Um, wow, so I'm kind of a fail. Things got so crazy at work after my last post that I honestly forgot all about the blog. Which isn't a good thing. Sorry!
So, yeah, I've completed the Year of Pie!!! How crazy is that? I managed to follow through and bake one pie each week for a year. That's not a bad accomplishment, in my opinion.
It's been quite a year too! Sometimes the project was frustrating (when I didn't have time to get a pie done and had to scramble to put something together, when I didn't have the money for expensive pies, or when they were complete failures), but overall, it was an extremely rewarding project! First of all, I accomplished something that even my family didn't think I'd follow through on (I'm notorious for quitting things I get bored with). Second, I've become a pretty good baker (possibly to the point where it could be a career choice for me). Third, I came out of the project with a lot of recipes and stories under my belt, which was one of my primary goals to begin with.
I learned stories from other folks about the recipes they gave me... some were their grandmothers' recipes, some were favorite birthday treats; and I made up my own stories as I went along... both with baking sucesses and failures.
One of the things I'm most excited about now, though, is just how much I've come to love baking. Pies, cookies, cupcakes... I'm in love with it! The baking aisle is my favorite in the store, and I'm constantly perusing websites and magazines for new recipes. When I'm bored, I whip something up... it's become almost second-nature to me. Granted, I've gained a lot of weight, but baking has become a passion of mine, and I think that's a pretty cool thing.
So to those of you who stuck with this blog and read, THANK YOU!!! And to those who ate all of my pies (even the disgusting ones), THANK YOU!!! To those who sent recipes and didn't complain when I butchered them, THANK YOU!!! You all mean more to me than I can say... this project wouldn't have been a smashing success without you!
Unfortunately, it's been awhile since my last post, and I can only remember 2 of the pies I baked... Key Lime Cheesecake and Cherry Pie.
The Key Lime Cheesecake was kind of a disgusting fail, but I don't think it was my fault. First of all, the crust was accidentally awesome... I added a cup of sugar to my graham cracker crumbs rather than the tablespoon it called for (oops!), and it wound up being super crispy, but almost cookie-like in taste, so that was pretty delicious.
The cheesecake itself was uber tart and left a horrible aftertaste. We all picked around the pie and ate just the crust after a few bites. Blech! I actually gave a slice to one of my co-workers and just stared at her, waiting to see the aftertaste reaction, and boy, was it a goodie! She started out going, "this isn't bad!" and then after a few more chews, her entire face fell and she almost gagged. It was hilariously fantastic.
And like I said, my final pie was Cherry Pie. I apparently missed fresh cherry season (oops!), so I had to use frozen ones. The pie turned out looking beautiful... I made a lattice top that was just gorgeous. Unfortunately, the cherries had almost no flavor... I thought that apart from the crust, it was pretty blah. Which was disappointing for my final pie. But that's the beauty of this project... some pies were awesome and some weren't. You just never knew what you were going to get!
So that's all I can remember as of now... if I think of the others, I'll come back with the stories. Maybe.
So thanks for reading, eating, and being downright awesome!
Much love, and much pie :)
Laura
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Friday, August 6, 2010
Succeeding and Failing, Peaches and Chocolate
Figuring out one's future is a funny thing. And by "funny" I mean a combination of excitement, stress, and fear, repeated simultaneously.
Trying to decide what to do with my life once my AmeriCorps position is done hasn't been easy for me. For the past two years, I had been planning on going to grad school for publishing and editing, but now that I've worked a bit in the Real World, I'm not so sure. Devoting 2 years of time, energy, and money into grad school when I'm not 100% sure it's the right thing for me seems like a bad plan.
Especially when I've enjoyed baking so much this year. But I'd never thought of baking as a seriously viable option. Sure, I joke about opening my own pie shop(pe), but never with much of a tone of seriousness.
That is, until my super awesome boyfriend stopped by with a stack of papers he had printed out with information on baking and pastry classes at a local community college! Seriously! After only 4 classes, I can get my baking and pastry certification, enabling me to work in a bakery! How cool is that?!
I'm waiting to get more information about possibly enrolling in a class this fall, but if I do just 1 class a semester, I can have this done in 2 years. SWEET!!!
And if I hate the classes, I hate them. So be it... no harm, no foul. But if I love them, then I may just have a new vocation path! Which I think is a pretty fantastic option. I'm super excited about this idea. I LOVE baking, and I think I'm pretty darn good at it, so what the hell, right? Why not?
:)
So now that I've shared that tidbit of my life with you... on to the pies!!!
For the Fourth of July, I kind of neglected to make a patriotic pie, but I made up for it the following week! I baked a Strawberry Blueberry Blackberry Pie, which isn't all that patriotic-sounding, except I made the top crust look like an American flag, so WIN! I laid stripes of crust across half of the pie, and then above that I scattered crust-stars. I swiped the idea from Martha Stewart, and it was adorable!
As almost all fruit pies are, this one was pretty tasty. With minimal ingredients added, you could really taste the natural flavors of the fruit. I LOVED it! Yum :)
The next week I headed home to the great state of Michigan to visit my fam and attend a friend's wedding. I had a GREAT time and got to hit up my favorite summer eateries... if you ever get to Grand Haven, you must try some Ray's, Pronto Pups, and Fricano's! I also got some Marge's Donuts and Olga's snackers... my sister and I named the weekend "Food Fest 2010" for good reason :)
And whilst at home enjoying some much-needed family time, I baked them a pie... they've only gotten to try a handful of my pies, so I didn't want to disappoint!
I made a simple Blueberry Pie. Of course, when I say simple, I mean I used 3 pounds of blueberries! It was heaping, or as my sister and I like to call it, "Pushing Daisies-esque."
The blueberries themselves were a bit tart, but I sprinkled enough sugar on top of the crust prior to baking (to give it a shine) that the sweetness of the crust balanced out the tartness of the berries. And my crust was awesome! Although it was kind of funny... the berries shrank as they cooked, but the crust didn't shrink with them, so there was a huge gap between the bubble of the top crust and the berries themselves. So it didn't slice well, but it was tasty!
The following week things got a little hectic, and my boyfriend's friend was getting married the next weekend, so I was cut short on pie-making time. So I made a quick and easy pie instead... Layered Chocolate Pudding Pie.
I purchased an oreo crust (I was seriously short on time!) and filled it with a few delicious layers. The bottom layer was chocolate pudding (made with half the milk), followed by a layer of chocolate pudding mixed with cool whip, followed by a layer of cool whip. Simple!
It was quite tasty, and while I always feel like I'm cheating a bit when I make easy pies, I think it's a good thing to have some fast recipes handy for any last-minute desserts. Much better than just pudding in a cup, but made without breaking a sweat! How can you lose?
Last weekend some friends of mine came to visit and I made Peach Pie! I've never really had peach pie before (peaches aren't my favorite), but as they're in prime season right now, I couldn't resist.
I bought what I thought was a sufficient amount of peaches (7), but wound up being about half of what I like in a pie, and had an awful time peeling them. They kept slipping out of my hands and mushing and the juice went everywhere! This is the exact reason I don't like eating them, by the way... mush and juice dribble. Yuck.
But anyway, I got them peeled and sliced and mixed them with some sugar, flour, lemon juice, cinnamon, and (most importantly) nutmeg. I poured them into a crust, sealed it with a top crust and baked it.
We couldn't wait for the pie to cool, so we ate it warm out of the oven with scoops of ice cream, and HOLY DELICIOUS, PIE MAN! Wowza, it was GOOD! The nutmeg seriously made that pie... it brought out all the right spices within the peaches... they tasted a bit like spiced peaches, actually, which are amazing. So anyway, I devoured my slice, and we still had about a third of the pie left, so we just scooped some ice cream into the pan and ate it family-style right out of the dish! Nom nom nom!!!
I really want to make some cup-peach-pies soon... it was so good!
The final pie I have to write about is Paula Deen's Kentucky Pie. I don't know why I tried another Paula pie when the last one was so terrible, but I did. And I shouldn't have.
This was promised to be a "brownie in a crust" which I figured was an absolute WIN. Except it was an absolute FAIL. So basically it was eggs, sugar, butter, chocolate, and flour all mixed together and poured into a crust to bake. I was supposed to get "self-rising" flour, but didn't see that line in the recipe, so I just added a bit of baking soda instead to make up for it.
Anyway, the mixture went into the oven to bake, and when I went to check on it, a bunch of the batter had spilled over the edge as it rose. Still, I figured it would work out. So I went to poke it with a fork to test the "done-ness" of the inside. The top crust was solid as a rock, and when I finally broke through, the inside was pure goo.
So I baked it a little longer and then took it out so it could set up on its own. It did not. I ate it warm, and it was like eating warm brownie batter with burnt edge bits mixed in. I wasn't a fan, even with the added help of ice cream.
I stuck it into the fridge and brought it into work today so everyone could at least sample it (yes, I allow others to sample my fails. It helps the learning process, I think.), and while it was better than it was (it now just tasted like a slightly crispy brownie), it was still a fail. I pretty much hated it.
Dang it, Paula! You're supposed to be my BFF!
Alright, folks, less than a month to go in this project!!! CRAZY!!!
Elizabeth and Mrs. Salisbury, please note that I stayed after work to finish this blog, just for you! On a Friday, no less! I owed you both :)
Trying to decide what to do with my life once my AmeriCorps position is done hasn't been easy for me. For the past two years, I had been planning on going to grad school for publishing and editing, but now that I've worked a bit in the Real World, I'm not so sure. Devoting 2 years of time, energy, and money into grad school when I'm not 100% sure it's the right thing for me seems like a bad plan.
Especially when I've enjoyed baking so much this year. But I'd never thought of baking as a seriously viable option. Sure, I joke about opening my own pie shop(pe), but never with much of a tone of seriousness.
That is, until my super awesome boyfriend stopped by with a stack of papers he had printed out with information on baking and pastry classes at a local community college! Seriously! After only 4 classes, I can get my baking and pastry certification, enabling me to work in a bakery! How cool is that?!
I'm waiting to get more information about possibly enrolling in a class this fall, but if I do just 1 class a semester, I can have this done in 2 years. SWEET!!!
And if I hate the classes, I hate them. So be it... no harm, no foul. But if I love them, then I may just have a new vocation path! Which I think is a pretty fantastic option. I'm super excited about this idea. I LOVE baking, and I think I'm pretty darn good at it, so what the hell, right? Why not?
:)
So now that I've shared that tidbit of my life with you... on to the pies!!!
For the Fourth of July, I kind of neglected to make a patriotic pie, but I made up for it the following week! I baked a Strawberry Blueberry Blackberry Pie, which isn't all that patriotic-sounding, except I made the top crust look like an American flag, so WIN! I laid stripes of crust across half of the pie, and then above that I scattered crust-stars. I swiped the idea from Martha Stewart, and it was adorable!
As almost all fruit pies are, this one was pretty tasty. With minimal ingredients added, you could really taste the natural flavors of the fruit. I LOVED it! Yum :)
The next week I headed home to the great state of Michigan to visit my fam and attend a friend's wedding. I had a GREAT time and got to hit up my favorite summer eateries... if you ever get to Grand Haven, you must try some Ray's, Pronto Pups, and Fricano's! I also got some Marge's Donuts and Olga's snackers... my sister and I named the weekend "Food Fest 2010" for good reason :)
And whilst at home enjoying some much-needed family time, I baked them a pie... they've only gotten to try a handful of my pies, so I didn't want to disappoint!
I made a simple Blueberry Pie. Of course, when I say simple, I mean I used 3 pounds of blueberries! It was heaping, or as my sister and I like to call it, "Pushing Daisies-esque."
The blueberries themselves were a bit tart, but I sprinkled enough sugar on top of the crust prior to baking (to give it a shine) that the sweetness of the crust balanced out the tartness of the berries. And my crust was awesome! Although it was kind of funny... the berries shrank as they cooked, but the crust didn't shrink with them, so there was a huge gap between the bubble of the top crust and the berries themselves. So it didn't slice well, but it was tasty!
The following week things got a little hectic, and my boyfriend's friend was getting married the next weekend, so I was cut short on pie-making time. So I made a quick and easy pie instead... Layered Chocolate Pudding Pie.
I purchased an oreo crust (I was seriously short on time!) and filled it with a few delicious layers. The bottom layer was chocolate pudding (made with half the milk), followed by a layer of chocolate pudding mixed with cool whip, followed by a layer of cool whip. Simple!
It was quite tasty, and while I always feel like I'm cheating a bit when I make easy pies, I think it's a good thing to have some fast recipes handy for any last-minute desserts. Much better than just pudding in a cup, but made without breaking a sweat! How can you lose?
Last weekend some friends of mine came to visit and I made Peach Pie! I've never really had peach pie before (peaches aren't my favorite), but as they're in prime season right now, I couldn't resist.
I bought what I thought was a sufficient amount of peaches (7), but wound up being about half of what I like in a pie, and had an awful time peeling them. They kept slipping out of my hands and mushing and the juice went everywhere! This is the exact reason I don't like eating them, by the way... mush and juice dribble. Yuck.
But anyway, I got them peeled and sliced and mixed them with some sugar, flour, lemon juice, cinnamon, and (most importantly) nutmeg. I poured them into a crust, sealed it with a top crust and baked it.
We couldn't wait for the pie to cool, so we ate it warm out of the oven with scoops of ice cream, and HOLY DELICIOUS, PIE MAN! Wowza, it was GOOD! The nutmeg seriously made that pie... it brought out all the right spices within the peaches... they tasted a bit like spiced peaches, actually, which are amazing. So anyway, I devoured my slice, and we still had about a third of the pie left, so we just scooped some ice cream into the pan and ate it family-style right out of the dish! Nom nom nom!!!
I really want to make some cup-peach-pies soon... it was so good!
The final pie I have to write about is Paula Deen's Kentucky Pie. I don't know why I tried another Paula pie when the last one was so terrible, but I did. And I shouldn't have.
This was promised to be a "brownie in a crust" which I figured was an absolute WIN. Except it was an absolute FAIL. So basically it was eggs, sugar, butter, chocolate, and flour all mixed together and poured into a crust to bake. I was supposed to get "self-rising" flour, but didn't see that line in the recipe, so I just added a bit of baking soda instead to make up for it.
Anyway, the mixture went into the oven to bake, and when I went to check on it, a bunch of the batter had spilled over the edge as it rose. Still, I figured it would work out. So I went to poke it with a fork to test the "done-ness" of the inside. The top crust was solid as a rock, and when I finally broke through, the inside was pure goo.
So I baked it a little longer and then took it out so it could set up on its own. It did not. I ate it warm, and it was like eating warm brownie batter with burnt edge bits mixed in. I wasn't a fan, even with the added help of ice cream.
I stuck it into the fridge and brought it into work today so everyone could at least sample it (yes, I allow others to sample my fails. It helps the learning process, I think.), and while it was better than it was (it now just tasted like a slightly crispy brownie), it was still a fail. I pretty much hated it.
Dang it, Paula! You're supposed to be my BFF!
Alright, folks, less than a month to go in this project!!! CRAZY!!!
Elizabeth and Mrs. Salisbury, please note that I stayed after work to finish this blog, just for you! On a Friday, no less! I owed you both :)
Thursday, July 8, 2010
How do you spell success? L-E-M-O-N
No, no, your eyes are not deceiving you. Yes, you read that title right. I know what you're thinking... "But Laura, you've never had a successful lemon pie! You even spelled "fail" l-e-m-o-n months ago! Could it be true?
IT IS TRUE!!! Snap your fingers and do a jig, folks, because after 3 failed attempts, I have finally succeeded in the pain-in-the-ass art that is lemon pie.
And not only was it successful, it was probably one of the BEST pies I've made so far! I couldn't believe it either. It's to die for.
It was a rather tricky and time consuming recipe... first I baked a pie crust (I tried "twisting" the edges this time... a new method that wasn't as pretty as some of my other methods) and let it cool.
Over the stovetop, I made a mixture of sugar, corn starch, water, lemon juice, lemon zest, lemon extract (LOTS of lemon) and let it cook down until it was thick. These types of custard-y layers require a lot of stirring... they always make me nervous. They can very quickly go from under-cooked to over-cooked with just a few extra seconds, so the process is slightly stressful.
All looked okay to me, so I let that cool to room temperature, then added it to the crust and put it in the fridge for a half hour, until it was solid.
While that was cooling, I made a lemon pudding mixture (which also had powdered sugar and cream cheese mixed in... yum), which then went on the top of the custard layer and cooled again for 30 minutes.
While that was cooling, I mixed cream cheese and powdered sugar until smooth, then folded in cool whip and spread it over the top and refrigerated the pie again.
The whole process took about 2 1/2 hours with just a little bit of down time. There were a lot of ingredients that went into it too (I may have missed a few in my description), so I honestly was expecting the worst. After all, that's what I've come to expect with lemon! And lime for that matter... heck, the whole citrus family has been pretty awful to me in this project.
But man-oh-man, did this surprise me! The lemon flavor wasn't over-powering, but the slight tang combined with the rich texture and creamy sweetness made for one glimmering plateful of heaven! The layers complimented each other, both in flavor and in texture, the whole thing was cooked perfectly, and there was no part that was "too much"... the balance was perfect.
I loved, loved, loved this pie. The best part was that I had just had a slice of lemon pie at Perkin's a few weeks prior and this beat it hands down. As an overly self-critical cook, that statement packs some serious punch. Just outstanding!
I've got to say, I've had a series of home runs lately! Good recipes or just getting better at baking? Hmmm...
Next on the list is a baked strawberry and raspberry pie! I'm making it patriotic looking, since I didn't bake a pie for the Fourth. An American crime, if you ask me!
Enjoy some of the best pies that summer has to offer! Later gators :)
IT IS TRUE!!! Snap your fingers and do a jig, folks, because after 3 failed attempts, I have finally succeeded in the pain-in-the-ass art that is lemon pie.
And not only was it successful, it was probably one of the BEST pies I've made so far! I couldn't believe it either. It's to die for.
It was a rather tricky and time consuming recipe... first I baked a pie crust (I tried "twisting" the edges this time... a new method that wasn't as pretty as some of my other methods) and let it cool.
Over the stovetop, I made a mixture of sugar, corn starch, water, lemon juice, lemon zest, lemon extract (LOTS of lemon) and let it cook down until it was thick. These types of custard-y layers require a lot of stirring... they always make me nervous. They can very quickly go from under-cooked to over-cooked with just a few extra seconds, so the process is slightly stressful.
All looked okay to me, so I let that cool to room temperature, then added it to the crust and put it in the fridge for a half hour, until it was solid.
While that was cooling, I made a lemon pudding mixture (which also had powdered sugar and cream cheese mixed in... yum), which then went on the top of the custard layer and cooled again for 30 minutes.
While that was cooling, I mixed cream cheese and powdered sugar until smooth, then folded in cool whip and spread it over the top and refrigerated the pie again.
The whole process took about 2 1/2 hours with just a little bit of down time. There were a lot of ingredients that went into it too (I may have missed a few in my description), so I honestly was expecting the worst. After all, that's what I've come to expect with lemon! And lime for that matter... heck, the whole citrus family has been pretty awful to me in this project.
But man-oh-man, did this surprise me! The lemon flavor wasn't over-powering, but the slight tang combined with the rich texture and creamy sweetness made for one glimmering plateful of heaven! The layers complimented each other, both in flavor and in texture, the whole thing was cooked perfectly, and there was no part that was "too much"... the balance was perfect.
