After the Linzertorte “bust” I decided to back to some basic Americana pie. What could be more American than peanut butter (yeah, yeah, I know you were going to say apple pie, but this is my blog) and chocolate?

Irma says in the book that this is a simple pie and sounds like kid stuff, but has a complexity and subtle flavor that will surprise.

We were invited over for dinner to the home of some of my favorite people ever. I first met Edwin and Patty when they were young and fresh married leaving for deep dark Africa as missionaries. In fact I met them at their going away potluck celebration as a guest of my best friend in the whole world Kevin. I remember a little envy at the things they were going to experience and accomplish. Between then and now the sun has risen and set quite a few times. Their twin daughters, Jessica and Bethany are both in their first year of high-school and the youngest; Tabitha is, well, I do not know how old she is…probably 6 or 8. Anyway we were invited to have supper with them and Patty tells me they are planning curry chicken. I tell her that curry wrecks havoc on my wife’s digestive system, so we had Mexican instead. Thanks, Patty.

I thought my daughter, Rachel would come with us and she was dragging her feet, not wanting to go and my son, Dave pops up with, “Hey, I want to go.” Then Rachel decides it might not be so terrible with Dave there. As it turned out we all have a really fun time and even Rachel, although she would not admit it, was glad she decided to go along.

I decided to bake and bring the Peanut Butter Pie. It has a crumb crust which can be made with graham crackers, but I thought it would be better made with chocolate wafer cookies. The filling itself is almost like a mousse, very light and the subtle flavor of peanut butter and cream cheese with the chocolate crust was very good by itself, but there was more. The pie is topped with a thin hard chocolate glaze and I made whipped cream for a garnish. There were nine of us and a pie that goes into eight servings so Patty and I cut it into ten slices. As it turned out we could have cut it into twelve servings because it was so rich.

Dinner was very good.

The company was great.

The game was goofy (fun).

And I think the pie turned out to be pretty good, too!

Thanks to our American-African friends for having us over.

Linzertorte

Funny how things go sometimes. My oldest daughter, Keri and my two sweet grandchildren, Erik who is two and Eliana who is eight months old, just left Sunday after staying for two weeks. They did not seem to demand much of my time, but I got pretty much nothing done while they were here.

I finally got around to making the Linzertorte for the family in our congregation that is, well, very European. I thought they would enjoy it more than my family due to the crust which is made from nuts and The Wife ‘O My Life does not like nuts in baked goods…not even brownies. When I gave it to them it was the oldest boy’s birthday, but he said he does not enjoy nuts that much either so it was “ok.” The king of the castle said he really liked it. The queen said it was pretty, but lacked the depth and complexity of flavor that she is used to in a Linzertorte. So all in all I feel it was not a great effort, but I ticked one more pie/tart off the list.

Chess Pie

I set out to make two pies. I was going to make the Chess Pie and the Lemon Chess Pie.
The Lemon Chess Pie for the Wife O' My Life and the Chess Pie for the gal who has a desk right next to Wife at work. It seems that one day I called for Sues and she, Antoinette, answered the phone and I was perturbed with her because she was not Sues. I do not remember the exchange at all, but if she says I was rude I want to beg forgiveness and what better way than to bake her a pie. Chess Pie has nuts in it and Lemon Chess does not. The Wife O' My Life does not like nuts in pie, or most anything else. So the Chess Pie was for Antoinette. I prepared everything for the pie and prepped all I could to make a smooth time baking, I love to have everything laid out and ready just like a TV cooking show. It called for an unusual method for making the filling. I had to combine the eggs, sugars and some evaporated milk in a heat-proof bowl and simmer an inch of water in a skillet and place the bowl in the water until the filling was shiny and warm to the touch. I was a little distracted by the strangeness of the recipe and forgot the six tablespoons of butter I cut into small pieces that were to be scattered on top as the mixture heated. I did not realize my mistake until I was done putting the meringue on the pie. I went to get a drink from the refrigerator and oops there was the saucer with little uniform cubes of butter.
I did not toss the pie, I eat my mistakes. I started over and made the Chess Pie the way it should be and did not make the Lemon Chess Pie. Oh, well. Another day I will make it.
We ate the pie that I screwed up and I thought it was quite good despite the omission of the butter in the filling. My family also enjoyed it. The meringue was very stable and delicious even after two days in the refrigerator.
I did not get pictures of either pie.
Antoinette said that the pie was very good, but very rich and she was eating only small pieces at a time.

