Fresh Strawberry Pie
on May 17, 2022, Updated Apr 15, 2024
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I daresay this is the most perfect Strawberry Pie recipe. It is beautiful, delicious, and a perfect fit for spring and summer!
This simple strawberry pie does not require Jell-O or fake strawberry flavor. It’s all-natural and tastes amazing. Plus, you can use fresh berries or a mix of fresh and frozen! It is the most delightful dessert to enjoy during the spring and summer months.
You’ll love the mashed strawberries mixed with the sliced strawberries for a perfect pie filling. Take this to your next party because it’s a show-stopper. No time to make a pie? Try this strawberry shortcake recipe today and the pie another day!
Table of Contents
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- A super simple pie recipe that can be made with pre-made crust to save even more time.
- No artificial flavors like strawberry pie recipes that call for Jell-O.
- Use frozen berries to make this pie all year round!
Recipe Ingredients
- Strawberries – Fresh or frozen, your choice!
- Lemon juice – Bottled juice is fine or use freshly squeezed.
- Unflavored gelatin – No Jell-O in this recipe, so the gelatin will help it set.
- Sugar – Plain granulated sugar
- Cream cheese – This makes the whipped topping extra special, so don’t skip it!
- Vanilla extract
- Heavy cream
- Pie crust – Store-bought or use my favorite pie crust
See the recipe card below for full information on ingredients and quantities.
How to Make Strawberry Pie
- Start by preparing your pie crust. You can buy a pre-cooked pie shell or blind-bake a homemade pie crust.
- To make the strawberry pie filling, cook part of the strawberries with sugar and add the gelatin. Then add the remaining fresh berries to the cooked.
- Let the filling cool, and then add to the cooked pie crust.
- Chill and add whipped cream on top.
Recipe FAQs
This recipe requires 3 pounds of strawberries. You can use fresh, frozen, or a mixture.
The pie should be set after about 4 hours in the fridge. Filled pie can be refrigerated for 24 hours.
No. The pie needs to be kept refrigerated for optimal freshness. Bring it to room temperature just before serving.
Expert Tips
- Cutting strawberries: I like to use a paring knife to cut strawberries. First, grab the stem and pull it out. Then, insert the paring knife and rotate in a circle to remove the hull. This way, you can preserve most of the strawberry.
- Fresh or frozen: Using frozen berries is cost-effective when making this pie out-of-season, but using some fresh berries gives it a fresh flavor.
- Cooking the filling: To get the perfect texture, cook part of the strawberries with sugar before adding the gelatin. Then mix in fresh berries. This is the secret to making the perfect strawberry pie filling texture!
- Don’t skip the topping: The whipped cream topping makes this pie recipe a true luxury. Mix it up a bit and top with chantilly cream for a different decadent taste!
More Delicious Pie Recipes to Consider
Desserts
Easy Apple Hand Pies
Pies, Crisps & Tarts
Apple Pie Filling
Desserts
Blueberry Cheesecake
Pies, Crisps & Tarts
Derby Pie
America’s Test Kitchen’s Fresh Strawberry Pie
Ingredients
For the Filling
- 2 pounds fresh or frozen strawberries
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1 tablespoon unflavored gelatin
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 pound fresh strawberries, hulled and sliced thin
- pinch salt
- 1 9-inch pie shell, baked and cooled – my favorite pie crust recipe
For the Topping
- 4 ounces cream cheese, softened
- 3 tablespoons sugar
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup heavy cream
Instructions
- Cook 2 pounds of the fresh and/or frozen berries in a large pan over medium-low heat until berries begin to release juice, about 3 minutes. Increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring frequently, until thick and jam-like, about 25 minutes. You should have about 2 cups of liquid in the end.
- Combine lemon juice, water, and gelatin in small bowl. Let stand until gelatin is softened and mixture has thickened, about 5 minutes. Stir gelatin mixture, sugar, and salt into cooked berry mixture and return to simmer, about 2 minutes. Transfer to bowl and cool to room temperature, about 30 minutes.
- Fold the fresh berries into filling. Spread evenly in pie shell and refrigerate until set, about 4 hours. (Filled pie can be refrigerated for 24 hours.)
- With electric mixer on medium speed, beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla until smooth, about 30 seconds. With mixer running, add cream and whip until stiff peaks form, about 2 minutes.
- Serve pie with whipped cream topping.
Notes
- To make with all fresh berries: Cook 2 pounds of fresh berries (that have been hulled and sliced) with the sugar. Crush the berries lightly with a potato masher to help release the juices before cooking them for the full 25 minutes.
- Make the pie crust a bit ahead of time and keep covered in the fridge until you’re ready to roll out and put in dish with cooled pie filling.
- The pie should be set after about 4 hours in the fridge.
- This recipe is from America’s Test Kitchen’s Family Baking Book, which is one of my favorite cookbooks!
Dear Melissa,
I have tried many of your recipes, always been a hit, flavorful, hearty and full of great goodies. My question is: you are great on your own and I feel that you are honest, but why do you take a recipe from the test kitchen and post it. Do they not have their own website. I want your expertise and not be disappointed it is not yours, but you are promoting the test kitchen and other sources. Please be true to yourself. You seem genuine, but you are piggybacking other sources for your website. Please explain. Thank you.
America’s Test Kitchen
Hey Susan, I worked with America’s Test Kitchen for year and years (not in a paid context, but they would send me their new books and I would highlight a recipe from the book). I promoted a lot of their recipes (and still do) because they are solid really really good recipes, I’ve been a huge fan of their work for 2 decades now. It’s a way to support them and in turn they would put my reviews of their recipes on their website which is also good for my site. I do a lot of recipe development on my own but I’ve never had a problem sharing someone else’s recipe if it’s awesome. The recipe instructions will always be rewritten in my own words and the tips and tricks will be based on my own cooking experience, so it’s not like I don’t add to the value of what they have put together. I don’t think there is a recipe out there that hasn’t been based on something that already exists, even if there are tweaks and adjustments, that just the nature of cooking.
I’ve been out in Missouri visiting family for a couple of weeks, my mom has the best strawberry patch so I made this pie for everyone (several of them actually, I have a big family). IT WAS SO GOOD! Not overly sweet but a little tangy. Oh my goodness, heaven. Not even a crumb left! Thanks!
Yummy! A delicious shortbread crust that’s so perfect you could just eat it like a cookie on it’s own is: 1.5 cups all purpose flour, 3/4 cup butter, and 3 tablespoons powdered sugar. Mix together, form into ball and refrigerate 30 min. Bake at 425 for 10 min. Let cool completely and then fill with desired toppings. Perfect for strawberry pies!
Has anyone ever pre cooked and froze this pie before and if so, how long can it last in the freezer?
Yum, yum, yum!
That Strawberry Pie looks delicious. I think I will have to try this recipe. It would be great to plant all kinds of berries in a garden — as long as the prairie dogs and sparrows don’t eat them first. That happened to my grandpa one year, and he was mad.
https://askmelissaanything.blogspot.com/
thank you so much
This looks awesome–America’s Test Kitchen is the best, and you did a gorgeous job making the pie! I personally don’t love pie crust, and usually give the very outer crust to my husband. But, I use lard from our own hogs, and I think it makes a huge difference in baking. Surely you can fit a piglet into your farm somewhere? 🙂 I’ve contemplated the U pick berry patch for our own farm, but for now, we’re just enjoying our own berries–we should have strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, and I bought a goji berry plant last year, so I’m anxious to see what that does! If I was doing it all over again, I would plant only a few blackberries, and LOTS of raspberries, instead of the other way around, but that’s my preference.