I loved, loved, loved this pie. The best part was that I had just had a slice of lemon pie at Perkin's a few weeks prior and this beat it hands down. As an overly self-critical cook, that statement packs some serious punch. Just outstanding!
I've got to say, I've had a series of home runs lately! Good recipes or just getting better at baking? Hmmm...
Next on the list is a baked strawberry and raspberry pie! I'm making it patriotic looking, since I didn't bake a pie for the Fourth. An American crime, if you ask me!
Enjoy some of the best pies that summer has to offer! Later gators :)
Monday, June 28, 2010
Helloooooo, summer!
Summer = fresh fruit. And fresh fruit = delicious pies. Particularly strawberry pie. Yummmmm.
But I'll get to that in a second. First, I need to tell you about the most awesomely awesome Breakfast Pie that was consumed in one sitting last week. Between two people. It was THAT good (and also low-calorie!).
I got this recipe from my friend Kelsey, and it's basically a quiche. A delicious quiche. Yes, I did quiche back in December, but this was a very different recipe in a lot of ways. My mom's quiche didn't have a crust. This one did. Plus, a few of the ingredients and the baking process was a bit different. Also, this one is technically called "Breakfast Pie" and not quiche. :)
So it was a combination of eggs, cheese, milk/cream, broccoli, ham, salt, and pepper that went into a crust and baked into pure deliciousness.
The boyfriend and I sat down to have this for dinner, and we each started off with a large slice (equaling half of the pie between the two of us). It was so savory and salty, and all around awesome that we quickly gobbled up the rest of it as well. Super, super good.
I think that pie actually kicked off my recent egg obsession. I've always liked eggs (scrambled eggs were one of the first things I learned to cook as a kid, and I used to make them for a snack all the time), but lately I've been making them a LOT. Awhile back I made some poached eggs (a first for me), and my new obsession is omelets. I've never made a successful omelet before, because I usually get bored waiting for it to cook and wind up scrambling it. However, I've picked up a little patience somewhere, and I'm now an omelet fiend! I can't get enough of them. Nom nom nom.
Okay, back to the pies!
The other pie I have to update you on is a Strawberry Pie, the recipe for which came from my friend Sara. Strawberry pies always look so so so good in pictures, but I've always been afraid to try them and have it be disastrous.
Anyway, I gave this one a shot. The crust was different than most... a combination of flour, pecans, sugar, salt, and melted butter. Combined, it forms a dough, which is then spread into a pan and baked.
Then whole strawberries are added to the cooled crust, stems trimmed and pointing up. I cut up a few extras to squeeze in between the larger ones, just to make it look full.
Then a glaze is poured over the top... the glaze is water, sugar, corn starch, and mashed strawberries, which are boiled together in a pot for about 10 minutes. Once the mixture is thickened (it smells delicious, by the way), it's poured over the top of the pie.
Finally, I piped whipped cream around the edges. It was the most beautiful pie I've made so far... the cream looked perfect around the edges, and the strawberries had that super fresh and super shiny look to them (thank you, glaze).
Thankfully, it tasted just as delicious as it looked! Holy yummy! The glaze made the strawberries taste incredibly sweet... it really enhanced the strawberry flavor. I think I might make just strawberries and glaze as a treat in the future! Scrumptious.
It didn't slice well at all, but as I've said many times before, those are usually the best pies. The crust was also fantastic, and though I never would've thought to use pecans before, the nuts really offset the sweetness of the fruit and gave it an overall balanced flavor.
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
The other bonus to the pie was that I had all of the ingredients except the strawberries! I love cheap pies :) I'm hoping to keep them cheap for the rest of the summer... the bonus to fruit pies is that other than crust, the only necessary ingredient is fruit!
Many more pies to come! I can't wait :)
But I'll get to that in a second. First, I need to tell you about the most awesomely awesome Breakfast Pie that was consumed in one sitting last week. Between two people. It was THAT good (and also low-calorie!).
I got this recipe from my friend Kelsey, and it's basically a quiche. A delicious quiche. Yes, I did quiche back in December, but this was a very different recipe in a lot of ways. My mom's quiche didn't have a crust. This one did. Plus, a few of the ingredients and the baking process was a bit different. Also, this one is technically called "Breakfast Pie" and not quiche. :)
So it was a combination of eggs, cheese, milk/cream, broccoli, ham, salt, and pepper that went into a crust and baked into pure deliciousness.
The boyfriend and I sat down to have this for dinner, and we each started off with a large slice (equaling half of the pie between the two of us). It was so savory and salty, and all around awesome that we quickly gobbled up the rest of it as well. Super, super good.
I think that pie actually kicked off my recent egg obsession. I've always liked eggs (scrambled eggs were one of the first things I learned to cook as a kid, and I used to make them for a snack all the time), but lately I've been making them a LOT. Awhile back I made some poached eggs (a first for me), and my new obsession is omelets. I've never made a successful omelet before, because I usually get bored waiting for it to cook and wind up scrambling it. However, I've picked up a little patience somewhere, and I'm now an omelet fiend! I can't get enough of them. Nom nom nom.
Okay, back to the pies!
The other pie I have to update you on is a Strawberry Pie, the recipe for which came from my friend Sara. Strawberry pies always look so so so good in pictures, but I've always been afraid to try them and have it be disastrous.
Anyway, I gave this one a shot. The crust was different than most... a combination of flour, pecans, sugar, salt, and melted butter. Combined, it forms a dough, which is then spread into a pan and baked.
Then whole strawberries are added to the cooled crust, stems trimmed and pointing up. I cut up a few extras to squeeze in between the larger ones, just to make it look full.
Then a glaze is poured over the top... the glaze is water, sugar, corn starch, and mashed strawberries, which are boiled together in a pot for about 10 minutes. Once the mixture is thickened (it smells delicious, by the way), it's poured over the top of the pie.
Finally, I piped whipped cream around the edges. It was the most beautiful pie I've made so far... the cream looked perfect around the edges, and the strawberries had that super fresh and super shiny look to them (thank you, glaze).
Thankfully, it tasted just as delicious as it looked! Holy yummy! The glaze made the strawberries taste incredibly sweet... it really enhanced the strawberry flavor. I think I might make just strawberries and glaze as a treat in the future! Scrumptious.
It didn't slice well at all, but as I've said many times before, those are usually the best pies. The crust was also fantastic, and though I never would've thought to use pecans before, the nuts really offset the sweetness of the fruit and gave it an overall balanced flavor.
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
The other bonus to the pie was that I had all of the ingredients except the strawberries! I love cheap pies :) I'm hoping to keep them cheap for the rest of the summer... the bonus to fruit pies is that other than crust, the only necessary ingredient is fruit!
Many more pies to come! I can't wait :)
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
So it's been awhile...
Hey! Hi! How's it going? Uh... ha ha *nervous chuckling*... it's, uh, been a little while, hasn't it? *scratches head sheepishly* Yeah, uh, sorry about that. The start of the summer just kind of distracted me a wee bit. In case you hadn't noticed.
I really do apologize to my faithful reader(s). Though I'm pretty sure I have just one. Hello again, Mrs. Salisbury!
So this lack of updating my blog has not meant a lack of pie baking, trust me! I've been a baking fiend these last 7 (seven?!) weeks! Seriously, I've done a LOT of baking.
Okay, so since I waited so long to update, I'm a bit hazy on what happened all those weeks ago, so some of these little pie-tales may be short and to the point. But with 7 pies to tell you about, there's hardly going to be a lack of reading here.
Waaaaaaaaaaaaay back on May first, I baked a very special birthday pie for my good friends Karley and Kristine. We had a nice little celebration for them, and I made Karley's mom's Apple Pie. Though I've done apple pie a few times, this one was new, because not only was it a new recipe, but it was a very different recipe from the one I had used before.
Rather than combine the apples with the sugar and cinnamon prior to adding it to the crust, this time I dumped the apples into the crust, then sprinkled the sugar, cinn., and butter over the top. And rather than top it with a traditional crust, I mixed up some butter and flour and sprinkled that, much like a crumble topping.
Overall, it was a really good apple pie! I'm always nervous baking family recipes, since those tend to be the most critically judged, but it was a hit! Hooray! And now I know that if I ever get lazy with making crust, a good crumble topping will work just fine :)
The following week I made something I had been really excited about for quite some time... PIE POPS!!! Basically, they're bite-sized pies on a stick!!! Adorable, right?
After much hunting, I found the proper sucker sticks that could also be baked and set to work. I didn't have an actual recipe for these, I just saw a picture and made it work.
First, I used a drinking glass to cut out 2-inch circles of crust. I then laid those circles on a baking sheet and placed a sucker stick in the middle of each one. These were Blueberry/Blackberry Pie Pops, so I mixed blueberries, blackberries, sugar, cinnamon, and tapioca together, mashing it all up slightly, and then scooped a small bit of the mixture onto each round. I topped with another round and used one of the sticks to seal the edges. They baked for about 15 minutes.
To be honest, they were a pain in the ass to make. The problem with pie crust is that if it starts to warm up before baking, it gets hard to work with and isn't as flaky in the long run. So I had to take small portions of crust at a time, and even then got stuck trying to seal warm dough together... it didn't always work so well.
As for taste, it's a lot of crust and not much filling, so while they were good, I'm more of a filling gal, so they weren't outstanding to me. However, pie pops are really more about the novelty of the thing, and these were darn cute! So I vote them an all-out win.
The following week was my birthday (hooray!), but in all honesty, I should say that the entire month of May was my birthday celebration... my awesome friends threw me a surprise party the week before my actual birthday (which was amazing), then for my actual birthday my super wonderful boyfriend took me to Chicago for the weekend (my favorite city in the world!), and then 2 weeks after my birthday my family came to visit me and we celebrated then, and THEN I received my final birthday present a week after that! Whew! What a month!
So anyway, I didn't make a pie specifically on my birthday (I attempted a carrot cake, but it was absolutely awful... I guess I should just stick to pie), but I made one right before, so it still counts as my birthday pie. It's called Chips Ahoy Pie, and I got the recipe from my sister, Sarah.
Originally, it wasn't a pie... just a dessert in a baking dish, but I made a crust for it and therefore count it as a pie. Basically, the recipe goes like this: combine Chips Ahoy crumbs and butter and form a crust... the warm butter will melt the chocolate in the cookies, and the crust will solidify into more of a chocolate crust. Still very yummy. Then dunk whole cookies into milk and layer on top of the crust. Spread a layer of Cool Whip, then repeat, topping the final layer with more cookie crumbs.
This pie doesn't last longer than a day, as the milk will make it waaaaaaaay too soggy. But also don't serve it right away... the cookies need time to get a little mushy. I know, it sounds weird, but holy mother of pie, it's AMAZING. Basically, it's cookies and milk x 100... purely delicious guilty-pleasure pie. Yum.
Okay, so after that pie came a Chess Tart. My boss gave me this recipe, and it's right up her alley. Back in January, I made her a signature pie... Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans + Meringue. This Chess Tart was very similar to that, so it's easy to see why she picked it.
It was a vanilla wafer crust, which I hadn't yet tried, with a filling that was basically a whole lot of butter, sugar, and eggs. Upon baking, it got a nice brown caramelized crust. This was a pie that could only (and should only) be eaten in very small portions... holy sugar! It was just about the sweetest, gooiest pie I had ever had... it pretty much tasted like pecan pie minus the pecans. Good, but very rich.
Next on the list was a Strawberry Cream Freeze. I got this recipe from my friend Kelsey, and it was the first pie she ever made as a wife! I think that's pretty cool and sweet :)
This one was whipped cream, strawberries, milk, vanilla pudding, and vanilla wafers all mixed together, then swirled with strawberry syrup and garnished with more strawberries. It was made in an oreo crust and then frozen overnight.
I should've let it thaw a bit more, but it was pretty darn tasty! It tasted a lot like strawberry ice cream, and went well with a side of brownies! It was a great summer treat, especially since it didn't take any baking to make. I'd love to make it again... I love simple baking like that. Kind of like no-bake oatmeal cookies. I remember making those all the time as a kid in the summer when it was too hot to turn on the oven. Yum Yum Yum.
Next on the list was another birthday pie, this time for my friend Kelly. We had a big cookout, and I offered to bring desserts... pie pops, cake balls (or cupcake truffles), and Banana Cream Pie were my picks. Yup yup, Banana Cream Pie.
I had to find this recipe online, and I've definitely learned that when using online recipes, it's best to read the comments and reviews and tweak the recipe based on the often unanimous recommendations. It saves you time, money, and experimenting!
So based on the suggestions for the recipe I found, I used a vanilla wafer crust instead of a regular crust or a graham cracker one, didn't bake it (as the recipe suggested), and swapped out a few ingredients for other ones. Basically, I lined the crust with sliced bananas, then topped with a homemade pudding mixture, and then finished off with whipped cream.
I decided to try and get fancy with my garnishes, and bought a piping gun to put the whipped cream on it. Well, I don't know how bakeries and restaurants get such stiff whipped cream! Mine just came out goopy (like it usually does), even after refrigerating overnight! It's really tasty, but just not suitable for decorating. So what do I need to do? Anyone know? Add cream cheese? Freeze it? What?! HELP!
That minor complaint aside, the pie was amazingly good... just about everything a banana cream pie should be! I don't know what all to say about it, but I loved it and can't wait to tweak it a bit in the future.
The final pie I have to tell you about today is one that influenced the Year of Pie way back last August. I've mentioned Julie and Julia a bit in this blog before, and it was really the thing that got this all going. So you know the part towards the beginning of the movie when Julie talks about cooking and how relaxing it is after a long day's work? Well, as she's discussing why she loves cooking (saying something along the lines of, "no matter what goes on, you know that you can come home and add chocolate to milk and eggs and it will get thick."), she's making a chocolate cream pie... Julia Child's Chocolate Cream Pie, to be precise.
So that's what I made last week! And boy oh boy, Julia Child was not about making everything easy. Sheesh.
This was also the exact opposite of the Strawberry Cream Freeze Pie... this one required a LOT of cooking over the stove. And my air conditioning is broken, so 30 minutes over a pot of steam means a LOT of sweat. It was disgusting.
So basically, this pie was to be made over a double boiler. Each step required 10 minutes of stirring over said boiler. And that meant a lot of steam and heat. Urgh.
I also learned something about double boilers... basically, don't forget to check the water level from time to time! In my last few minutes of cooking, I noticed a lot of steam coming out from the bottom of the pot... not the bottom of the bowl, like before. Apparently I had let the water run out and was now scalding my pot! Oops! Thankfully I caught it in time and no permanent damage was done, but yikes!
So anyway, the chocolate mixture went into a baked crust, and was then cooled before being topped with whipped cream. I brought it into work that morning and the entire pie was finished off in one sitting! It was creamy, but not too rich (only 2 squares of chocolate went into it), and just delightful. Bravo, Julia, bravo!
Alrighty, so! Less than 3 months to this project... and I feel like I have more recipes than I need! I plan to continue baking after this, so that's not a complaint, but I'm just trying to decide which recipes are going to be included in the Year of Pie and which aren't. Hmmmm....
Hopefully I won't let so much time go between postings... I sincerely apologize!
Now enjoy some summer pie... I'm getting really excited about all the fresh fruit and endless possibilities this brings!!!
I really do apologize to my faithful reader(s). Though I'm pretty sure I have just one. Hello again, Mrs. Salisbury!
So this lack of updating my blog has not meant a lack of pie baking, trust me! I've been a baking fiend these last 7 (seven?!) weeks! Seriously, I've done a LOT of baking.
Okay, so since I waited so long to update, I'm a bit hazy on what happened all those weeks ago, so some of these little pie-tales may be short and to the point. But with 7 pies to tell you about, there's hardly going to be a lack of reading here.
Waaaaaaaaaaaaay back on May first, I baked a very special birthday pie for my good friends Karley and Kristine. We had a nice little celebration for them, and I made Karley's mom's Apple Pie. Though I've done apple pie a few times, this one was new, because not only was it a new recipe, but it was a very different recipe from the one I had used before.
Rather than combine the apples with the sugar and cinnamon prior to adding it to the crust, this time I dumped the apples into the crust, then sprinkled the sugar, cinn., and butter over the top. And rather than top it with a traditional crust, I mixed up some butter and flour and sprinkled that, much like a crumble topping.
Overall, it was a really good apple pie! I'm always nervous baking family recipes, since those tend to be the most critically judged, but it was a hit! Hooray! And now I know that if I ever get lazy with making crust, a good crumble topping will work just fine :)
The following week I made something I had been really excited about for quite some time... PIE POPS!!! Basically, they're bite-sized pies on a stick!!! Adorable, right?
After much hunting, I found the proper sucker sticks that could also be baked and set to work. I didn't have an actual recipe for these, I just saw a picture and made it work.
First, I used a drinking glass to cut out 2-inch circles of crust. I then laid those circles on a baking sheet and placed a sucker stick in the middle of each one. These were Blueberry/Blackberry Pie Pops, so I mixed blueberries, blackberries, sugar, cinnamon, and tapioca together, mashing it all up slightly, and then scooped a small bit of the mixture onto each round. I topped with another round and used one of the sticks to seal the edges. They baked for about 15 minutes.
To be honest, they were a pain in the ass to make. The problem with pie crust is that if it starts to warm up before baking, it gets hard to work with and isn't as flaky in the long run. So I had to take small portions of crust at a time, and even then got stuck trying to seal warm dough together... it didn't always work so well.
As for taste, it's a lot of crust and not much filling, so while they were good, I'm more of a filling gal, so they weren't outstanding to me. However, pie pops are really more about the novelty of the thing, and these were darn cute! So I vote them an all-out win.
The following week was my birthday (hooray!), but in all honesty, I should say that the entire month of May was my birthday celebration... my awesome friends threw me a surprise party the week before my actual birthday (which was amazing), then for my actual birthday my super wonderful boyfriend took me to Chicago for the weekend (my favorite city in the world!), and then 2 weeks after my birthday my family came to visit me and we celebrated then, and THEN I received my final birthday present a week after that! Whew! What a month!
So anyway, I didn't make a pie specifically on my birthday (I attempted a carrot cake, but it was absolutely awful... I guess I should just stick to pie), but I made one right before, so it still counts as my birthday pie. It's called Chips Ahoy Pie, and I got the recipe from my sister, Sarah.
Originally, it wasn't a pie... just a dessert in a baking dish, but I made a crust for it and therefore count it as a pie. Basically, the recipe goes like this: combine Chips Ahoy crumbs and butter and form a crust... the warm butter will melt the chocolate in the cookies, and the crust will solidify into more of a chocolate crust. Still very yummy. Then dunk whole cookies into milk and layer on top of the crust. Spread a layer of Cool Whip, then repeat, topping the final layer with more cookie crumbs.
This pie doesn't last longer than a day, as the milk will make it waaaaaaaay too soggy. But also don't serve it right away... the cookies need time to get a little mushy. I know, it sounds weird, but holy mother of pie, it's AMAZING. Basically, it's cookies and milk x 100... purely delicious guilty-pleasure pie. Yum.
Okay, so after that pie came a Chess Tart. My boss gave me this recipe, and it's right up her alley. Back in January, I made her a signature pie... Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans + Meringue. This Chess Tart was very similar to that, so it's easy to see why she picked it.
