls for a 9 inch pie pan.
12. The crust is ready to transfer into the pan when you've rolled it out so it's about 1/2 an inch thick. It should be thick enough to hold the pie filling, but not so thick that it's too doughy. You want a light and flaky dough.
13. Use a rolling pin to roll the dough onto it, then unroll it into the pie pan, positioning it so it covers the whole pan with a little hanging over the edges. Trim the edges if they're too long, but keep an inch of dough around the egde of the pan.
14. Use your hands to make sure the dough is flat against the sides of the pan and there are no bubbles.
15. Add the cherry filling into the pie pan. Sprinkle a tiny amount of sugar over the filling before adding the top pie crust.
16. Take the other dough disc from the fridge and repeat the process of rolling it out to make the top pie cover. Lay the dough over the cherry filling. Trim the dough around the pan so there is about an inch hanging over.
17. Tuck any extra pie crust dough behind the bottom pie crust dough, and pinch so it creates the outer crust. Try to seal the two doughs together by pressing them together as you go around the pie crust. It takes a few times making pie to get a feel for how to do this.
18. Once the dough has been sealed around the entire pie, take a fork and press it into this outer crust edge. Move it along the entire edge, creating ridges. If you don't care to create this effect, it's not necessary. I like the way it looks, so I tend to do this for all my pies.
19. I also use the fork to quickly poke holes into a criss cross pattern in the middle of the pie. This will allow air to leak out during the cooking process, and adds a nice design to the top of the pie. Add more holes as you wish along the top in whatever pattern suits you.
20. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and bake the pie on this sheet for about 30 minutes.
21. After 30 minutes, change the oven temperature to 375, and cook for another 25-30 minutes.
22. Take the pie out when it's starting to get golden brown. The filling might have leaked out a bit, which is okay.
23. Cool on a wire rack until cooled and ready to serve.