The Village Pie Maker: Strawberry Rhubarb Pie (Aldi) Review
Author’s Note: The following review is my own ridiculous opinion. I don’t work for Aldi. Nobody paid me to write this review. I have no affiliation with The Village Pie Maker nor Aldi.
I am utterly ruined.
If this Village Pie Maker is single and a dude, I want to marry him. Take me to your village!
I’ve been seeing these frozen strawberry-rhubarb pies at Aldi for the last couple years, and I finally got one. Finally. They were sold out last year at my local store.
So. Confession time: I’ve never had a strawberry rhubarb pie before. In fact, I’ve never had ANY rhubarb pie before. I don’t have anything to compare this to. This is new.
All I can say is, wow. This pie is absolutely BURSTING with flavor. The fruity strawberry taste is strong, and the rhubarb flavor sent tingly shivers through my tastebuds. Almost like a kiwi tingle. The filling is quite tart, but balanced by sweetness.
There are fairly large chunks of both strawberries and rhubarb in this pie, although the pieces are very, very soft and begin disintegrating as soon as I scoop them with my fork. I normally prefer perkier fruit pieces and something “chewable,” but I can confidently say that the flavor more than compensates for the squashy texture.
There’s a decent amount of viscous fruit gel, too, but it tastes so good, I’m not mad. It’s thick enough to hold the fruit securely in place without running across the plate. How did they get it so beautifully red without dyes or artificial colors? Amazing.
The crust is phenomenal. It’s flakey, crisp, and somewhat savory in taste. I was surprised how thin it is on the top of my pie — the bottom layer is tad thicker. If you are someone who hates getting a high ratio of pie crust to filling, you will rejoice. There is little crust compared to filling volume.
I’m further amazed by how well this pie serves. I let mine cool for at least 30 minutes before slicing into it, but it was still HOT. I fully expected that first slice to fall apart. But it didn’t. It scooped out perfectly, and the filling even stayed inside, as molten as it was. You can thank the combination of the crust-crispness, and that viscous fruit gel-glue.
I didn’t think I could get more impressed, but the ingredients blew my mind. I don’t remember the last time I saw a grocery store pie with such clean and simple ingredients. Wowzers. From the strong, rich taste, I expected a hot mess of artificial flavors and chemicals. Nope. More about the ingredients later.
Please indulge me in this weird little tangent: I love that this is a “normal-sized” pie. Most of the grocery store pies I’ve bought recently have been more like “mini pies,” even though they aren’t sold or branded as such. They rarely exceed 7 inches in diameter. If you are serving a hungry family, those tiny pies look a bit embarrassing. THIS Village Pie Maker rendition is the size pie I would bake myself. It’s a healthy 9.5 inches to the edges of the pan. This is a pie I would not be ashamed to bring to a family gathering.
The box said the crust was made from scratch and hand-crimped. I actually believe it. If I took this pie out of the disposable aluminum pan it comes in, and put it in my own pie pan, no one would believe I didn’t make this in my own kitchen.
If I had room in my freezer for more of these strawberry rhubarb pies, I would buy them and hoard them all year. In a heartbeat. But I do not have room in my freezer. Not a single shred of room. Not one iota. There is less room in my freezer than there was at “the inn” for baby Jesus.
In fact, I bought this pie knowing there was no room. I used that as justification to bake my pie as soon as I got home. I mean, what choice did I have? I’m not eating this whole pie because I’m greedy; I’m doing it because there was no freezer space. See? Sometimes, things just work out!
Cooking Instructions
Conveniently, this pie bakes from frozen. It doesn’t need to be thawed. It goes straight from your freezer to the oven. I love this. I want more pies like this. I baked mine at 350 for exactly 90 minutes. But I checked on it at 75 minutes, per the box instructions. Mine still had a doughy, pale crust at 75 minutes.
The crust bubbled up like a dome during baking, but deflated within 5 minutes of coming out of the oven.
Serving and re-heating the pie
In my opinion, this pie is best eaten warm or room temperature after baking. Refrigerating it makes the crust hard and stiff and almost waxy-tasting (from the palm oil). I tried microwaving my leftovers, and I didn’t like this very much. The insides are too molten, while the crust stays a bit too cold and hard.
Instead, I prefer to toast each leftover slice in my countertop air-fryer toaster oven. It only takes about 5 minutes at 350 degrees for the crust to re-heat and get crispy-fresh, while the fruit inside doesn’t turn into lava.
Ingredients in The Village Pie Maker Strawberry Rhubarb
Here are the ingredients, from the label:
- Strawberries
- Rhubarb
- Wheat Flour
- Sugar
- Water
- Palm Oil
- Butter (Pasteurized Cream [Milk], Salt)
- Cornstarch
- Vinegar
- Sea Salt
- Orange Peel
- Nonfat Milk
I don’t really know how these ingredients could get any better, unless the crust was all-butter. I love that the tartness is from the orange peel and vinegar (and rhubarb!), instead of citric acid. Impressive absence of “ick.” No preservatives, artificial colors, artificial flavors, or even “natural flavor.” Take my money.
More information from the box:
- Non-GMO Project Verified
- “No Canned Stuff”
Nutrition Facts in Strawberry Rhubarb Pie
There are 10 servings per pie of 136 grams each. See below about how many servings I actually got. Following the label servings, each slice has 320 calories, 16 grams of fat, and 2 grams of protein. There’s a modest 21 grams of sugar (of which 19 grams are “added sugar”) and 2 grams of fiber.
Price and Servings
This frozen pie cost $15 at my local Aldi. Since there are 10 servings per pie, each serving costs about $1.50. Honestly, I only got about 8 servings, and I think for the pie size, that would be the typical number. If you divide this into 8 servings, the cost per slice is $1.88, which is fairly high for an Aldi product. However, it is totally worth it. Per ounce, this pie costs about 31 cents.
Shelf-Life
The box says to “enjoy within 3 days of baking.” I ate my pie over a period of 7 days. It stayed pretty much the same consistency in my refrigerator throughout that period. But, I was re-baking each serving in my toaster oven before eating.
Dramatic Conclusion
I am pretty sure eating this pie is like tasting the White-Witch’s Turkish Delight. I am ruined now. Nothing else will satisfy me after trying this. Not only would I buy this pie from Aldi again, I would buy pretty much any pie from The Village Pie Maker. The texture and flavor is outstanding, and the ingredients are as good as a homemade product. I wish we had more stores in my area that carry this line of desserts! It’s a travesty that I live in an area where these aren’t generally available. I guess I’ll have to move.
The End.
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