It was a vanilla wafer crust, which I hadn't yet tried, with a filling that was basically a whole lot of butter, sugar, and eggs. Upon baking, it got a nice brown caramelized crust. This was a pie that could only (and should only) be eaten in very small portions... holy sugar! It was just about the sweetest, gooiest pie I had ever had... it pretty much tasted like pecan pie minus the pecans. Good, but very rich.
Next on the list was a Strawberry Cream Freeze. I got this recipe from my friend Kelsey, and it was the first pie she ever made as a wife! I think that's pretty cool and sweet :)
This one was whipped cream, strawberries, milk, vanilla pudding, and vanilla wafers all mixed together, then swirled with strawberry syrup and garnished with more strawberries. It was made in an oreo crust and then frozen overnight.
I should've let it thaw a bit more, but it was pretty darn tasty! It tasted a lot like strawberry ice cream, and went well with a side of brownies! It was a great summer treat, especially since it didn't take any baking to make. I'd love to make it again... I love simple baking like that. Kind of like no-bake oatmeal cookies. I remember making those all the time as a kid in the summer when it was too hot to turn on the oven. Yum Yum Yum.
Next on the list was another birthday pie, this time for my friend Kelly. We had a big cookout, and I offered to bring desserts... pie pops, cake balls (or cupcake truffles), and Banana Cream Pie were my picks. Yup yup, Banana Cream Pie.
I had to find this recipe online, and I've definitely learned that when using online recipes, it's best to read the comments and reviews and tweak the recipe based on the often unanimous recommendations. It saves you time, money, and experimenting!
So based on the suggestions for the recipe I found, I used a vanilla wafer crust instead of a regular crust or a graham cracker one, didn't bake it (as the recipe suggested), and swapped out a few ingredients for other ones. Basically, I lined the crust with sliced bananas, then topped with a homemade pudding mixture, and then finished off with whipped cream.
I decided to try and get fancy with my garnishes, and bought a piping gun to put the whipped cream on it. Well, I don't know how bakeries and restaurants get such stiff whipped cream! Mine just came out goopy (like it usually does), even after refrigerating overnight! It's really tasty, but just not suitable for decorating. So what do I need to do? Anyone know? Add cream cheese? Freeze it? What?! HELP!
That minor complaint aside, the pie was amazingly good... just about everything a banana cream pie should be! I don't know what all to say about it, but I loved it and can't wait to tweak it a bit in the future.
The final pie I have to tell you about today is one that influenced the Year of Pie way back last August. I've mentioned Julie and Julia a bit in this blog before, and it was really the thing that got this all going. So you know the part towards the beginning of the movie when Julie talks about cooking and how relaxing it is after a long day's work? Well, as she's discussing why she loves cooking (saying something along the lines of, "no matter what goes on, you know that you can come home and add chocolate to milk and eggs and it will get thick."), she's making a chocolate cream pie... Julia Child's Chocolate Cream Pie, to be precise.
So that's what I made last week! And boy oh boy, Julia Child was not about making everything easy. Sheesh.
This was also the exact opposite of the Strawberry Cream Freeze Pie... this one required a LOT of cooking over the stove. And my air conditioning is broken, so 30 minutes over a pot of steam means a LOT of sweat. It was disgusting.
So basically, this pie was to be made over a double boiler. Each step required 10 minutes of stirring over said boiler. And that meant a lot of steam and heat. Urgh.
I also learned something about double boilers... basically, don't forget to check the water level from time to time! In my last few minutes of cooking, I noticed a lot of steam coming out from the bottom of the pot... not the bottom of the bowl, like before. Apparently I had let the water run out and was now scalding my pot! Oops! Thankfully I caught it in time and no permanent damage was done, but yikes!
So anyway, the chocolate mixture went into a baked crust, and was then cooled before being topped with whipped cream. I brought it into work that morning and the entire pie was finished off in one sitting! It was creamy, but not too rich (only 2 squares of chocolate went into it), and just delightful. Bravo, Julia, bravo!
Alrighty, so! Less than 3 months to this project... and I feel like I have more recipes than I need! I plan to continue baking after this, so that's not a complaint, but I'm just trying to decide which recipes are going to be included in the Year of Pie and which aren't. Hmmmm....
Hopefully I won't let so much time go between postings... I sincerely apologize!
Now enjoy some summer pie... I'm getting really excited about all the fresh fruit and endless possibilities this brings!!!
Friday, April 30, 2010
Chicken pot, chicken pot, chicken pot PIE!!!
David Cross explains...
Now we're onto one of my favorite dinner pies! I remember growing up and painstakingly waiting for the individual frozen ones to cook in the oven (30 minutes?! Who are they kidding?) before diving in and scalding my mouth on the delicious chicken lava that erupted from this metal tin of goodness.
And then they introduced the microwavable ones, and it only took 5 minutes before joy was at my fingertips.
And then I ordered a chicken pot pie for dinner at Perkins right before a soccer game in high school and thought I was going to be sick as I ran around with 2,000 calories of chicken and cream and crust rolling around in my stomach.
And then it was back at Perkins two weeks ago that I saw a waitress carrying a pie to a nearby table and it dawned on me to cook up a chicken pot pie for myself!
Seriously, I LOVE the stuff. It's the perfect comfort food.
So I set to work on finding a recipe, this time learning from my mistakes on the last pie and reading the comments section for each recipe. I found one that looked great and got great reviews, and after tweaking the recipe a bit based on suggestions from the readers, I set to work.
It's a basic set of ingredients: crust, chicken, chicken stock, cream, flour, butter, onion, celery, carrots, peas, and garlic. I purchased a rotisserie chicken, rather than cook it up myself, and for a few good reasons. Rotisserie chickens are the most delicious time-saver ever. They're juicy and packed with flavor, so you don't have to worry about the chicken being too dry if you were to cook it yourself, and they're extraordinarily cost-efficient. I only used about 1/3 of the chicken in the pie!
Also, this time I decided to measure out all of the ingredients ahead of time and set them out in front of me. I completely get why cooking shows do this. I tend to be a frazzled cook, and I often overcook things as I scramble to mince the garlic I forgot about or sift the flour. With everything pre-chopped and pre-measured, baking this pie was smooth sailing!
Basically, you melt a shit-ton of butter in a pot, then sautee in the onions and garlic, add the flour, chicken stock, and cream and simmer that until it thickens. Then add in the veggies and chicken and pour the whole mixture into a crust. Put on the top crust, bake it, and voila! Chicken Pot Pie!
Holy pollo, it was awesome! Just as good as any pot pie I've had before, if not better. And it was so remarkably easy, I can't wait to try it again. I'll just have to remember to make twice as many pies next time... we gobbled this one up quick!
With the leftover chicken, stock, and veggies, I made a pot of chicken soup (look at me go!), which was also quite good, especially considering the only seasonings I had were garlic powder, salt, pepper, and oregano. And I still had leftover chicken! Seriously, rotisserie chickens are fantastic.
So anyway, that's that.
Now, in the last post I mentioned the possibility of a Laura/Paula project, which could've been cool had my boyfriend not come up with something that's roughly 1,486 times better.
Get this: Cooking Across the U.S.!!!
I'm going to spend next year cooking a dish (or a meal) from each of the 50 states! How cool is that? That way I either get 2 weeks off, or I use those 2 weeks for Thanksgiving and the 4th of July (U.S. holidays don't get more American than that).
But anyway, I'll cook by region and start up a new blog to get ideas from people across the country on what dishes I should cook. Appetizers, salads, main courses, fish, meat, desserts, drinks... everything is up for grabs. And I'll share the stories of that food and that state and hopefully learn (and provide) a bit of insight into the history and culture of the U.S.
Now, I just need a name. Pans Across America? The United States of Food?
However it turns out, here's to another year of yummy goodness. :)
Now we're onto one of my favorite dinner pies! I remember growing up and painstakingly waiting for the individual frozen ones to cook in the oven (30 minutes?! Who are they kidding?) before diving in and scalding my mouth on the delicious chicken lava that erupted from this metal tin of goodness.
And then they introduced the microwavable ones, and it only took 5 minutes before joy was at my fingertips.
And then I ordered a chicken pot pie for dinner at Perkins right before a soccer game in high school and thought I was going to be sick as I ran around with 2,000 calories of chicken and cream and crust rolling around in my stomach.
And then it was back at Perkins two weeks ago that I saw a waitress carrying a pie to a nearby table and it dawned on me to cook up a chicken pot pie for myself!
Seriously, I LOVE the stuff. It's the perfect comfort food.
So I set to work on finding a recipe, this time learning from my mistakes on the last pie and reading the comments section for each recipe. I found one that looked great and got great reviews, and after tweaking the recipe a bit based on suggestions from the readers, I set to work.
It's a basic set of ingredients: crust, chicken, chicken stock, cream, flour, butter, onion, celery, carrots, peas, and garlic. I purchased a rotisserie chicken, rather than cook it up myself, and for a few good reasons. Rotisserie chickens are the most delicious time-saver ever. They're juicy and packed with flavor, so you don't have to worry about the chicken being too dry if you were to cook it yourself, and they're extraordinarily cost-efficient. I only used about 1/3 of the chicken in the pie!
Also, this time I decided to measure out all of the ingredients ahead of time and set them out in front of me. I completely get why cooking shows do this. I tend to be a frazzled cook, and I often overcook things as I scramble to mince the garlic I forgot about or sift the flour. With everything pre-chopped and pre-measured, baking this pie was smooth sailing!
Basically, you melt a shit-ton of butter in a pot, then sautee in the onions and garlic, add the flour, chicken stock, and cream and simmer that until it thickens. Then add in the veggies and chicken and pour the whole mixture into a crust. Put on the top crust, bake it, and voila! Chicken Pot Pie!
Holy pollo, it was awesome! Just as good as any pot pie I've had before, if not better. And it was so remarkably easy, I can't wait to try it again. I'll just have to remember to make twice as many pies next time... we gobbled this one up quick!
With the leftover chicken, stock, and veggies, I made a pot of chicken soup (look at me go!), which was also quite good, especially considering the only seasonings I had were garlic powder, salt, pepper, and oregano. And I still had leftover chicken! Seriously, rotisserie chickens are fantastic.
So anyway, that's that.
Now, in the last post I mentioned the possibility of a Laura/Paula project, which could've been cool had my boyfriend not come up with something that's roughly 1,486 times better.
Get this: Cooking Across the U.S.!!!
I'm going to spend next year cooking a dish (or a meal) from each of the 50 states! How cool is that? That way I either get 2 weeks off, or I use those 2 weeks for Thanksgiving and the 4th of July (U.S. holidays don't get more American than that).
But anyway, I'll cook by region and start up a new blog to get ideas from people across the country on what dishes I should cook. Appetizers, salads, main courses, fish, meat, desserts, drinks... everything is up for grabs. And I'll share the stories of that food and that state and hopefully learn (and provide) a bit of insight into the history and culture of the U.S.
Now, I just need a name. Pans Across America? The United States of Food?
However it turns out, here's to another year of yummy goodness. :)
Friday, April 23, 2010
The Laura/Paula Project?
I love Paula Deen.
If you've read this blog, you should be well aware of that. I watch her show just about every day after work, and everything she makes looks like buttery, creamy, thigh-expanding heaven.
It dawned on me the other day that Paula Deen is, in some senses, the Julia Child of our day. She really loves food and the comfort and joy behind it, and is never one to skimp on the ingredients that truly make it soar.
I've realized more and more just how much I love this style of cooking. I buy only whole milk for my baking, and often switch to cream if I think it'll make the recipe tastier. I'm the exact opposite of "light" recipes. And yes, my stomach, thighs, and hips are proof of this. For the most part, I'm okay with that.
I wish I could've counted the sticks of butter I've used in this pie project, because it's the ingredient I buy the most of. With pie, there's just no way around it. There's no such thing as a light pie... or there shouldn't be. Every single pie recipe calls for butter! And I love it!
So anyway, this Paula/Julia comparison got me thinking. My pie project ends in September, and I've been thinking about what next year's project will be. Crazy, I know. This project has been expensive enough... I don't know why I want to tack another year onto it! For the most part, my consensus has been to spend the next year improving on my favorite pies from this year. It wouldn't be as intensive as this project has been, and I won't have to make one a week if I don't want to, but I think it would be great to really get good at this.
But then a crazy idea popped into my head the other day, inspired by my reading of Julie and Julia. What if I started the Laura/Paula project? I could call it something else, of course (Operation Butter?), but what if I got one of Paula's cookbooks and tried to cook my way through it? Is that 100% insane?
Granted, Julia wrote one of the greatest cookbooks of all time. It's been revered for years as one of the classics, along with the Joy of Cooking. Paula, on the other hand, has numerous cookbooks with significantly fewer recipes. It would be a different sort of project.
But if I picked the right one, it could be kinda cool. Yes? No? Thoughts?
Anyway, I bring up Paula Deen because I made one of her pies. I saw it on her show and I'd been looking forward to it for weeks.
However, it was a downright fail.
:(
I couldn't even finish my slice! So I guess that's a pretty bad omen to Operation Butter, but I won't be daunted. Because this was PAULA'S fault! Not mine AT ALL!
Here's the scoop.
I decided to bake Paula's Key Lime Mousse Pie, which sounds absolutely devine, were it perfectly executed. It was full of my favorite things: cream cheese (3 sticks of it), key lime juice, white chocolate, and cream. Lots of cream.
I melted cream, key lime juice, and the white chocolate on the stove, and then added unflavored gelatin. I thought it was weird, but whatever. Paula knows best!
Except she didn't.
Here's where the pie went wrong. I'm copying this line from the recpie verbatum: Add 1 1/4 ounces (1 envelope) package unflavored gelatin. Okay, unflavored gelatin comes in 1/4 ounce packages. So even though the recipe said 1 envelope, it CLEARLY also stated 1 1/4 ounces. NOT one 1/4 ounce package. So I added 4 envelopes (the box only had 4... I didn't feel like buying more). FOUR.
Anyway, I finished the recipe and it was tasty and creamy and looked perfect. I poured it into the crust and froze it for 24 hours, as instructed. However, when I went to slice into the pie, it was hard as rock. Virtually impossible to cut, no matter how much I ran the knife through warm water.
I finally got a few slices plated, and holy cow, was it awful! It wasn't at all creamy like it was supposed to be... in fact, each bite kind of separated in my mouth and crumbled. It's hard to describe, but as Brianne put it, "My tongue doesn't want to touch it!"
Blech.
The lime flavor was barely there too... it basically tasted like curdled, frozen cream cheese. Horrible. We all threw our slices out and I began to investigate. I learned something from this... always read the comments on recipe sites! Not only do you get tips on how to improve recipes, you get comments on HOW THE RECIPE WAS WRONG AND IT'S TOTALLY NOT YOUR FAULT!!!
Apparently, Paula did in fact mean one 1/4 ounce (no "s") package. But she worded it so terribly, I didn't feel at all bad about screwing it up. And I wasn't the only one... quite a few people did the same thing.
Kristine tried to be optimistic and thought perhaps it would taste better if it were thawed a bit in the fridge. Wishful thinking. It's still awful.
3/4 of a pie was thrown out.
Tragic.
So anyway, now what do you think of Operation Butter?
If you've read this blog, you should be well aware of that. I watch her show just about every day after work, and everything she makes looks like buttery, creamy, thigh-expanding heaven.
It dawned on me the other day that Paula Deen is, in some senses, the Julia Child of our day. She really loves food and the comfort and joy behind it, and is never one to skimp on the ingredients that truly make it soar.
I've realized more and more just how much I love this style of cooking. I buy only whole milk for my baking, and often switch to cream if I think it'll make the recipe tastier. I'm the exact opposite of "light" recipes. And yes, my stomach, thighs, and hips are proof of this. For the most part, I'm okay with that.
I wish I could've counted the sticks of butter I've used in this pie project, because it's the ingredient I buy the most of. With pie, there's just no way around it. There's no such thing as a light pie... or there shouldn't be. Every single pie recipe calls for butter! And I love it!
So anyway, this Paula/Julia comparison got me thinking. My pie project ends in September, and I've been thinking about what next year's project will be. Crazy, I know. This project has been expensive enough... I don't know why I want to tack another year onto it! For the most part, my consensus has been to spend the next year improving on my favorite pies from this year. It wouldn't be as intensive as this project has been, and I won't have to make one a week if I don't want to, but I think it would be great to really get good at this.
But then a crazy idea popped into my head the other day, inspired by my reading of Julie and Julia. What if I started the Laura/Paula project? I could call it something else, of course (Operation Butter?), but what if I got one of Paula's cookbooks and tried to cook my way through it? Is that 100% insane?
Granted, Julia wrote one of the greatest cookbooks of all time. It's been revered for years as one of the classics, along with the Joy of Cooking. Paula, on the other hand, has numerous cookbooks with significantly fewer recipes. It would be a different sort of project.
But if I picked the right one, it could be kinda cool. Yes? No? Thoughts?
Anyway, I bring up Paula Deen because I made one of her pies. I saw it on her show and I'd been looking forward to it for weeks.
However, it was a downright fail.
:(
I couldn't even finish my slice! So I guess that's a pretty bad omen to Operation Butter, but I won't be daunted. Because this was PAULA'S fault! Not mine AT ALL!
Here's the scoop.
I decided to bake Paula's Key Lime Mousse Pie, which sounds absolutely devine, were it perfectly executed. It was full of my favorite things: cream cheese (3 sticks of it), key lime juice, white chocolate, and cream. Lots of cream.
I melted cream, key lime juice, and the white chocolate on the stove, and then added unflavored gelatin. I thought it was weird, but whatever. Paula knows best!
Except she didn't.
Here's where the pie went wrong. I'm copying this line from the recpie verbatum: Add 1 1/4 ounces (1 envelope) package unflavored gelatin. Okay, unflavored gelatin comes in 1/4 ounce packages. So even though the recipe said 1 envelope, it CLEARLY also stated 1 1/4 ounces. NOT one 1/4 ounce package. So I added 4 envelopes (the box only had 4... I didn't feel like buying more). FOUR.
Anyway, I finished the recipe and it was tasty and creamy and looked perfect. I poured it into the crust and froze it for 24 hours, as instructed. However, when I went to slice into the pie, it was hard as rock. Virtually impossible to cut, no matter how much I ran the knife through warm water.
I finally got a few slices plated, and holy cow, was it awful! It wasn't at all creamy like it was supposed to be... in fact, each bite kind of separated in my mouth and crumbled. It's hard to describe, but as Brianne put it, "My tongue doesn't want to touch it!"
Blech.
The lime flavor was barely there too... it basically tasted like curdled, frozen cream cheese. Horrible. We all threw our slices out and I began to investigate. I learned something from this... always read the comments on recipe sites! Not only do you get tips on how to improve recipes, you get comments on HOW THE RECIPE WAS WRONG AND IT'S TOTALLY NOT YOUR FAULT!!!
Apparently, Paula did in fact mean one 1/4 ounce (no "s") package. But she worded it so terribly, I didn't feel at all bad about screwing it up. And I wasn't the only one... quite a few people did the same thing.
Kristine tried to be optimistic and thought perhaps it would taste better if it were thawed a bit in the fridge. Wishful thinking. It's still awful.
3/4 of a pie was thrown out.
Tragic.
So anyway, now what do you think of Operation Butter?
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Pie is Champion
It's true, folks. In a polled competition, pie has won victory over cake! That's wonderful news for pie lovers like us, is it not?
Read the full article here: http://jezebel.com/5510811/pie-vs-cake-pie-is-champion
Friday, April 16, 2010
The things I've learned...