Rhubarb brings me back home...

We got some rhubarb from the market table at church and I was going to make a pie. No strawberries, though. Just rhubarb. The Wife O' My Life has a pal at work who is the pharmacy manager and she has to put up with a lot of grief from people who want more than their insurance will allow and some times she comes to Wife almost in tears. So, she asked me to bake her pie to cheer her up. One of the coolest parts of the whole story is that she told Wife that rhubarb was her favorite pie!

I did not get to taste the pie, again, but it bubbled up and I did get to taste the filling and it was tart and delicious. Irma said that the best rhubarb for pies is the early spring rhubarb that is as big around as your finger. Says it is sweeter and more flavorful. This rhubarb was about an inch or slightly more across the widest part so it was not early by any means, but I hope she enjoyed the pie. I did use the greater amout of sugar suggested and I added the optional grated zest of one orange.

I tasted some of the raw rhubarb and it made me remember when I was a kid going with Mom, my brother, Dan and my sister, Cookie and finding wild rhubarb or at least feral rhubarb. She made a really tasty cake with it. It is the simplest recipe. You make a yellow or white cake mix according to the directions and put half the batter in a 9x13 and top it with two cups sliced rhubarb then the rest of the batter, bake a little longer than the box says and it is delicious.

The Bake Sale Trio

The preschool that is in our church building had an Easter egg hunt and a bake sale. The hunt was just for fun and a few of our teens and even fewer of our adults filled plastic eggs with toys and candy. I do not know how many eggs were there, but it was a LOT! We came in Saturday about noon and hid them for the hunt which started at one o’clock. For the little ones it is more scattering than hiding, but they have a good time and so did we.

In connection with the hunt they wanted to have a bake sale to help toward the purchase of a copier. I contacted the gal in charge and asked how I could help. She said she wanted to have small $1 packages for people to purchase and a few larger items for a few dollars more. I told her I could bake two or three pies for her and she appreciated that and could I put a price on them. Gee, how do you put a price on a pie? I had no idea how to price them. Oh, well. Worry about that later like Scarlet O’Hara.

I took The Book with me and went to the grocery store. They have not had peaches since I started this adventure up until this week and they came out great in the Fruit Crostata so I thought I would make peach. I selected my fruit with great care. I am sure the produce guy thinks I am very picky, the Wife ‘O My Life would say anal-retentive, but I think that goes too far. After I had taken all of five minutes to pick the six best peaches in the lot I remembered that I had told my sweet little girl, Rachel that when I make the Peach Pie it would be for her and it did not seem right to make her buy it from the bake sale. I put the peaches back and picked out three perfect pears for the Pear Streusel Tart. I choose lemons for the Ohio Lemon Pie and then decided to make one of the Canned Fruit Pies. I got pears for that pie.

I had never made or even heard of Ohio Lemon Pie. You take three lemons and zest them and then with the while part of the peel still on you slice them “paper thin” and mix them with their zest, two cups of sugar and a bit of salt. As they soak, or as Irma puts it they macerate everything becomes soft and very sticky. I was instructed to macerate them for a minimum of two hours and up to twenty-four. The longer you macerate them the better. I went for fourteen hours and took it to the sale still warm. I do not know what it tasted like as it was sold in the bake sale. The lemon pie and the tart were purchased by the same gal and I know people who know her so perhaps I can get a message to her through them and she would comment on here as to how she liked or did not like the baked goods. The Wife ‘O My Life told me if I wrapped the tart in colored plastic wrap and gathered it up top and put a ribbon on it I could sell it for fifteen or twenty dollars. I did not have colored plastic wrap or ribbon…they went for ten dollars each.