When it comes to pie baking, I'm learning a few things.
I've learned never to wear black when baking. Flour is remarkably annoying to get out of clothing. Sure, it seems easy at first, but there's always a spot missed somewhere.
I've learned that fruit should be thawed and as well drained as possible before it goes into a pie crust. Unless you want to be drinking fruit syrup from a straw as you eat your now soggy pie, get the juices out as best you can! Not that drinking fruit syrup isn't fun...
I've learned that when in doubt, it's always best to have extra ingredients at hand. At least 25% of the pies I've baked this year have been incredibly close calls, and some have even been disastrous because I was using up the last of the flour I had or the only can of sweetened condensed milk. Leaving little room for error is a fantastically stupid move.
I've learned that very few people will ever turn down a chocolate pie, but lemon is a much tougher sell. Or perhaps it's just my lemon pies that are so sketchy.
I've learned that pie should never be rushed. Far too often I've given myself less than the bare minimum amount of time needed to bake a good pie, and there's definitely a difference in quality. Even a good pie, if baked quickly, won't be great. To sound 100% cliche, it's the ones that are given extra patience and yes, love, that are the tastiest and most memorable.
I've learned that the right pie pan plays a huge role in the pie's outcome. I started this project with 1 pan, I now have 5 because of this.
I've learned that in many cases, the easier recipe is often just as good as the more intense ones. No need to attempt anything fancy, especially as an amateur. I've also learned that in many cases, it's okay to pick and choose from different recipes and combine them to create the pie you want.
I've learned that a pie is nothing, nothing without a good crust. It's absolutely essential. If the crust is bad, no matter how good the filling, it will go down as just an "okay" pie at best.
I've learned that pie is best shared. It's so cool to me that people have favorites and stories about the pie-tasting experience. That's what this is all about for me.
This list could go on for quite awhile, but here's one final tidbit (and lo and behold! It's also a segue into the pie!):
I've learned that I can't expect perfection the first time I make a pie. This is especially true with instructions like, "Over medium heat, cook and stir rapidly until chocolate melts and mixture thickens. Remove from heat." How thick? Who knows! How long should I cook it? No idea! Best of luck to you!
Way back in my first post, I mentioned the movie Waitress as one of my inspirations for this project. So I decided to pay homage to the movie by baking some of the pies Keri Russell makes. The first one being "Falling in Love Chocolate Mousse Pie."
The recipe seemed simple enough... a chocolate pudding made with sweetened condensed milk and water instead of regular milk combined with whipped cream and chilled in a pie crust. I set about making the pudding on the stovetop, and here's where the vague instructions came in.
I stirred until the pudding mixtures started to thicken, then removed it and let it chill for awhile. Not knowing how thick it should've been on the stove, I assumed (like the instructions said) that it would turn into pudding as it cooled. But no dice.
Nope, the mixture stayed soupy even after I folded the cream into it, and after cooling the sucker for 4 hours, it hadn't gotten any better. So into the freezer it went.
The frozen version of this pie is still pretty tasty, but has a slightly gritty texture. As Brianne put it though, it tasted just like a milkshake that had been re-frozen. So if you like re-frozen milkshakes, this is the pie for you!
I guess I still have some things to learn.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Some more of what? I haven't had anything yet, so how can I have some more of nothing?
For the past few weeks, I've been riding high, my friends. I've been baking new pies with new methods and different ingredients, and they've been coming out perfectly every time. I've been in pie heaven, making praise-worthy concoctions and feeling good (and maybe a little cocky) about my skills.
I was confidently chug-a-lugging along, whistling a merry tune (if only I could whistle), snapping my fingers (if only I could snap), and bopping along to a funky beat I like to call "pie-baker-extraordinaire."
Yup, life has been goooooood. Pie has been goooooood.
Until now.
My success must have angered someone somewhere, because last week I was knocked off of my high horse and flat onto my amateur deriere.
*sigh*
I once again had pie fail.
So last weekend I went to Chicago for the day to do some shopping, and there are a few stops that all trips to that glorious city require: Garrett's Popcorn (cheese popcorn that stains your fingers for days... it's to die for), Giordanno's Pizza, and the Hershey Store. The Hershey Store is a weird one to make the list, as it's a nationwide thing, but the store is so dang cute and the chocolate is so dang fresh that a stop in is an absolute must.
Luckily, I hit all three of the above delicious hot spots that day, and my inspiration for last week's pie came from the Hershey Store bakery (thankfully... can you imagine a cheesey popcorn pie? Gross.). I decided to attempt to make a S'more Pie, based on the delicious S'more Bar I had at the bakery.
The idea seemed easy enough: a graham cracker crust, a chocolate filling, and a marshmallow topping. This bad boy was going to be a piece of cake!
Now, I think there are two main reasons for the fail. One is that I tried to make things complicated with my filling. Rather than just make a thick ganache or pudding layer of chocolate, I opted for a complicated fudge pie recipe that involved roughly ten ingredients and a bit of baking. Not my wisest move. Apparently simple is better after all.
Well, the first problem might be directly related to the second problem. Where I shoved my laziness aside on the filling attempt and picked a more labor-intensive recipe, it came back in full force later, when I decided to bake the pie in my toaster oven rather than the conventional oven downstairs. One flight of stairs. Yes, I'm that lazy.
Basically what happened is the filling didn't set all the way through, but looked set from the top, so I threw some marshmallows, chocolate chips, and peanut butter chips on top and broiled it a bit, thinking it was fine. It then didn't have enough time to refrigerate, so when we finally bit into it, the filling poured out in a lukewarm, sloppy, raw goo. It was about as tasty as it sounds. Blech. Some of the filling also soaked into the crust, which made every component BUT the mallows kind of disgusting. Pretty much everyone agreed.
Well, except for Alison, who channeled her inner Joey Tribiani: "What's not to like? Crust: GOOD, Filling: GOOD, Marshmallows: GOOOOOOD!!!" I don't get it, but she seemed to thoroughly enjoy it.
For those of you who didn't get that reference, read here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0583482/quotes?qt0177651
So, now I know to follow one simple rule: K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Otherwise no one will want some more.
Except Alison.
I was confidently chug-a-lugging along, whistling a merry tune (if only I could whistle), snapping my fingers (if only I could snap), and bopping along to a funky beat I like to call "pie-baker-extraordinaire."
Yup, life has been goooooood. Pie has been goooooood.
Until now.
My success must have angered someone somewhere, because last week I was knocked off of my high horse and flat onto my amateur deriere.
*sigh*
I once again had pie fail.
So last weekend I went to Chicago for the day to do some shopping, and there are a few stops that all trips to that glorious city require: Garrett's Popcorn (cheese popcorn that stains your fingers for days... it's to die for), Giordanno's Pizza, and the Hershey Store. The Hershey Store is a weird one to make the list, as it's a nationwide thing, but the store is so dang cute and the chocolate is so dang fresh that a stop in is an absolute must.
Luckily, I hit all three of the above delicious hot spots that day, and my inspiration for last week's pie came from the Hershey Store bakery (thankfully... can you imagine a cheesey popcorn pie? Gross.). I decided to attempt to make a S'more Pie, based on the delicious S'more Bar I had at the bakery.
The idea seemed easy enough: a graham cracker crust, a chocolate filling, and a marshmallow topping. This bad boy was going to be a piece of cake!
Now, I think there are two main reasons for the fail. One is that I tried to make things complicated with my filling. Rather than just make a thick ganache or pudding layer of chocolate, I opted for a complicated fudge pie recipe that involved roughly ten ingredients and a bit of baking. Not my wisest move. Apparently simple is better after all.
Well, the first problem might be directly related to the second problem. Where I shoved my laziness aside on the filling attempt and picked a more labor-intensive recipe, it came back in full force later, when I decided to bake the pie in my toaster oven rather than the conventional oven downstairs. One flight of stairs. Yes, I'm that lazy.
Basically what happened is the filling didn't set all the way through, but looked set from the top, so I threw some marshmallows, chocolate chips, and peanut butter chips on top and broiled it a bit, thinking it was fine. It then didn't have enough time to refrigerate, so when we finally bit into it, the filling poured out in a lukewarm, sloppy, raw goo. It was about as tasty as it sounds. Blech. Some of the filling also soaked into the crust, which made every component BUT the mallows kind of disgusting. Pretty much everyone agreed.
Well, except for Alison, who channeled her inner Joey Tribiani: "What's not to like? Crust: GOOD, Filling: GOOD, Marshmallows: GOOOOOOD!!!" I don't get it, but she seemed to thoroughly enjoy it.
For those of you who didn't get that reference, read here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0583482/quotes?qt0177651
So, now I know to follow one simple rule: K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Otherwise no one will want some more.
Except Alison.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
"All you really need is love, but a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt."
Last week was a bad week.
My work computer got a virus and it took a week and a half to get fixed, so I spent all of that time without the files I needed to get stuff done and actually accomplish something more than cleaning my desk. It was horrible.
I dropped my cell phone in a sink full of water, and while just about everything is now fixed on it, the microphone doesn't work, so I can't call out. A bit of a problem. I now have a bluetooth earpiece, so I'm officially one of those weirdos who looks like she's talking to herself in public. It's not a perfect system, but it's cheaper than a new phone, so I'm learning to deal.
Without a phone last week, getting in touch with people to do anything turned out to be absolute chaos. I had to have other people call the people I needed to get in touch with and have other people give me rides. It was irritating.
I was possibly going to get a new car, but the deal fell through. This happened three days before my car, Wall*E, died. I had to push him into a parking lot. Urgh.
I tried to print 20 pictures at Walmart, which took me 45 minutes to order, and then what I thought was "next day" printing turned out to be "you have to wait for 6 days, sucker" printing.
So all of that, on top of a whole bunch of little things that went wrong that I won't get into on such a public forum, meant for a ridiculously awful week.
Well, until I found out I get to keep my job for another year!!! It's been a little chaotic trying to figure it out, and it's been stressing me out for quite some time, so a weight was lifted right off my shoulders when I got that news :)
But anyway, what's the best way to cure a bad mood? Just about every woman I know will attest to this...
CHOCOLATE!!!
I decided chocolate pie was an absolute must last week, so on Saturday, I whipped up a little diddy that I'm calling "Death by Chocolate Treat Pie." Sound delicious? It was.
So my friend Alison makes this dessert called "chocolate treat," and it's basically chocolate cake, but less cake-like and more brownie-like. It's also smothered in chocolate chips... it's one of the best things I've ever eaten.
Well, I decided I needed to turn this into a pie somehow. After brainstorming ways to use cake mix in a pie, I came up with my own solution that was an absolute WIN.
Death by Chocolate Treat Pie is this: Oreo crust, chocolate cheesecake (which I made earlier this year), a layer of chocolate ganache, and topped with chocolate treat, all baked into my springform pan.
Say it with me... nom nom nom!!!
It was incredible. Not as overwhelmingly rich as I expected it to be, but it was gooey and creamy and chocolate-y... perfectly perfect, basically. And served with some homemade whipped cream? Wowza, it's a definite favorite.
Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
:)
And yes, Death by Chocolate Treat Pie made just about everything better. Lucy Van Pelt, you were quite right.
My work computer got a virus and it took a week and a half to get fixed, so I spent all of that time without the files I needed to get stuff done and actually accomplish something more than cleaning my desk. It was horrible.
I dropped my cell phone in a sink full of water, and while just about everything is now fixed on it, the microphone doesn't work, so I can't call out. A bit of a problem. I now have a bluetooth earpiece, so I'm officially one of those weirdos who looks like she's talking to herself in public. It's not a perfect system, but it's cheaper than a new phone, so I'm learning to deal.
Without a phone last week, getting in touch with people to do anything turned out to be absolute chaos. I had to have other people call the people I needed to get in touch with and have other people give me rides. It was irritating.
I was possibly going to get a new car, but the deal fell through. This happened three days before my car, Wall*E, died. I had to push him into a parking lot. Urgh.
I tried to print 20 pictures at Walmart, which took me 45 minutes to order, and then what I thought was "next day" printing turned out to be "you have to wait for 6 days, sucker" printing.
So all of that, on top of a whole bunch of little things that went wrong that I won't get into on such a public forum, meant for a ridiculously awful week.
Well, until I found out I get to keep my job for another year!!! It's been a little chaotic trying to figure it out, and it's been stressing me out for quite some time, so a weight was lifted right off my shoulders when I got that news :)
But anyway, what's the best way to cure a bad mood? Just about every woman I know will attest to this...
CHOCOLATE!!!
I decided chocolate pie was an absolute must last week, so on Saturday, I whipped up a little diddy that I'm calling "Death by Chocolate Treat Pie." Sound delicious? It was.
So my friend Alison makes this dessert called "chocolate treat," and it's basically chocolate cake, but less cake-like and more brownie-like. It's also smothered in chocolate chips... it's one of the best things I've ever eaten.
Well, I decided I needed to turn this into a pie somehow. After brainstorming ways to use cake mix in a pie, I came up with my own solution that was an absolute WIN.
Death by Chocolate Treat Pie is this: Oreo crust, chocolate cheesecake (which I made earlier this year), a layer of chocolate ganache, and topped with chocolate treat, all baked into my springform pan.
Say it with me... nom nom nom!!!
It was incredible. Not as overwhelmingly rich as I expected it to be, but it was gooey and creamy and chocolate-y... perfectly perfect, basically. And served with some homemade whipped cream? Wowza, it's a definite favorite.
Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
:)
And yes, Death by Chocolate Treat Pie made just about everything better. Lucy Van Pelt, you were quite right.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
A Culinary Trip Around the World
Folks, we're traversing the globe with this post! In the last two weeks, I've made 4 pies from 4 different cultures! Represent! I whipped up an Apple Pie (the good 'ole USofA), a Pizza Pie-a (say it with an Italian accent), Shepherd's Pie (top 'o the mornin' to ya, Ireland!), and Banoffee Pie (yes, that's what it's called... crazy Brits).
So, let's start our global trek!
For my boyfriend's birthday a few weeks ago, I made an apple pie, and it turned out SO much better than the first one I made. Apart from a pool of juice in the bottom, it was damn near perfect. I'm ridiculously proud of that pie... it was super full (so it looked awesome) and packed with flavor. Yum, yum, yum! I could go on and on... the crust was flaky and golden, the apples were cooked just right... it. was. awesome!
But as that was a "special" pie, I had to make another that week, so I decided on pizzas! Totally counts as a pie, by the way. A bit of a background on this... growing up, for all of our family gatherings (on my dad's side), we would meet up at Fricano's Pizza Parlor in Grand Haven, Michigan (sometimes we ordered it to go and ate it elsewhere, but it was always Fricano's). The owners of Fricano's are old family friends (my dad used to work there too... I think. Right? Wrong? Someone help me out there), but even if they weren't, I think Fricano's still would've been the place to go. The pizza is amazing.
The original location is in an old house that's been converted into the restaurant, and to get a table, you wait on the steps outside... most nights the line wraps way down the steps and onto the sidewalk. It's a pretty simple pizza place... they have one size and one type of crust: thin. I'm not usually a thin crust person, but this is so, so, so good. It's so hard to describe just how fantastic a Fricano's pizza is... it's all greasy and messy, but so packed with fresh flavors that it's insanely easy to lose count of how many slices you eat (as in, I could easily eat a whole pizza. Not that I have...).
Well, the Fricano's being old friends and all, my dad has the recipe and we've been making pizzas that way since I was a kid. Way back in my 2nd post, I told you about our pie making days growing up. Well, we did the same thing for pizza days, and we would make a huge batch of them to freeze and enjoy for a few weeks. I always volunteered to be in charge of either the cheese, mushrooms, or pepperoni, as I was a sneaky little foodie and loved to swipe samples as we baked.
I've been dying to make these pizzas as part of my project for months now, so I called up my dad to get the dough recipe and set to work!
My boyfriend and I made 4 pizzas: pepperoni, mushroom, ham and pineapple, and pepperoni and ham. As it was a Lenten Friday, we ate the mushroom one that night and the ham and pineapple the next. I still have the other 2 in my freezer.
Unfortunately, I didn't roll the dough thin enough, so that wound up being the dominating flavor :( Otherwise, though, they were quite scrumptious! I think mine tasted a bit healthier than they were supposed to... the dough was too thick to let the grease soak all the way through! Haha. I could've added more sauce, but these aren't supposed to be super saucy pizzas, so the dough was really the big issue there. Oh well, it was my first attempt at baking something I've been eating my entire life, and it wasn't a failure, so I'm pretty proud of that!
As last week was St. Patrick's Day, I made a Shepherd's pie! Again, this was a "special" pie, since I already made a version of this in January, but I wanted to give it another go and hopefully improve on the previous recipe. If you remember, I complained that there was a lack of flavor in the meat last time, which I attributed to a lack of gravy, so this time around I looked up a gravy recipe and set to work.
I've never made a homemade gravy before, and I don't know if I ever will again! I made it WAY too thick, and had a lot of trouble trying to thin it out, so I just mixed it in as is with the meat mixture and let it bake.
It came out looking beautiful and tasted pretty good (my fellow taste testers absolutely raved about it), but the "gravy" (if you can call brown goop gravy) didn't add as much flavor as I would've liked, so it was a bit too bland for my liking. Next time, I think I'll try more spices or something. Hmmm...
And finally, Banoffee Pie! I don't have much to complain about here... this is an AWESOME pie. Definitely going on the pie shop list. Yes, I'm creating a list. It's not very long right now, but it'll grow as I work on improving my previous endeavors.
Anyway, banoffee pie is a British recipe (so thanks to the boyfriend for this one), and the weird name is a contraction of banana toffee pie. I found three recipes for this, all of which varied slightly but featured really similar concepts. So I stole my favorite parts of each of them and created my own ultimate recipe! Sounds a bit crazy, but when you hear how simple this pie is, you'll get it.
Well, I say "simple," because it's a really basic idea and consists of few ingredients, but the sucker took about 4 1/2 hours to actually make... only because I chose the easiest methods of baking from each recipe. More time consuming, but easier :)
So I first made a graham cracker crust in my springform pan (which I adore), and I discovered when shopping for graham crackers that Keebler sells boxes of graham cracker crumbs! I don't see this as cheating... I still make my own crust, but I just cut out the process of smashing the crackers with a rolling pin. Genius, Keebler, genius.
So then I had to make the toffee. I always thought of this as a complex process (like all candy is), but it was about the easiest damn thing ever! All I did was take 2 cans of sweetened condensed milk, put them in a pot of water, and boil them for 3 hours! Hence, the time consuming pie-making process. But open the cans after they've boiled, and voila! The milk has magically transformed into a caramel-colored toffee!
That went on top of the crust, followed by a layer of bananas, and topped with homemade whipped cream. I sprinkled some cocoa powder over the top and after a few hours in the fridge, the pie was done!
Apart from being delicious (the flavors mesh well and are actually pretty light), this was also the most perfect-looking pie I've made so far! When I took the springform pan apart, you could see each individual layer, and it sliced in perfect wedges. I was SO proud of that! Three cheers for sprinform!
Alrighty, I think all of my typing has probably burned your retinas by now, so I'm out!
So, let's start our global trek!
For my boyfriend's birthday a few weeks ago, I made an apple pie, and it turned out SO much better than the first one I made. Apart from a pool of juice in the bottom, it was damn near perfect. I'm ridiculously proud of that pie... it was super full (so it looked awesome) and packed with flavor. Yum, yum, yum! I could go on and on... the crust was flaky and golden, the apples were cooked just right... it. was. awesome!
But as that was a "special" pie, I had to make another that week, so I decided on pizzas! Totally counts as a pie, by the way. A bit of a background on this... growing up, for all of our family gatherings (on my dad's side), we would meet up at Fricano's Pizza Parlor in Grand Haven, Michigan (sometimes we ordered it to go and ate it elsewhere, but it was always Fricano's). The owners of Fricano's are old family friends (my dad used to work there too... I think. Right? Wrong? Someone help me out there), but even if they weren't, I think Fricano's still would've been the place to go. The pizza is amazing.
The original location is in an old house that's been converted into the restaurant, and to get a table, you wait on the steps outside... most nights the line wraps way down the steps and onto the sidewalk. It's a pretty simple pizza place... they have one size and one type of crust: thin. I'm not usually a thin crust person, but this is so, so, so good. It's so hard to describe just how fantastic a Fricano's pizza is... it's all greasy and messy, but so packed with fresh flavors that it's insanely easy to lose count of how many slices you eat (as in, I could easily eat a whole pizza. Not that I have...).
Well, the Fricano's being old friends and all, my dad has the recipe and we've been making pizzas that way since I was a kid. Way back in my 2nd post, I told you about our pie making days growing up. Well, we did the same thing for pizza days, and we would make a huge batch of them to freeze and enjoy for a few weeks. I always volunteered to be in charge of either the cheese, mushrooms, or pepperoni, as I was a sneaky little foodie and loved to swipe samples as we baked.
I've been dying to make these pizzas as part of my project for months now, so I called up my dad to get the dough recipe and set to work!
My boyfriend and I made 4 pizzas: pepperoni, mushroom, ham and pineapple, and pepperoni and ham. As it was a Lenten Friday, we ate the mushroom one that night and the ham and pineapple the next. I still have the other 2 in my freezer.
Unfortunately, I didn't roll the dough thin enough, so that wound up being the dominating flavor :( Otherwise, though, they were quite scrumptious! I think mine tasted a bit healthier than they were supposed to... the dough was too thick to let the grease soak all the way through! Haha. I could've added more sauce, but these aren't supposed to be super saucy pizzas, so the dough was really the big issue there. Oh well, it was my first attempt at baking something I've been eating my entire life, and it wasn't a failure, so I'm pretty proud of that!
As last week was St. Patrick's Day, I made a Shepherd's pie! Again, this was a "special" pie, since I already made a version of this in January, but I wanted to give it another go and hopefully improve on the previous recipe. If you remember, I complained that there was a lack of flavor in the meat last time, which I attributed to a lack of gravy, so this time around I looked up a gravy recipe and set to work.
I've never made a homemade gravy before, and I don't know if I ever will again! I made it WAY too thick, and had a lot of trouble trying to thin it out, so I just mixed it in as is with the meat mixture and let it bake.
It came out looking beautiful and tasted pretty good (my fellow taste testers absolutely raved about it), but the "gravy" (if you can call brown goop gravy) didn't add as much flavor as I would've liked, so it was a bit too bland for my liking. Next time, I think I'll try more spices or something. Hmmm...
And finally, Banoffee Pie! I don't have much to complain about here... this is an AWESOME pie. Definitely going on the pie shop list. Yes, I'm creating a list. It's not very long right now, but it'll grow as I work on improving my previous endeavors.
Anyway, banoffee pie is a British recipe (so thanks to the boyfriend for this one), and the weird name is a contraction of banana toffee pie. I found three recipes for this, all of which varied slightly but featured really similar concepts. So I stole my favorite parts of each of them and created my own ultimate recipe! Sounds a bit crazy, but when you hear how simple this pie is, you'll get it.
Well, I say "simple," because it's a really basic idea and consists of few ingredients, but the sucker took about 4 1/2 hours to actually make... only because I chose the easiest methods of baking from each recipe. More time consuming, but easier :)
So I first made a graham cracker crust in my springform pan (which I adore), and I discovered when shopping for graham crackers that Keebler sells boxes of graham cracker crumbs! I don't see this as cheating... I still make my own crust, but I just cut out the process of smashing the crackers with a rolling pin. Genius, Keebler, genius.
So then I had to make the toffee. I always thought of this as a complex process (like all candy is), but it was about the easiest damn thing ever! All I did was take 2 cans of sweetened condensed milk, put them in a pot of water, and boil them for 3 hours! Hence, the time consuming pie-making process. But open the cans after they've boiled, and voila! The milk has magically transformed into a caramel-colored toffee!
That went on top of the crust, followed by a layer of bananas, and topped with homemade whipped cream. I sprinkled some cocoa powder over the top and after a few hours in the fridge, the pie was done!
Apart from being delicious (the flavors mesh well and are actually pretty light), this was also the most perfect-looking pie I've made so far! When I took the springform pan apart, you could see each individual layer, and it sliced in perfect wedges. I was SO proud of that! Three cheers for sprinform!
Alrighty, I think all of my typing has probably burned your retinas by now, so I'm out!
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Happy 3.14 Day!!!
I don't have an update ready just yet, but I wanted to take the time to celebrate!
HAPPY PI DAY!!!
Enjoy the day! Eat pie!
:)
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
The First Annual Pie Slicies
Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the First Annual Pie Slicies! In honor of the halfway point of my pie project (6 months! Holy cow!), and in the spirit of the Academy Awards, I have a few awards to present to my pies. I suppose I could say a few words on what this pie project has meant for me so far and reflect back on the experiment as a whole, but I think awards are more fun. Consider this a short acceptance speech.
So, without further ado, the Pie Slicies!
Best First Pie: Apple Pie
Best Pie in a Profile Picture: White Chocolate Strawberry Pie
Best Reason to Invent a Time Machine so I Can Punch the Shakers in the Face: Shaker Lemon Pie
Best Pie that Represents America's Stomping of Canada at the Olympics: Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie (aka the pie that was "like eating Canada")
Best Excuse to Add More Chocolate to My Life: Chocolate Cheesecake
Best Pie that's Actually a Cookie with Fruit: Caramel Apple Dessert Pizza
Best Fruit Pie: Blackberry Apple Pie
Best Lattice-Topped Pie: Blueberry Raspberry Pie
Best Cheesecake: Chocolate Chip Cheesecake
Best Example of Pie Fail: Lemon Cheese Pie
Best Pie that Came From a Non-Pie Lover: Banana Pudding Pie
Best Pie that Shouldn't Have Worked But Somehow Did: Chocolate Pecan Pie (aka Twice-Baked Pecan Pie)
Best Way to Eat Your Daily Serving of Nuts When You're Actually Eating Pure Sugar: Pecan Pie
Best Reason to Have an Actual Recipe Rather than Improvising: Caramel Apple Cheesecake
Best Pie With My Initials: Lemon Meringue
Best Christmas Pie Invention: Peppermint Patty Pie
Best Christmas Morning Breakfast Pie: Broccoli and Ham Quiche
Best Meat Pie: Shepherd's Pie
Best Reason to Just Throw Out Ruined Meringue Rather than Attempt to Save it: Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans with a Meringue Topping
Best Name for a Pie, Even if it's No the Real Name and I Just Invented it Because it Sounds Cool: Pink Lady Pie (aka Pink Lemonade Pie)... also Orange Creamsicle Pie
Best Non-Cheesecake that Totally Tasted like Cheesecake: Key Lime Pie
Best Perkin's Knock-Off: Peanut Butter Pie
Best Pie Made in an Apple-Shaped Pie Pan: Chicken Taco Pie
Best Pie to Make When Sick and Unable to Do Anything but Throw Ice Cream in a Crust: Snickers Ice Cream Pie
Best Example of Why Martha Stewart Can't Be Trusted (and Should Also be Punched in the Face): Chocolate Ganache Tart
Best On-a-Whim Pie Invention (also Best Reason to Shop When Hungry): I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls Pie
Best Excuse to Make Chili and Still Count it as a Pie: Walking Taco Pie
So! There you have it! Every pie I've made so far! I mean, I've made duplicates of a few of these, but thus far I've baked 27 different recipes... kind of crazy/cool!
And tonight, in honor of this momentous anniversary, and more importantly in celebration of my boyfriend's birthday, I'm baking Apple Pie... the first pie I ever made :)
Okay, so a write-up of that last award there. Last week I decided to try out an invention that Jerry came up with... Walking Taco Pie. In case you don't know what it is, a walking taco is a snack/meal that's frequently sold at sporting events for its simplicity and genius. You take a small bag of Frito's (or jumbo bag, if you're really hungry or want to make it "family style"), open it, and pour a scoop of chili over the top, and then finish it off with cheese and sour cream (or whatever chili toppings tickle your fancy). You then eat and enjoy, whilst getting your fingers all kinds of messy. Ah well, c'est la vie when you eat sloppy foods in public!
So turning this into a pie was definitely a challenge, and it took me awhile to think of how exactly to do it. I knew I wanted a Frito's crust, but just pouring chili on top of that seemed a bit ridiculous to me... that's not a pie, it's just chili and smashed Frito's, and that would be unfair to the pie quest.
Instead, with Jerry's suggestion, I made a Frito crust (which didn't hold its shape nearly as well as graham crackers do, but oh well) and then poured on top a cornbread batter which I had added some chili to (homemade chili... woot woot!). The chili was meatless, as it was a Friday, but still tasty. I then baked the mixture in the new springform pan that I bought at Ikea last weekend (I also got a super cute apron and pastry brush along with some other things, and I got to see my lovely siblings, which is a win!).
Well, when I sliced it to serve, the Frito crust kind of crumbled, so we put the slices in bowls and added chili on top. So basically, it was cornbread and chili, but it was baked like a pie, so it totally counts! The experiment wasn't as successful as I had hoped... the crust was pretty darn awful (baking the Frito's burnt them), but the chili and cornbread were both tasty!
So anyway, it wasn't a win, but it wasn't a total fail... and besides, I had chili for the last few days for lunch, and I can't really complain about that :)
Well, that's about all I have I think! Apple pie tonight and then pizza pies this week! Hooray!
So, without further ado, the Pie Slicies!
Best First Pie: Apple Pie
Best Pie in a Profile Picture: White Chocolate Strawberry Pie
Best Reason to Invent a Time Machine so I Can Punch the Shakers in the Face: Shaker Lemon Pie
Best Pie that Represents America's Stomping of Canada at the Olympics: Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie (aka the pie that was "like eating Canada")
Best Excuse to Add More Chocolate to My Life: Chocolate Cheesecake
Best Pie that's Actually a Cookie with Fruit: Caramel Apple Dessert Pizza
Best Fruit Pie: Blackberry Apple Pie
Best Lattice-Topped Pie: Blueberry Raspberry Pie
Best Cheesecake: Chocolate Chip Cheesecake
Best Example of Pie Fail: Lemon Cheese Pie
Best Pie that Came From a Non-Pie Lover: Banana Pudding Pie
Best Pie that Shouldn't Have Worked But Somehow Did: Chocolate Pecan Pie (aka Twice-Baked Pecan Pie)
Best Way to Eat Your Daily Serving of Nuts When You're Actually Eating Pure Sugar: Pecan Pie
Best Reason to Have an Actual Recipe Rather than Improvising: Caramel Apple Cheesecake
Best Pie With My Initials: Lemon Meringue
Best Christmas Pie Invention: Peppermint Patty Pie
Best Christmas Morning Breakfast Pie: Broccoli and Ham Quiche
Best Meat Pie: Shepherd's Pie
Best Reason to Just Throw Out Ruined Meringue Rather than Attempt to Save it: Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans with a Meringue Topping
Best Name for a Pie, Even if it's No the Real Name and I Just Invented it Because it Sounds Cool: Pink Lady Pie (aka Pink Lemonade Pie)... also Orange Creamsicle Pie
Best Non-Cheesecake that Totally Tasted like Cheesecake: Key Lime Pie
Best Perkin's Knock-Off: Peanut Butter Pie
Best Pie Made in an Apple-Shaped Pie Pan: Chicken Taco Pie
Best Pie to Make When Sick and Unable to Do Anything but Throw Ice Cream in a Crust: Snickers Ice Cream Pie
Best Example of Why Martha Stewart Can't Be Trusted (and Should Also be Punched in the Face): Chocolate Ganache Tart
Best On-a-Whim Pie Invention (also Best Reason to Shop When Hungry): I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls Pie
Best Excuse to Make Chili and Still Count it as a Pie: Walking Taco Pie
So! There you have it! Every pie I've made so far! I mean, I've made duplicates of a few of these, but thus far I've baked 27 different recipes... kind of crazy/cool!
And tonight, in honor of this momentous anniversary, and more importantly in celebration of my boyfriend's birthday, I'm baking Apple Pie... the first pie I ever made :)
Okay, so a write-up of that last award there. Last week I decided to try out an invention that Jerry came up with... Walking Taco Pie. In case you don't know what it is, a walking taco is a snack/meal that's frequently sold at sporting events for its simplicity and genius. You take a small bag of Frito's (or jumbo bag, if you're really hungry or want to make it "family style"), open it, and pour a scoop of chili over the top, and then finish it off with cheese and sour cream (or whatever chili toppings tickle your fancy). You then eat and enjoy, whilst getting your fingers all kinds of messy. Ah well, c'est la vie when you eat sloppy foods in public!
So turning this into a pie was definitely a challenge, and it took me awhile to think of how exactly to do it. I knew I wanted a Frito's crust, but just pouring chili on top of that seemed a bit ridiculous to me... that's not a pie, it's just chili and smashed Frito's, and that would be unfair to the pie quest.
Instead, with Jerry's suggestion, I made a Frito crust (which didn't hold its shape nearly as well as graham crackers do, but oh well) and then poured on top a cornbread batter which I had added some chili to (homemade chili... woot woot!). The chili was meatless, as it was a Friday, but still tasty. I then baked the mixture in the new springform pan that I bought at Ikea last weekend (I also got a super cute apron and pastry brush along with some other things, and I got to see my lovely siblings, which is a win!).
Well, when I sliced it to serve, the Frito crust kind of crumbled, so we put the slices in bowls and added chili on top. So basically, it was cornbread and chili, but it was baked like a pie, so it totally counts! The experiment wasn't as successful as I had hoped... the crust was pretty darn awful (baking the Frito's burnt them), but the chili and cornbread were both tasty!
So anyway, it wasn't a win, but it wasn't a total fail... and besides, I had chili for the last few days for lunch, and I can't really complain about that :)
Well, that's about all I have I think! Apple pie tonight and then pizza pies this week! Hooray!
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Yum and Yuck, Yin and Yang
So back when I was in 5th grade, the 4th graders at my elementary school put on a Christmas play, and we all piled into the gym to watch the antics of a family coming together for the holidays. I don't remember the details of the play (other than it dealt with just about every "crazy relatives are packed into one house" stereotype that one normally associates with Christmas), but there was one part that was particularly poignant for me and continues to stick out in my memory to this day.
Two brothers were sitting on a couch arguing over what to watch on TV -- one wanted football, the other It's a Wonderful Life. They dramatically yanked the remote back and forth in the epic holiday-TV showdown, before their younger sister waltzed in and announced that she had the perfect show to watch.
The stage lights dimmed and the spotlight was on this little girl as she stood center stage and belted out the following three words (I only wish I could describe the tune... it's lovely):
"Martha! Martha Stewart!"
It was hilariously awesome, mostly because few of my fellow 5th graders cared about who Martha Stewart was and the joke therefore fell somewhat flat on them, but NOT ME! Oh, no sir! I, at the ripe young age of 10, was a bonafide Martha Stewart junkie (this was pre-insider trading scandal)... I watched her show rigorously in search of great recipes and phenomenal crafting tricks to one day try out (unfortunately, my parents didn't quite get on board with her recomendation of wrapping each individual Christmas tree branch in lights, but I tried).
I've always loved cooking shows (I watched 8 hours of the Food Network when I was home sick last week), and Martha Stewart was my idol. I worshiped the East Hamptons air she breathed and the perfectly manicured grass she walked on.
Until, of course, she was sent to "jail". At that exact moment, Martha was potting soil to me. I saw her for the lying snob she is, and my "I want to be her" attitude turned into absolute loathing and a disgusted scoff every time I hear her name.
So at the start of this project, I declared that I wanted only recipes with a story, and none that could be found on marthastewart.com. And so far, I've done pretty well with that.
However, I tell you all of this because this past Saturday, I caved. I made a Martha Stewart pie.
I debated, I struggled, but in the end this was the perfect pie for what I needed (or so I thought).
As you're aware, Valentine's Day was almost two weeks ago, but my boyfriend was at a conference that weekend, so we celebrated Fake-Valentine's Day last Friday. We went out to dinner (which was lovely), swapped gifts (I got him the super awesome movie Black Dynamite... be impressed), and had an all-around awesome day.
Well, I also had another gift for him... a super adorable-looking Valentine's pie, courtesy of Martha Stewart's magazine. It was on the cover, so it had to be good, right?!
Wrong.
I spent 6 hours (SIX!) baking the sucker, which was a Chocolate Ganache Tart in a heart-shaped pan with cutesy meringue hearts all over the top. The crust was a chocolate pastry crust, which didn't roll out as Ms. Stewart claimed it would, so I wound up throwing the whole lump in my pan and smushing it out with my fingers... not a good start.
I baked the crust, and -- wait, let it be known that part of the subsequent problems with the pie were partially my fault... my pie pan was actually a cake pan in this case, and the baking times (I discovered later) were different, so I overbaked it. Anyway, I baked the crust and moved on to the meringue.
I was supposed to put the meringue mixture (combined with different food colorings) in a piping bag and make small hearts to bake and then set atop the pie. My "piping bag" was a spoon and a bowl (yes, I failed again) and my "hearts" were polka dots. Urgh. Martha's pies were clearly not meant for those of us inexperienced bakers who can't afford her fancy shmancy baking tools.
Moving on... the filling was a bittersweet chocolate ganache, and knowing my past experiences with the bitterness of bittersweet chocolate, I knew I should've swapped some out for semi-sweet, but I was trying to stay with the recipe, so I went ahead and did as instructed.
The pie was baked again, the meringue dots were added, and voila! I had a Valentine's Day pie!
I wish I had pictures, but alas, those will have to come later, because it's quite hilarious (I snapped a pic of my pie alongside the one of hers, and it's easy to see who's the pro and who's the one in the midst of a mildly stressful pie project). To give it to you straight, Martha Stewart is fully deserving of all of my spite and anger. To quote Julie Powell in Julie & Julia, "the bitch lied."
The pie was, in my opinion, awful. The crust was so dry, dust flew out of my mouth when I coughed, and the filling was far too bitter for my taste. I hated it. The boyfriend claimed it was awesome, but that's just a sign of how sweet he is. Because seriously? HORRIBLE! One of the worst I've made so far.
So to be somewhat crass, suck it, Martha.
I'm back to being spiteful. And this means I need recipes! So... send some! Please!
The day after the aforementioned terrible-ness, I went grocery shopping (as I had pancakes multiple meals in a row, since they were the only food I had in my apartment), and I made the grave mistake of going shopping while hungry. Oops. I picked up a rather random variety of goods, including stuff for chili dogs and tuna noodle casserole. Ridiculous.
I also picked up roll of cinnamon rolls, and on the drive home realized that cinnamon rolls are a rather idiotic purchase when you live by yourself, as you either have to bake all of them or risk them getting weird after storing them.
Luckily, however, Brianne and Kristine came up with the most genius usage ever for my dilemma, and a new pie invention was born!
We called it "I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls" Pie, and the recipe was as follows: cinnamon rolls baked as the bottom crust, then topped with baked cinnamon apples and topped off with a drizzling of icing.
Spell it with me: G-E-N-I-U-S! How awesome does that sound?! Yeah, yeah, you know your mouth just watered a bit. Don't deny it.
So anywho, I took the cinnamon rolls and smushed them into a ball which I then rolled out and baked in a pie pan. They baked up a bit wonky, so I wound up having to smush them down with a spoon to even out the base crust. The apples on top were perfect (I made them "French style", meaning I threw a stick of butter in a skillet along with five sliced apples and a hearty dose of cinnamon and sugar and baked them until soft), and the icing oozed down into the mixture.
Apart from the "crust" being a bit dough-y, this pie was HEAVEN. This was the exact opposite of the "Martha Pie"... for every complaint I had about that one, I had a praise to sing about this one.
The only change I plan to make in the future (because, yes, I will be baking this again, and again, and again) is with the crust. I want to try out a few different methods... coiling the cinnamon rolls into one giant roll and baking it or baking the rolls as is but really close together are the two that I've come up with so far. Given practice, though, I'll perfect it. It deserves to be perfected. Oh yes, it does. Yum.
The scores for I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls Pie:
Appearance: 17/20
Taste: 22/25
Crust: 17/20
Filling: 19/20
Originality: 15.2/15 (Brianne gave it bonus points here)
Total: 90.2/100
Comments
The Good:
"The apples looked perfect!"
"This pie was awesome."
The In-Between:
"A better fitting pie pan and keeping the rolls rolled would make it perfect."
On the crust: "Could improve and have more crisp."
The Bad:
"It was a little thin... needs more apples!"
"The crust was a bit chewy/doughy."
Alrighty, so that's all I have for you for now, so have a lovely rest of the weekend and I'll catch you soon :)
Two brothers were sitting on a couch arguing over what to watch on TV -- one wanted football, the other It's a Wonderful Life. They dramatically yanked the remote back and forth in the epic holiday-TV showdown, before their younger sister waltzed in and announced that she had the perfect show to watch.
The stage lights dimmed and the spotlight was on this little girl as she stood center stage and belted out the following three words (I only wish I could describe the tune... it's lovely):
"Martha! Martha Stewart!"
It was hilariously awesome, mostly because few of my fellow 5th graders cared about who Martha Stewart was and the joke therefore fell somewhat flat on them, but NOT ME! Oh, no sir! I, at the ripe young age of 10, was a bonafide Martha Stewart junkie (this was pre-insider trading scandal)... I watched her show rigorously in search of great recipes and phenomenal crafting tricks to one day try out (unfortunately, my parents didn't quite get on board with her recomendation of wrapping each individual Christmas tree branch in lights, but I tried).
I've always loved cooking shows (I watched 8 hours of the Food Network when I was home sick last week), and Martha Stewart was my idol. I worshiped the East Hamptons air she breathed and the perfectly manicured grass she walked on.
Until, of course, she was sent to "jail". At that exact moment, Martha was potting soil to me. I saw her for the lying snob she is, and my "I want to be her" attitude turned into absolute loathing and a disgusted scoff every time I hear her name.
So at the start of this project, I declared that I wanted only recipes with a story, and none that could be found on marthastewart.com. And so far, I've done pretty well with that.
However, I tell you all of this because this past Saturday, I caved. I made a Martha Stewart pie.
I debated, I struggled, but in the end this was the perfect pie for what I needed (or so I thought).
As you're aware, Valentine's Day was almost two weeks ago, but my boyfriend was at a conference that weekend, so we celebrated Fake-Valentine's Day last Friday. We went out to dinner (which was lovely), swapped gifts (I got him the super awesome movie Black Dynamite... be impressed), and had an all-around awesome day.
Well, I also had another gift for him... a super adorable-looking Valentine's pie, courtesy of Martha Stewart's magazine. It was on the cover, so it had to be good, right?!
Wrong.
I spent 6 hours (SIX!) baking the sucker, which was a Chocolate Ganache Tart in a heart-shaped pan with cutesy meringue hearts all over the top. The crust was a chocolate pastry crust, which didn't roll out as Ms. Stewart claimed it would, so I wound up throwing the whole lump in my pan and smushing it out with my fingers... not a good start.
I baked the crust, and -- wait, let it be known that part of the subsequent problems with the pie were partially my fault... my pie pan was actually a cake pan in this case, and the baking times (I discovered later) were different, so I overbaked it. Anyway, I baked the crust and moved on to the meringue.
I was supposed to put the meringue mixture (combined with different food colorings) in a piping bag and make small hearts to bake and then set atop the pie. My "piping bag" was a spoon and a bowl (yes, I failed again) and my "hearts" were polka dots. Urgh. Martha's pies were clearly not meant for those of us inexperienced bakers who can't afford her fancy shmancy baking tools.
Moving on... the filling was a bittersweet chocolate ganache, and knowing my past experiences with the bitterness of bittersweet chocolate, I knew I should've swapped some out for semi-sweet, but I was trying to stay with the recipe, so I went ahead and did as instructed.
The pie was baked again, the meringue dots were added, and voila! I had a Valentine's Day pie!
I wish I had pictures, but alas, those will have to come later, because it's quite hilarious (I snapped a pic of my pie alongside the one of hers, and it's easy to see who's the pro and who's the one in the midst of a mildly stressful pie project). To give it to you straight, Martha Stewart is fully deserving of all of my spite and anger. To quote Julie Powell in Julie & Julia, "the bitch lied."
The pie was, in my opinion, awful. The crust was so dry, dust flew out of my mouth when I coughed, and the filling was far too bitter for my taste. I hated it. The boyfriend claimed it was awesome, but that's just a sign of how sweet he is. Because seriously? HORRIBLE! One of the worst I've made so far.
So to be somewhat crass, suck it, Martha.
I'm back to being spiteful. And this means I need recipes! So... send some! Please!
The day after the aforementioned terrible-ness, I went grocery shopping (as I had pancakes multiple meals in a row, since they were the only food I had in my apartment), and I made the grave mistake of going shopping while hungry. Oops. I picked up a rather random variety of goods, including stuff for chili dogs and tuna noodle casserole. Ridiculous.
I also picked up roll of cinnamon rolls, and on the drive home realized that cinnamon rolls are a rather idiotic purchase when you live by yourself, as you either have to bake all of them or risk them getting weird after storing them.
Luckily, however, Brianne and Kristine came up with the most genius usage ever for my dilemma, and a new pie invention was born!
We called it "I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls" Pie, and the recipe was as follows: cinnamon rolls baked as the bottom crust, then topped with baked cinnamon apples and topped off with a drizzling of icing.
Spell it with me: G-E-N-I-U-S! How awesome does that sound?! Yeah, yeah, you know your mouth just watered a bit. Don't deny it.
So anywho, I took the cinnamon rolls and smushed them into a ball which I then rolled out and baked in a pie pan. They baked up a bit wonky, so I wound up having to smush them down with a spoon to even out the base crust. The apples on top were perfect (I made them "French style", meaning I threw a stick of butter in a skillet along with five sliced apples and a hearty dose of cinnamon and sugar and baked them until soft), and the icing oozed down into the mixture.
Apart from the "crust" being a bit dough-y, this pie was HEAVEN. This was the exact opposite of the "Martha Pie"... for every complaint I had about that one, I had a praise to sing about this one.
The only change I plan to make in the future (because, yes, I will be baking this again, and again, and again) is with the crust. I want to try out a few different methods... coiling the cinnamon rolls into one giant roll and baking it or baking the rolls as is but really close together are the two that I've come up with so far. Given practice, though, I'll perfect it. It deserves to be perfected. Oh yes, it does. Yum.
The scores for I Was Craving Cinnamon Rolls Pie:
Appearance: 17/20
Taste: 22/25
Crust: 17/20
Filling: 19/20
Originality: 15.2/15 (Brianne gave it bonus points here)
Total: 90.2/100
Comments
The Good:
"The apples looked perfect!"
"This pie was awesome."
The In-Between:
"A better fitting pie pan and keeping the rolls rolled would make it perfect."
On the crust: "Could improve and have more crisp."
The Bad:
"It was a little thin... needs more apples!"
"The crust was a bit chewy/doughy."
Alrighty, so that's all I have for you for now, so have a lovely rest of the weekend and I'll catch you soon :)
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
A Lenten Promise
So it's been almost two weeks since my last post, but I've only made one pie... I still have a few days in this week to get one done (don't worry, I haven't missed a week yet). So for the first time in awhile, you'll get a relatively short post. Yay? I don't know if that's a good or bad thing.
Anyway, while I've been really good about baking a pie every week, I haven't been as good about updating this here blog. Part of the reason for that is my laziness, part is that I don't feel like people are really reading it, and part is that I get busy and then negligent.
Well, I was talking to my dad the other day and he asked about the blog and why I've been so bad about keeping it up-to-date. I mentioned the above reasons, expecting that to be enough of an excuse... of course, it wasn't. My dad reminded me that writing for other people wasn't the reason I started this blog in the first place -- I decided to keep track of my pie-venture for myself. The Year of Pie was created because I wanted to write. Without school papers pushing me, I have nothing to motivate me to practice writing -- something I really, really, really love to do. This blog was supposed to take the place of my professors' deadlines and be a means for me to write, and write well, since people were going to read it.
I was supposed to use this blog to record the stories, the frustrations, the excitement, and all of the little moments that are part of this grand project, so that I would have something to reflect upon when it's all over. Each recipe has a story and the baking of each pie has a story, and by not updating my blog, I'm neglecting to remember them.
So more than letting you down, I've let myself down. This project isn't everything it was meant to be. Baking pies can be difficult work, but spending a few hours once a week throwing something in the oven isn't making me a better person. It's not really helping me to improve upon myself and discover new things. Sure, I'm learning proper ways to make a meringue and how to sculpt the perfect crust, but that's not really changing me for the better.
Besides, as my dad also pointed out, I complain that people don't read, but they aren't reading because I'm not giving them a reason to. By going a month between updates, people are going to stop checking back to see if there's anything new.
Yes, I'm aware that whole above section was somewhat angsty and possibly an over-share, but I'm trying to put some real heart into this blog, and I want to share this weird journey with you... so deal with it :)
So, on this Ash Wednesday evening, the start of Lent, I've decided (along with giving up french fries and credit cards) to make sure I update my blog each and every week. I've set an alarm on my calendar and everything. I'm declaring that my promise, here and now. Cross my heart.
For those who do still read this, onto the PIE!!!
Last week's pie was Snickers Ice Cream Pie. I snagged this recipe from my sister, Sarah, although I made a few variations on it for my liking.
First of all, a brief update as part of the pie story. So last Thursday evening, I had a minor headache and a teensy-bit of a sore throat. I went to bed not thinking much of it (and not taking anything for it... I really hate taking medication, even if it's just aspirin), and woke up the next morning feeling achy. Nothing over-the-top, but just enough to contemplate calling in sick.
I got ready for work, with this achy feeling coming and going in waves, and headed off, as I had a presentation to give that morning. I gave my boss a heads up before the presentation that I wasn't feeling so hot, and I headed back out the door. I gave the presentation, which went well, and then went back to the office. It wasn't a far walk, but I was incredibly winded by the time I got back. Bad sign.
I walked in the door and almost immediately I was told to go home... apparently I wasn't looking so great. Actually, I found out later that I was pretty pale... another bad sign. So I took my first sick day and went back to bed, still feeling only minorly ill (I felt that taking the day off was more preventative than anything). I rested up for the day and by that night, it had gotten much worse.
As you should be aware, unless you're living under a box, and even then you should be aware, The Olympics started on Friday!!!!!! I'm a die-hard Olympics fan... I can't think or talk of anything but the antics of Apolo Ohno, Shaun White, and any other Olympian that graces NBC from 7:00 onward. It gets a little ridiculous... I usually even go through a post-Olympics bout of depression afterwards. Nothing serious, mind you, but it's the same gloomy feeling anyone gets after saying goodbye to something they won't see for a long, long time.
Anyway, so I geared up to watch the Opening Ceremonies, and got as excited as I could whilst feeling like I could be sick at any moment. I was achy all over, it hurt to swallow, my head was pounding, and about every 20 minutes I experienced waves of nausea. No bueno.
Well, I'm a dork (as many of you know), and I tend to clap when I get excited. The Olympics are therefore cause for me to clap... A LOT. And every time I clapped during the Ceremonies, my hands would tense up in extreme pain. That's how achy my joints were. Ugh.
So Saturday rolled around and while I was still pretty sickly, I needed to make a pie, so I picked one of the easiest ones I had... this Snickers Ice Cream Pie. I justify the simplicity of it by the above 6 paragraphs. I was sick, I was crabby, and I wasn't in the mood for elaborate baking.
The recipe called for an Oreo crust, and Walmart was out of those, so I purchased a graham cracker one. Yes, I did. Woe-is-me, remember? I then made up for the lack of chocolate in the crust by squirting chocolate and caramel sauce into the bottom before adding a mixture of chocolate and vanilla ice cream and chopped up snickers. The whole goopy mess was thrown back in the freezer to solidify.
It was the perfect pie for the state I was in. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it... and how could I not? Some of the greatest ingredients went into that sucker! I could've gotten more creative, sure, but it was just what the doctor ordered (the doctor being me in this case, since I don't go to doctors for the flu). Yu-um!
Okay, this entry isn't going to be as short as I promised... I have a few more stories to share.
So I was pretty much patched up by Sunday (although now I'm feeling sick again... ack!), and in honor of Paczki Day yesterday (also known as Fat Tuesday), I whipped up a batch of Polish paczkis! For those who don't know, paczkis are a donut-esque dessert... slightly heavier than the average Krispy Kream, covered in powdered sugar (or glaze), and often filled with jelly. We make them every year and deliver them to our relatives... it's a tradition I grew up with and really missed in my four years of college. Ours aren't jelly-filled, though; we add the jelly as we eat them.
Well, I decided, for the first time ever, to make my own paczkis this year! I called home and my mom read the recipe off of the age-old notecard my dad had it written down on, and then I set to work. After mixing all of the ingredients listed, I stared down not into a bowl of thick dough, but into a bowl of runny soup. What went wrong? My dad didn't write to add flour on the recipe... that's just something he knows to do.
I had a minor freak-out, as a batch requires almost 8 cups when all is said and done, and I only had 6, but I managed to borrow the rest. Phew! After fixing the problem, the soup was transformed into dough! Hooray!
Jumping to the end, the paczkis weren't as round, fluffy, and delicious as my dad's are... mine were flat, hard, and only good after being microwaved. The problem? I realized I didn't let the dough rise enough before rolling it out, and then I rolled it out too thin, so when they were fried, they didn't puff up like they're supposed to. Urgh.
Still, I can say that I made them! For the first time! I made my great-grandma's paczki's! Hooray! That's all I need to be a happy girl.
Well, that, and good pancakes... I made the perfect stack last night, for the first time EVER! They were all round, the same size, and golden brown. So I stacked them up, put a pat of butter on top, and drizzled syrup over to (of course) snap a picture for proof. And then I threw the butter out. Ha.
I'm rather proud of myself, to say the least!
And I'm going to continue to share joyous moments like that as I consistently update my blog from here on out! Huzzah!!!!
Okay, pictures coming (hopefully) soon. :)
Anyway, while I've been really good about baking a pie every week, I haven't been as good about updating this here blog. Part of the reason for that is my laziness, part is that I don't feel like people are really reading it, and part is that I get busy and then negligent.
Well, I was talking to my dad the other day and he asked about the blog and why I've been so bad about keeping it up-to-date. I mentioned the above reasons, expecting that to be enough of an excuse... of course, it wasn't. My dad reminded me that writing for other people wasn't the reason I started this blog in the first place -- I decided to keep track of my pie-venture for myself. The Year of Pie was created because I wanted to write. Without school papers pushing me, I have nothing to motivate me to practice writing -- something I really, really, really love to do. This blog was supposed to take the place of my professors' deadlines and be a means for me to write, and write well, since people were going to read it.
I was supposed to use this blog to record the stories, the frustrations, the excitement, and all of the little moments that are part of this grand project, so that I would have something to reflect upon when it's all over. Each recipe has a story and the baking of each pie has a story, and by not updating my blog, I'm neglecting to remember them.
So more than letting you down, I've let myself down. This project isn't everything it was meant to be. Baking pies can be difficult work, but spending a few hours once a week throwing something in the oven isn't making me a better person. It's not really helping me to improve upon myself and discover new things. Sure, I'm learning proper ways to make a meringue and how to sculpt the perfect crust, but that's not really changing me for the better.
Besides, as my dad also pointed out, I complain that people don't read, but they aren't reading because I'm not giving them a reason to. By going a month between updates, people are going to stop checking back to see if there's anything new.
Yes, I'm aware that whole above section was somewhat angsty and possibly an over-share, but I'm trying to put some real heart into this blog, and I want to share this weird journey with you... so deal with it :)
So, on this Ash Wednesday evening, the start of Lent, I've decided (along with giving up french fries and credit cards) to make sure I update my blog each and every week. I've set an alarm on my calendar and everything. I'm declaring that my promise, here and now. Cross my heart.
For those who do still read this, onto the PIE!!!
Last week's pie was Snickers Ice Cream Pie. I snagged this recipe from my sister, Sarah, although I made a few variations on it for my liking.
First of all, a brief update as part of the pie story. So last Thursday evening, I had a minor headache and a teensy-bit of a sore throat. I went to bed not thinking much of it (and not taking anything for it... I really hate taking medication, even if it's just aspirin), and woke up the next morning feeling achy. Nothing over-the-top, but just enough to contemplate calling in sick.
I got ready for work, with this achy feeling coming and going in waves, and headed off, as I had a presentation to give that morning. I gave my boss a heads up before the presentation that I wasn't feeling so hot, and I headed back out the door. I gave the presentation, which went well, and then went back to the office. It wasn't a far walk, but I was incredibly winded by the time I got back. Bad sign.
I walked in the door and almost immediately I was told to go home... apparently I wasn't looking so great. Actually, I found out later that I was pretty pale... another bad sign. So I took my first sick day and went back to bed, still feeling only minorly ill (I felt that taking the day off was more preventative than anything). I rested up for the day and by that night, it had gotten much worse.
As you should be aware, unless you're living under a box, and even then you should be aware, The Olympics started on Friday!!!!!! I'm a die-hard Olympics fan... I can't think or talk of anything but the antics of Apolo Ohno, Shaun White, and any other Olympian that graces NBC from 7:00 onward. It gets a little ridiculous... I usually even go through a post-Olympics bout of depression afterwards. Nothing serious, mind you, but it's the same gloomy feeling anyone gets after saying goodbye to something they won't see for a long, long time.
Anyway, so I geared up to watch the Opening Ceremonies, and got as excited as I could whilst feeling like I could be sick at any moment. I was achy all over, it hurt to swallow, my head was pounding, and about every 20 minutes I experienced waves of nausea. No bueno.
Well, I'm a dork (as many of you know), and I tend to clap when I get excited. The Olympics are therefore cause for me to clap... A LOT. And every time I clapped during the Ceremonies, my hands would tense up in extreme pain. That's how achy my joints were. Ugh.
So Saturday rolled around and while I was still pretty sickly, I needed to make a pie, so I picked one of the easiest ones I had... this Snickers Ice Cream Pie. I justify the simplicity of it by the above 6 paragraphs. I was sick, I was crabby, and I wasn't in the mood for elaborate baking.
The recipe called for an Oreo crust, and Walmart was out of those, so I purchased a graham cracker one. Yes, I did. Woe-is-me, remember? I then made up for the lack of chocolate in the crust by squirting chocolate and caramel sauce into the bottom before adding a mixture of chocolate and vanilla ice cream and chopped up snickers. The whole goopy mess was thrown back in the freezer to solidify.
It was the perfect pie for the state I was in. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it... and how could I not? Some of the greatest ingredients went into that sucker! I could've gotten more creative, sure, but it was just what the doctor ordered (the doctor being me in this case, since I don't go to doctors for the flu). Yu-um!
Okay, this entry isn't going to be as short as I promised... I have a few more stories to share.
So I was pretty much patched up by Sunday (although now I'm feeling sick again... ack!), and in honor of Paczki Day yesterday (also known as Fat Tuesday), I whipped up a batch of Polish paczkis! For those who don't know, paczkis are a donut-esque dessert... slightly heavier than the average Krispy Kream, covered in powdered sugar (or glaze), and often filled with jelly. We make them every year and deliver them to our relatives... it's a tradition I grew up with and really missed in my four years of college. Ours aren't jelly-filled, though; we add the jelly as we eat them.
Well, I decided, for the first time ever, to make my own paczkis this year! I called home and my mom read the recipe off of the age-old notecard my dad had it written down on, and then I set to work. After mixing all of the ingredients listed, I stared down not into a bowl of thick dough, but into a bowl of runny soup. What went wrong? My dad didn't write to add flour on the recipe... that's just something he knows to do.
I had a minor freak-out, as a batch requires almost 8 cups when all is said and done, and I only had 6, but I managed to borrow the rest. Phew! After fixing the problem, the soup was transformed into dough! Hooray!
Jumping to the end, the paczkis weren't as round, fluffy, and delicious as my dad's are... mine were flat, hard, and only good after being microwaved. The problem? I realized I didn't let the dough rise enough before rolling it out, and then I rolled it out too thin, so when they were fried, they didn't puff up like they're supposed to. Urgh.
Still, I can say that I made them! For the first time! I made my great-grandma's paczki's! Hooray! That's all I need to be a happy girl.
Well, that, and good pancakes... I made the perfect stack last night, for the first time EVER! They were all round, the same size, and golden brown. So I stacked them up, put a pat of butter on top, and drizzled syrup over to (of course) snap a picture for proof. And then I threw the butter out. Ha.
I'm rather proud of myself, to say the least!
And I'm going to continue to share joyous moments like that as I consistently update my blog from here on out! Huzzah!!!!
Okay, pictures coming (hopefully) soon. :)
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Of Pink Ladies and Yellow Pies
So does anyone else out there still have issues writing 2010 as the year? I always think it looks weird to just write "10" at the end of the date. Also, I'm usually writing the previous year down until, oh, about May-ish. *sigh*
Well anyway, I'm sorry for only posting one entry in January! Time is a-flyin'! Also, as a hint, a few comments might motivate me to update more :) Just saying...
I have 4 new pies to update you on, so let's get cracking!
So shortly after my last entry, I took off for the great state of Arkansas to lead a Habitat for Humanity trip. It was a phenomenal week... we had a great group (I can't sing their praises enough. They were no-fuss, "what can I do next?" kind of people... basically, a dream group!), we accomplished a lot, and got that amazing feeling that comes after knowing you've just done something great for someone else. I love that feeling!
So while in Arkansas (which, by the way, is a gorgeous state... who knew?), I was having all sorts of pie anxiety. We left on a Sunday and got back on a Saturday (aka my pie week), and I didn't know if I'd be able to make one down there or have to scramble to make one late Saturday night. Seriously, I was panicking... this is the ONE rule I just don't mess with!
Well, we were staying in a house for the week, but even then I wasn't sure of what I would have in terms of necessary baking equipment. And what kind of pie would I make?
The group was really excited when they heard about my year of pie, and we spent a few days trying to come up with something that I could make up (as I forgot my recipe book... also, I don't have all that many recipes left, so send some please!!!). Figuring I would do this on our last night, I was wracking my brain for ideas, still stressing a tiny bit, when everything fell into place on Wednesday night.
We were invited to the home of one of the Habitat board members for dinner, and we were served up some lovely down-home Southern hospitality, along with a side of charm and a nice helping of gratitude (which we returned). The actual food was also wonderful, and we ate ourselves silly. And then dessert rolled around.
We were offered two different pies: an oreo ice cream pie and the one I chose, Pink Lemonade Pie (which I then accidentally called Pink Lady Pie... I think I like my name better). It was heaven. Slightly tart but with a creamy, smooth filling, it was the perfect palate-cleanser -- not too heavy, but just satisfying enough to consider another slice. I was absolutely in love with this pie, so I mentioned my project to our fabulous hostess, and she happily gave me the recipe! Pie crisis solved!
It was just about the easiest thing ever... sweetened condensed milk mixed with cool whip and half a can of frozen pink lemonade all whipped together and frozen in a graham cracker pie crust. Easy peasy! So that night I ran out to the store and picked up the ingredients, swapping orange juice for the pink lemonade, making this... Orange Creamsicle Pie!!! Win.
The downside was that I purchased an already made graham cracker crust... I just didn't have the tools to make my own. I felt like a slight failure for this, but I justified it by saying that I was at least making a pie that week! That was tough enough to do!
It was phenomenal, the only downside being I forgot to put it in the fridge after it set in the freezer... it was a bit, well, frozen, whereas the Pink Lady Pie was silkier. Ah well, it was still tasty.
So then, let's see... the next week's pie was one I've been dying to try for quite some time -- Key Lime Pie. I got the recipe from my sister Sarah and brother-in-law Jerry, who went to the Florida Keys for their honeymoon a few months back. The one souvenir I asked for was a recipe while they were there (and maybe some key limes if they could manage it... otherwise I would just be making lime pie. Walmart's produce section isn't quite equipped for such exotic things as key limes.). And they delivered! Not only did they get me a recipe (apparently every restaurant in the Keys uses the same recipe), they also got me a bottle of key lime juice! Double win!
So I decided to bake the pie in my Paula Deen dish... once again forgetting its size and therefore stupidly purchasing only one can of sweetened condensed milk. I don't understand how I continue to fail at this. Urgh.
Anyway, I made the crust, mixed up the ingredients, and juuuuuust as I was about to pour the batter into the crust I thought "Hmm... I don't think Key Lime Pie is supposed to be yellow. This looks weird." I put the bowl down and re-checked the recipe and lo and behold, I was supposed to add egg whites, not eggs. Whoopsidaisy!
Irritated at my mistake, I sprinted back to the store to pick up more of the milk I needed (this time remembering to grab 2), then whipped up another batch. The upside to my mistake? I got to actually double the recipe. The downside? I used 3/4 of my lime juice. Dang.
So the recipe said to bake the pie for 8 minutes, but since I doubled it, I figured it should go in longer. 25 minutes later (!), the pie finally looked set enough to take out of the oven. I sat and checked the dang thing every five minutes, but it looked too liquidy to be a decent pie until the 25 minute mark. Having never baked this kind of pie, I didn't really know if what it was supposed to look like as it came out of the oven, and the recipe was rather vague.
Well anyway, we ate the pie once it cooled, and it had a really heavy cheesecake-esque consistency that I quite liked, but I think it was overcooked for what the pie is supposed to be like. The lime flavor was really light, and while it seemed a bit off, overall I really liked it and hope to try it again sometime soon (this time in the smaller pan that the recipe calls for).
Halfway through! Deep breath! And... onto the next pie!
So last week was my friend Lydia's birthday, and I made her the pie she requested, which was Peanut Butter Pie. Yes, I've done variations on this before, but this was a new recipe that I kind of invented and was really excited to try out. I've mentioned once or twice that it's one of my goals for this year to recreate Perkins' peanut butter pie (which is HEAVEN), and this was the closest I've come thus far.
I found three separate recipes for chocolate ganache, peanut butter mousse, and homemade whipped cream, and then I set to work! On a crust, I layered the aforementioned ingredients (which I sampled quite a bit in the mixing process... shhhhh) and topped it off with a lovely garnish of chocolate shavings. Okay, really I forgot to pick up mini-Reese's cups, so chocolate it was!
The pie was quite tasty overall, although I used bittersweet chocolate instead of semisweet for the ganache, so that part was not as on-the-money as I would have liked. Also, the consistency of the whipped cream wasn't as thick as Perkin's, but still, it was a rather delicious pie! And I can't wait to give it another shot... also to let it set longer (I hate making pies mid-week, because they usually have less than 2 hours to set, which doesn't allow the mousse or other fillings to firm up as much as they should). The things one learns...
Finally, pie number 4 (sorry!) was a meat pie (again, recipes are running low... let's fix this, folks!). Actually, it was Chicken Taco Pie, to be exact, and I got the recipe from Jerry's mom, Irma. The recipe was super easy overall... shredded chicken, onion, and taco seasoning baked in a pie pan with bisquick mix, eggs, and milk, and topped with cheese. Can we say yum? It was pretty darn great overall (served with salsa and sour cream) and I know now to double this recipe, as most of us wanted seconds. I want to mess with spices a bit if I try it again, though, since I think it could've used an extra kick. Otherwise, I loved it!
I also have to let you know that I baked this pie in my apple-shaped pie pan. Why? Because I'm lazy. I was hesitant to share this story, as I don't want to be judged (and I will), but since it relates to the pie, I feel I must. So I'm a terrible housekeeper... living on my own, I tend to put off cleaning until it's absolutely necessary. I'm not a complete slob by any means, but vacuuming and putting away clothes aren't usually my top priorities when I get home from work (Vegging out in front of the Food Network while reading Entertainment Weekly are.).
And since I own a LOT of dishes (seriously, way more than one person needs), I tend to just keep using new plates and mugs and pans and let the sink get fuller and fuller and fuller. It's gross, I know! But in my defense, washing the dishes is my absolute least favorite chore. Always has been. Always will be.
So basically I was out of clean dishes when it came time to bake this pie (to give you an idea, the key lime and peanut butter pie pans were dirty in the sink), hence the apple dish. Also my random measurements (my measuring cups were also dirty).
Don't worry your pretty little head though, I finally washed my dishes on Monday. I had to empty the dishwater 3 times and filled up my dish rack 4 times, but they're clean! For now.
Judge away, you know you want to.
Okay, so a few final things before I wrap this up. First of all, sorry for the lack of pictures... I'm hoping that later this week I can post an entry that's pictures-only. Some of these pies have turned out rather beautifully, and I want to show them off, but in the interest of getting the blog posted ASAP (and taking into account how remarkably slow my computer at home is), this is text only. My sincerest apologies.
Also, I want your thoughts on this... I have a Barnes and Noble gift card (!!!!!!!), and I've been trying to decide what to buy. There are a lot of great novels out there that I'm interested in, and I can get 3 of the ones I really want on my card. OR, I just found a "Pie Bible" on their website, and it has everything one could possibly know about pie... recipes, tips, crusts, garnishes, EVERYTHING. But it's a bit pricier, so that would be the only book I could afford. What do I do?!
And last, but certainly not least, I would like to throw a special shoutout to Mrs. Salisbury! It means so much to me that you read this and I'm so sorry it took me so long to update!!!
Keep on keepin' on, folks! And Happy Super Bowl Weekend! Also, Happy Birthday, Dad!!!
Well anyway, I'm sorry for only posting one entry in January! Time is a-flyin'! Also, as a hint, a few comments might motivate me to update more :) Just saying...
I have 4 new pies to update you on, so let's get cracking!
So shortly after my last entry, I took off for the great state of Arkansas to lead a Habitat for Humanity trip. It was a phenomenal week... we had a great group (I can't sing their praises enough. They were no-fuss, "what can I do next?" kind of people... basically, a dream group!), we accomplished a lot, and got that amazing feeling that comes after knowing you've just done something great for someone else. I love that feeling!
So while in Arkansas (which, by the way, is a gorgeous state... who knew?), I was having all sorts of pie anxiety. We left on a Sunday and got back on a Saturday (aka my pie week), and I didn't know if I'd be able to make one down there or have to scramble to make one late Saturday night. Seriously, I was panicking... this is the ONE rule I just don't mess with!
Well, we were staying in a house for the week, but even then I wasn't sure of what I would have in terms of necessary baking equipment. And what kind of pie would I make?
The group was really excited when they heard about my year of pie, and we spent a few days trying to come up with something that I could make up (as I forgot my recipe book... also, I don't have all that many recipes left, so send some please!!!). Figuring I would do this on our last night, I was wracking my brain for ideas, still stressing a tiny bit, when everything fell into place on Wednesday night.
We were invited to the home of one of the Habitat board members for dinner, and we were served up some lovely down-home Southern hospitality, along with a side of charm and a nice helping of gratitude (which we returned). The actual food was also wonderful, and we ate ourselves silly. And then dessert rolled around.
We were offered two different pies: an oreo ice cream pie and the one I chose, Pink Lemonade Pie (which I then accidentally called Pink Lady Pie... I think I like my name better). It was heaven. Slightly tart but with a creamy, smooth filling, it was the perfect palate-cleanser -- not too heavy, but just satisfying enough to consider another slice. I was absolutely in love with this pie, so I mentioned my project to our fabulous hostess, and she happily gave me the recipe! Pie crisis solved!
It was just about the easiest thing ever... sweetened condensed milk mixed with cool whip and half a can of frozen pink lemonade all whipped together and frozen in a graham cracker pie crust. Easy peasy! So that night I ran out to the store and picked up the ingredients, swapping orange juice for the pink lemonade, making this... Orange Creamsicle Pie!!! Win.
The downside was that I purchased an already made graham cracker crust... I just didn't have the tools to make my own. I felt like a slight failure for this, but I justified it by saying that I was at least making a pie that week! That was tough enough to do!
It was phenomenal, the only downside being I forgot to put it in the fridge after it set in the freezer... it was a bit, well, frozen, whereas the Pink Lady Pie was silkier. Ah well, it was still tasty.
So then, let's see... the next week's pie was one I've been dying to try for quite some time -- Key Lime Pie. I got the recipe from my sister Sarah and brother-in-law Jerry, who went to the Florida Keys for their honeymoon a few months back. The one souvenir I asked for was a recipe while they were there (and maybe some key limes if they could manage it... otherwise I would just be making lime pie. Walmart's produce section isn't quite equipped for such exotic things as key limes.). And they delivered! Not only did they get me a recipe (apparently every restaurant in the Keys uses the same recipe), they also got me a bottle of key lime juice! Double win!
So I decided to bake the pie in my Paula Deen dish... once again forgetting its size and therefore stupidly purchasing only one can of sweetened condensed milk. I don't understand how I continue to fail at this. Urgh.
Anyway, I made the crust, mixed up the ingredients, and juuuuuust as I was about to pour the batter into the crust I thought "Hmm... I don't think Key Lime Pie is supposed to be yellow. This looks weird." I put the bowl down and re-checked the recipe and lo and behold, I was supposed to add egg whites, not eggs. Whoopsidaisy!
Irritated at my mistake, I sprinted back to the store to pick up more of the milk I needed (this time remembering to grab 2), then whipped up another batch. The upside to my mistake? I got to actually double the recipe. The downside? I used 3/4 of my lime juice. Dang.
So the recipe said to bake the pie for 8 minutes, but since I doubled it, I figured it should go in longer. 25 minutes later (!), the pie finally looked set enough to take out of the oven. I sat and checked the dang thing every five minutes, but it looked too liquidy to be a decent pie until the 25 minute mark. Having never baked this kind of pie, I didn't really know if what it was supposed to look like as it came out of the oven, and the recipe was rather vague.
Well anyway, we ate the pie once it cooled, and it had a really heavy cheesecake-esque consistency that I quite liked, but I think it was overcooked for what the pie is supposed to be like. The lime flavor was really light, and while it seemed a bit off, overall I really liked it and hope to try it again sometime soon (this time in the smaller pan that the recipe calls for).
Halfway through! Deep breath! And... onto the next pie!
So last week was my friend Lydia's birthday, and I made her the pie she requested, which was Peanut Butter Pie. Yes, I've done variations on this before, but this was a new recipe that I kind of invented and was really excited to try out. I've mentioned once or twice that it's one of my goals for this year to recreate Perkins' peanut butter pie (which is HEAVEN), and this was the closest I've come thus far.
I found three separate recipes for chocolate ganache, peanut butter mousse, and homemade whipped cream, and then I set to work! On a crust, I layered the aforementioned ingredients (which I sampled quite a bit in the mixing process... shhhhh) and topped it off with a lovely garnish of chocolate shavings. Okay, really I forgot to pick up mini-Reese's cups, so chocolate it was!
The pie was quite tasty overall, although I used bittersweet chocolate instead of semisweet for the ganache, so that part was not as on-the-money as I would have liked. Also, the consistency of the whipped cream wasn't as thick as Perkin's, but still, it was a rather delicious pie! And I can't wait to give it another shot... also to let it set longer (I hate making pies mid-week, because they usually have less than 2 hours to set, which doesn't allow the mousse or other fillings to firm up as much as they should). The things one learns...
Finally, pie number 4 (sorry!) was a meat pie (again, recipes are running low... let's fix this, folks!). Actually, it was Chicken Taco Pie, to be exact, and I got the recipe from Jerry's mom, Irma. The recipe was super easy overall... shredded chicken, onion, and taco seasoning baked in a pie pan with bisquick mix, eggs, and milk, and topped with cheese. Can we say yum? It was pretty darn great overall (served with salsa and sour cream) and I know now to double this recipe, as most of us wanted seconds. I want to mess with spices a bit if I try it again, though, since I think it could've used an extra kick. Otherwise, I loved it!
I also have to let you know that I baked this pie in my apple-shaped pie pan. Why? Because I'm lazy. I was hesitant to share this story, as I don't want to be judged (and I will), but since it relates to the pie, I feel I must. So I'm a terrible housekeeper... living on my own, I tend to put off cleaning until it's absolutely necessary. I'm not a complete slob by any means, but vacuuming and putting away clothes aren't usually my top priorities when I get home from work (Vegging out in front of the Food Network while reading Entertainment Weekly are.).
And since I own a LOT of dishes (seriously, way more than one person needs), I tend to just keep using new plates and mugs and pans and let the sink get fuller and fuller and fuller. It's gross, I know! But in my defense, washing the dishes is my absolute least favorite chore. Always has been. Always will be.
So basically I was out of clean dishes when it came time to bake this pie (to give you an idea, the key lime and peanut butter pie pans were dirty in the sink), hence the apple dish. Also my random measurements (my measuring cups were also dirty).
Don't worry your pretty little head though, I finally washed my dishes on Monday. I had to empty the dishwater 3 times and filled up my dish rack 4 times, but they're clean! For now.
Judge away, you know you want to.
Okay, so a few final things before I wrap this up. First of all, sorry for the lack of pictures... I'm hoping that later this week I can post an entry that's pictures-only. Some of these pies have turned out rather beautifully, and I want to show them off, but in the interest of getting the blog posted ASAP (and taking into account how remarkably slow my computer at home is), this is text only. My sincerest apologies.
Also, I want your thoughts on this... I have a Barnes and Noble gift card (!!!!!!!), and I've been trying to decide what to buy. There are a lot of great novels out there that I'm interested in, and I can get 3 of the ones I really want on my card. OR, I just found a "Pie Bible" on their website, and it has everything one could possibly know about pie... recipes, tips, crusts, garnishes, EVERYTHING. But it's a bit pricier, so that would be the only book I could afford. What do I do?!
And last, but certainly not least, I would like to throw a special shoutout to Mrs. Salisbury! It means so much to me that you read this and I'm so sorry it took me so long to update!!!
Keep on keepin' on, folks! And Happy Super Bowl Weekend! Also, Happy Birthday, Dad!!!
Saturday, January 9, 2010
New Year, New Decade, New Pies, No New Creative Title.
Well Happy New Year everyone! Welcome to 2010! Also, I'm 1/3 of the way through this pie project! How crazy is that?! Pretty freakin' nuts, I'd say!
So it's been awhile... again. I don't mean to neglect, really, I don't, but between the pre-Christmas chaos, the Christmas chaos, and the post-Christmas chaos, life has been pretty, well, chaotic, to say the least. But I'm back at work, back in my apartment, and I've packed away all of my Christmas decorations and set everything up for January (yes, January decorations exist!), so now that I can take a deep breath, I can focus back on life as I know it! Wahoo! And that means more focus on pie! Always a win.
I have quite a bit to update on... four pies since my last post! Well, actually, six pies (I had 2 extra pie-ventures thrown in), so yeah, a LOT to update on!
Are you sitting down? Good! (I would hope so... otherwise you're just that weirdo who checks the computer while standing up.)
Do you have something to drink? A snack, perhaps? Don't worry, I can wait...
Okay, is your brain set on pie mode (or pie a la mode? Ha.)? Good!
Here we go!
So four weeks ago (wow!), my friend Kaitlin popped on over with the idea of making a holiday-esque pie that, since we would be inventing, would automatically be super delicious, because we would only put in delicious things. This theory makes perfect sense to me. So we started throwing around ideas (chocolate! candy canes! chocolate!) and wound up with a scrumptious-sounding pie worthy of the Christmas season... Peppermint Patty Pie! We decided this would have a mint Oreo crust, chocolate ganache (mostly just because I like the word "ganache"), mint chocolate mousse, and a whipped cream topping (with crushed candy canes for garnish). Awesome, no?
So off to the store we went! Walmart was out of mint Oreos, but they had a limited edition holiday version that fit out pie even better -- candy cane oreos (with a red and white center! Win!). We found our remaining ingredients, cursed the high price of peppermint extract, and went back home to bake. Everything went rather smoothly, although our ganache layer was a bit thin (but the mint mousse made up for that), and minus its short time in the fridge (meaning the mousse didn't set quite like it should have), we served it up at our holiday gift exchange where it was an absolute WIN! Success!! Seriously, it was phenomenal... super rich, but the flavors meshed perfectly and it was like a little Christmas party in your mouth. Yum, yum, yum.
It was even better the next day, after it had refrigerated overnight, and the shape of the pie held up on the plate (which is always cool). It was even richer, if that's possible, but while my coworkers could barely eat a slice, I had one for breakfast (Wheaties? Psh... this is the breakfast of champions) and another at work an hour later. Apparently decadent chocolate has zero affect on the stomach of a chocoholic. Good to know.
So a few days later I made mini versions of this pie for a holiday party along with adorable pecan tartlets... I don't have the pictures, but they were super cute! I made too many of the mini peppermint patty pies, so I wound up throwing some out (boo), but they sure looked delightful on a platter! And the pecan tartlets had a bit too much crust for their small size, which overwhelmed the filling, but otherwise they turned out pretty great. So now I know I can make mini-versions of the big pies! Hello dinner parties!
So those are pies 1, 2, and 3... and on we go!
Wall*E and I ventured home to Michigan just before Christmas (I had a week off from work) so I could spend the holidays with my fabulous family. We made it just fine, though the trip took a little longer after I stopped off at Albanese Confectionary in Indiana... the BEST chocolates on the face of the earth. Honest to blog, they're truly outstanding, like close-your-eyes-and-let-the-chocolate-do-the-talking kind of good. I picked up a bunch to surprise my family with, and I think my mom was more excited to see the pounds of chocolate on the table than me (I kid!), so that was a worthwhile pit stop :)
So the next pie was my first venture away from dessert and into the savory-type pies, which was cool to experiment with. My mom and I made her outstanding (to overuse the phrase) broccoli and cheese quiche for our breakfast on Christmas morning. It's a pretty easy recipe, and for my first-ever quiche, I'd say it turned out rather well! It was a warm and yummy way to kick off another great Christmas! I don't have tons to say about it... it looked great, tasted great, and what more is there to say about eggs and cheese that could possibly make it sound any better? Not much, they're pretty freakin' perfect without any fancy descriptions.
It was also great baking with my mom (and stealing her recipe!)... my mom is an avid Christmas baker, so I'm glad I got to partake in some of the fun this year! Gracias, mamacita!
On to... CHRISTMAS!!! So I won't add tons here (6 pies takes up a lot of blog space), but I had a spectacular Christmas, and it was a joy and a blessing to spend it with my family. We ate good food, laughed heartily, opened lovely gifts, and did all the merry things one does with family on such a beautiful holiday.
I got a great new pie pan for Christmas, and it's actually 9 inches, so now I don't need to double recipes! Yippee skippy! Keeping with the baking theme, I also got some awesome mixing bowls and Julie and Julia!!! Win win WIN! I got some other great gifts, but they're mostly unrelated to this pie blog (other than the fact that they equate to a happier version of me, which in turn makes this blog a happier thing, but still...), so I won't bore you with that.
Onward!
So my week off was great... I saw great movies (hello Sherlock Holmes and Up in the Air), hung out with some old friends, and spent a lot of time just relaxing with the fam-bam. It was awesome. The next pie also occurred over my vacation, and for New Year's Eve I made Shepherd's Pie! A bit of a stretch on the "pie" thing, but it totally counts. My brother-in-law Jerry gave me the recipe, and it was super easy and super delicious.
Basically, I browned some meat, then mixed in a bag of frozen mixed veggies and a can of cream of mushroom soup. This mixture (with some salt and pepper) went into a casserole dish, and I topped it off with a hearty layer of homemade mashed potatoes. Quick sidenote... I love mashed potatoes. Seriously, LOVE them. I can eat mountains of them in a sitting. And I still make a mashed potato volcano with the gravy/lava every time. But until just this past week, I never actually knew how to make them! My mom always did, and while I watched her a few times, I never saw the process all the way through... how ridiculous is that? So I just learned how to make her fantabulous spuds! Woot woot. Anywho, those went on top, then a pretty sprinkling of paprika was added and the whole thing went in the oven to bake.
Overall, it was quite scrum-diddly-umptious! I've only had shepherd's pie once before, and I think a gravy was added to the meat mixture, rather than the soup, but I think both are equally tasty. I can't wait to try this one again, and mix it up a bit... test out some seasonings!
So that's five down and ONE to go!
So I had a great New Year's, and came back to J'ville on the 2nd to throw my friend's bachelorette party/shower that night (which was super fun), and started work again on Monday. It was a really quiet week, since no students are back, and I mention that because I have a funny story for you. Yes, I'm telling it. I swear, we're almost done!
Okay, so I live in an apartment in a dorm building (for those who aren't aware), and yes, I think that information is safe to give out (I've never mentioned which dorm or even which campus for that matter, so we're good). Anyway, so since students are gone, I'm the only one in the building. I'm actually they only one with a key... they changed the locks over break so that students can't break in and do damage. So basically, I've felt pretty secure this whole time knowing that. Well anyway, so by being the only one in the building, that means Wall*E is the only car in the parking lot. So a few nights ago, I was getting ready for bed, and as I closed the curtains, I noticed another car out there... right near my window. Well to know me is to know that I'm a paranoid scaredy-cat, so I started freaking out a little bit. What if someone else is in the building? What if they're out there watching me shut my lights off? NO ONE CAN HEAR ME!
You get the idea.
So here's where it's kind of funny... I'm in my room, trying to find something to defend myself with (just in case), and since I couldn't find anything weapon-worthy, other than some books (and really, what good do those do me in this kind of situation?), I went into my living room, dragged my recliner over to the door, and reclined it so that the back wedged underneath the door handle and the chair was blocking the entire door. Seriously. I was able to sleep though, so I felt it was a brilliant plan.
The only downside was when I woke up the next morning and had to figure out why my chair was against my door (I was rather tired during the previous situaysh.)... kind of hilarious.
Okay, back to pie!
This week, I baked a pie for my boss... Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans with a Meringue Topping! Yup, that's what she wanted. Well, I got to try out my new pan, which was fun, and the pecan mixture filled up the crust, so woot for no doubling/thin pies! I baked that part up and as it set, I started whipping up the meringue. Well, in my fancy Kitchenaid mixer, it's super hard to tell when "stiff peaks" have formed, so in the process I managed to overwhip it :( I didn't realize that was possible, but when I stopped the mixer to check it, the whole thing was super runny and gross. After some frantic phonecalls, I discovered that it's sometimes salvageable if you add another egg white, which is great news, only I didn't have any more eggs! And it had started snowing, so I wasn't in the mood to go buy more.
Sometimes, it must be noted, I do stupid things when I'm frustrated. And this time was no different. I poured the liquid meringue over the pie, and then threw the whole thing under the broiler. I then proceeded to ruin this even further by forgetting to check the oven until I smelled smoke. Awesome.
So the whole top was burnt and my apartment smelled like burnt marshmallows. Blech.
Well, I brought it into work the next day and once we peeled the meringue (if you can call it that) part off, it was actually a pretty good pie! Basically pure syrup, but I vote that a win :)
I need more meringue practice! Lesson learned. Also, keep more than the necessary ingredients on hand.
Okay, so in the interest of getting this post up now, I don't have pictures to add just yet... I'll add them later! Sorry!
And now I have to actually go, so this ending is going to be rather abrupt... thanks for reading, sorry for neglecting you!!!
Eat some pie!!!
New poll up! And from the last poll, I discovered that the majority of you like whipped cream with your pie, some like ice cream, and a few like either coffee or nothing. Mmmmkay! That is all!
So it's been awhile... again. I don't mean to neglect, really, I don't, but between the pre-Christmas chaos, the Christmas chaos, and the post-Christmas chaos, life has been pretty, well, chaotic, to say the least. But I'm back at work, back in my apartment, and I've packed away all of my Christmas decorations and set everything up for January (yes, January decorations exist!), so now that I can take a deep breath, I can focus back on life as I know it! Wahoo! And that means more focus on pie! Always a win.
I have quite a bit to update on... four pies since my last post! Well, actually, six pies (I had 2 extra pie-ventures thrown in), so yeah, a LOT to update on!
Are you sitting down? Good! (I would hope so... otherwise you're just that weirdo who checks the computer while standing up.)
Do you have something to drink? A snack, perhaps? Don't worry, I can wait...
Okay, is your brain set on pie mode (or pie a la mode? Ha.)? Good!
Here we go!
So four weeks ago (wow!), my friend Kaitlin popped on over with the idea of making a holiday-esque pie that, since we would be inventing, would automatically be super delicious, because we would only put in delicious things. This theory makes perfect sense to me. So we started throwing around ideas (chocolate! candy canes! chocolate!) and wound up with a scrumptious-sounding pie worthy of the Christmas season... Peppermint Patty Pie! We decided this would have a mint Oreo crust, chocolate ganache (mostly just because I like the word "ganache"), mint chocolate mousse, and a whipped cream topping (with crushed candy canes for garnish). Awesome, no?
So off to the store we went! Walmart was out of mint Oreos, but they had a limited edition holiday version that fit out pie even better -- candy cane oreos (with a red and white center! Win!). We found our remaining ingredients, cursed the high price of peppermint extract, and went back home to bake. Everything went rather smoothly, although our ganache layer was a bit thin (but the mint mousse made up for that), and minus its short time in the fridge (meaning the mousse didn't set quite like it should have), we served it up at our holiday gift exchange where it was an absolute WIN! Success!! Seriously, it was phenomenal... super rich, but the flavors meshed perfectly and it was like a little Christmas party in your mouth. Yum, yum, yum.
It was even better the next day, after it had refrigerated overnight, and the shape of the pie held up on the plate (which is always cool). It was even richer, if that's possible, but while my coworkers could barely eat a slice, I had one for breakfast (Wheaties? Psh... this is the breakfast of champions) and another at work an hour later. Apparently decadent chocolate has zero affect on the stomach of a chocoholic. Good to know.
So a few days later I made mini versions of this pie for a holiday party along with adorable pecan tartlets... I don't have the pictures, but they were super cute! I made too many of the mini peppermint patty pies, so I wound up throwing some out (boo), but they sure looked delightful on a platter! And the pecan tartlets had a bit too much crust for their small size, which overwhelmed the filling, but otherwise they turned out pretty great. So now I know I can make mini-versions of the big pies! Hello dinner parties!
So those are pies 1, 2, and 3... and on we go!
Wall*E and I ventured home to Michigan just before Christmas (I had a week off from work) so I could spend the holidays with my fabulous family. We made it just fine, though the trip took a little longer after I stopped off at Albanese Confectionary in Indiana... the BEST chocolates on the face of the earth. Honest to blog, they're truly outstanding, like close-your-eyes-and-let-the-chocolate-do-the-talking kind of good. I picked up a bunch to surprise my family with, and I think my mom was more excited to see the pounds of chocolate on the table than me (I kid!), so that was a worthwhile pit stop :)
So the next pie was my first venture away from dessert and into the savory-type pies, which was cool to experiment with. My mom and I made her outstanding (to overuse the phrase) broccoli and cheese quiche for our breakfast on Christmas morning. It's a pretty easy recipe, and for my first-ever quiche, I'd say it turned out rather well! It was a warm and yummy way to kick off another great Christmas! I don't have tons to say about it... it looked great, tasted great, and what more is there to say about eggs and cheese that could possibly make it sound any better? Not much, they're pretty freakin' perfect without any fancy descriptions.
It was also great baking with my mom (and stealing her recipe!)... my mom is an avid Christmas baker, so I'm glad I got to partake in some of the fun this year! Gracias, mamacita!
On to... CHRISTMAS!!! So I won't add tons here (6 pies takes up a lot of blog space), but I had a spectacular Christmas, and it was a joy and a blessing to spend it with my family. We ate good food, laughed heartily, opened lovely gifts, and did all the merry things one does with family on such a beautiful holiday.
I got a great new pie pan for Christmas, and it's actually 9 inches, so now I don't need to double recipes! Yippee skippy! Keeping with the baking theme, I also got some awesome mixing bowls and Julie and Julia!!! Win win WIN! I got some other great gifts, but they're mostly unrelated to this pie blog (other than the fact that they equate to a happier version of me, which in turn makes this blog a happier thing, but still...), so I won't bore you with that.
Onward!
So my week off was great... I saw great movies (hello Sherlock Holmes and Up in the Air), hung out with some old friends, and spent a lot of time just relaxing with the fam-bam. It was awesome. The next pie also occurred over my vacation, and for New Year's Eve I made Shepherd's Pie! A bit of a stretch on the "pie" thing, but it totally counts. My brother-in-law Jerry gave me the recipe, and it was super easy and super delicious.
Basically, I browned some meat, then mixed in a bag of frozen mixed veggies and a can of cream of mushroom soup. This mixture (with some salt and pepper) went into a casserole dish, and I topped it off with a hearty layer of homemade mashed potatoes. Quick sidenote... I love mashed potatoes. Seriously, LOVE them. I can eat mountains of them in a sitting. And I still make a mashed potato volcano with the gravy/lava every time. But until just this past week, I never actually knew how to make them! My mom always did, and while I watched her a few times, I never saw the process all the way through... how ridiculous is that? So I just learned how to make her fantabulous spuds! Woot woot. Anywho, those went on top, then a pretty sprinkling of paprika was added and the whole thing went in the oven to bake.
Overall, it was quite scrum-diddly-umptious! I've only had shepherd's pie once before, and I think a gravy was added to the meat mixture, rather than the soup, but I think both are equally tasty. I can't wait to try this one again, and mix it up a bit... test out some seasonings!
So that's five down and ONE to go!
So I had a great New Year's, and came back to J'ville on the 2nd to throw my friend's bachelorette party/shower that night (which was super fun), and started work again on Monday. It was a really quiet week, since no students are back, and I mention that because I have a funny story for you. Yes, I'm telling it. I swear, we're almost done!
Okay, so I live in an apartment in a dorm building (for those who aren't aware), and yes, I think that information is safe to give out (I've never mentioned which dorm or even which campus for that matter, so we're good). Anyway, so since students are gone, I'm the only one in the building. I'm actually they only one with a key... they changed the locks over break so that students can't break in and do damage. So basically, I've felt pretty secure this whole time knowing that. Well anyway, so by being the only one in the building, that means Wall*E is the only car in the parking lot. So a few nights ago, I was getting ready for bed, and as I closed the curtains, I noticed another car out there... right near my window. Well to know me is to know that I'm a paranoid scaredy-cat, so I started freaking out a little bit. What if someone else is in the building? What if they're out there watching me shut my lights off? NO ONE CAN HEAR ME!
You get the idea.
So here's where it's kind of funny... I'm in my room, trying to find something to defend myself with (just in case), and since I couldn't find anything weapon-worthy, other than some books (and really, what good do those do me in this kind of situation?), I went into my living room, dragged my recliner over to the door, and reclined it so that the back wedged underneath the door handle and the chair was blocking the entire door. Seriously. I was able to sleep though, so I felt it was a brilliant plan.
The only downside was when I woke up the next morning and had to figure out why my chair was against my door (I was rather tired during the previous situaysh.)... kind of hilarious.
Okay, back to pie!
This week, I baked a pie for my boss... Pecan Pie Minus the Pecans with a Meringue Topping! Yup, that's what she wanted. Well, I got to try out my new pan, which was fun, and the pecan mixture filled up the crust, so woot for no doubling/thin pies! I baked that part up and as it set, I started whipping up the meringue. Well, in my fancy Kitchenaid mixer, it's super hard to tell when "stiff peaks" have formed, so in the process I managed to overwhip it :( I didn't realize that was possible, but when I stopped the mixer to check it, the whole thing was super runny and gross. After some frantic phonecalls, I discovered that it's sometimes salvageable if you add another egg white, which is great news, only I didn't have any more eggs! And it had started snowing, so I wasn't in the mood to go buy more.
Sometimes, it must be noted, I do stupid things when I'm frustrated. And this time was no different. I poured the liquid meringue over the pie, and then threw the whole thing under the broiler. I then proceeded to ruin this even further by forgetting to check the oven until I smelled smoke. Awesome.
So the whole top was burnt and my apartment smelled like burnt marshmallows. Blech.
Well, I brought it into work the next day and once we peeled the meringue (if you can call it that) part off, it was actually a pretty good pie! Basically pure syrup, but I vote that a win :)
I need more meringue practice! Lesson learned. Also, keep more than the necessary ingredients on hand.
Okay, so in the interest of getting this post up now, I don't have pictures to add just yet... I'll add them later! Sorry!
And now I have to actually go, so this ending is going to be rather abrupt... thanks for reading, sorry for neglecting you!!!
Eat some pie!!!
New poll up! And from the last poll, I discovered that the majority of you like whipped cream with your pie, some like ice cream, and a few like either coffee or nothing. Mmmmkay! That is all!
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