Fruit Crostata

The Fruit Crostata was a pat-in-the-pan shortbread crust, so it was a little different than any other. It looks a bit like a Galette, but does not taste like it. I made it for Scott and Susan’s regular every-other-Thursday get together. Last time I baked for them was the pumpkin pie with brandy sauce. This was better, they both tried it and both said they liked it. Sues and I liked it too. It was trickier to put together than the Galette in that the dough had to be rolled out between two pieces of parchment paper because it was very sticky. I made a nice fat border this time, learned my lesson making the Galette. I used fresh peaches and the frozen blueberries we were given.

As an interesting side note the Wife O’ My Life is journaling all her food intake now and so I try to provide her with calorie counts on what I cook and bake. All About Pies and Tarts does not list that sort of information so I have to calculate each ingredient and do math to figure it out. A lot of the time I am able to find a recipe on the internet that has about the same composition and use the information provided. I did a search for Fruit Crostata and was surprised to find a web site called Trusan Cuisines that had a sample menu on their web site with different menu items and photos of the dishes. The surprise came in the photo they had for their Fresh Fruit Crostata. The photo is a little hazy as if it were a phone pic or it was scanned and as I looked at it I realized why it seemed so familiar. It was the picture from All About Pies and Tarts. I called Sues over and we compared different parts of the pictures and it is, right down to the wrinkles on the berries, the same photo. I wonder if they can get in trouble for that. If you want to see it you can look here: http://www.trusancuisines.com/menu_tuscan.htm

Tamale Pie

I do not know why, but making the savory pies does not get me as thrilled as the dessert pies do. I still feel creative, but it is different.

This is different from most of the Tamale Pie recipes I have seen in that it has a top and bottom crust, most just have the top crust.

This turned out very nice. The crust was solid enough to hold up to being served in whole pieces and tender enough to compete with some of the best cornbread I have had. The top crust blended with a layer of cheddar cheese that made it quite remarkable. The filling was spicy and very flavorful. The only downside to this dish was that it made an entire 9x13 pan with Sweet Wife and I being the only ones home to enjoy it most of it ended up in the trash.

I went out to Camp Yamhill this weekend for the retreat that we have with our youth group each year. It is a really great weekend with some terrific kids. The Spirit of God permeated the weekend. I was moved as were so many of the teens and participating adults.

One of the reasons I enjoy Camp Yamhill so much is the couple that has taken over the cooking and such there, Alex and Pam. No more packaged foods. The food there used to be OK, but now it is very good. I have struck up a friendship with them and enjoy visiting with them whenever I go out there. Alex is a funny guy, I always enjoy his humor and Pam is a chef willing to teach and answer all my goofy questions. It was sad this weekend because Pam was sick and I only saw her briefly the first morning for breakfast. I pray she gets well fast.

If I had not run out of time to bake on Friday before I left I had planned to bring her an example of my baking adventure in an Apple Galette. She told me that one of the "final exams" in culinary school was to bake a galette and I wanted to get her opinion of mine, well maybe next time.

Apple Pie II

Well, I got some new stuff from Pampered Chef (R) and have been enjoying the garlic peeler, fun little gadget it is a silicone tube and you put your garlic clove in there and rub it between your hands and it peels it for you so you can chop it up. Also got some little prep bowls that I have not used much, becuase they are kind of small and I forget have them and just use monkey dishes.

One of the tools I got was a pastry cutter wheel. It has three blades, one that cuts straight like a pizza cutter, only smaller, one that is flat for crimping dough and one that cuts a wavy line. I used the wavy one to cut the dough to make a lattice on this pie.

I finally got around to making the second recipe for apple pie in the book. The filling is cooked before it goes in the pie and Irma said that it is a bit softer filling than Apple Pie I and not as sweet, but with more apple flavor. I did taste the filling before it went in the pie and thought it was very good.

The lattice was fun to make. I always wondered how people got those great lattice patterens with thin pieces of dough, because my dough would always get all messed up with the filling while I was weaving it. In the book I found out. You make it off the pie on a cookie sheet and refrigerate it until it is stiff and place it on the top of the pie in one piece...pretty clever. I do not know if you can tell I used my new cookie cutter to put a couple of little apple shapes on the top of the crust...Ellen noticed when I gave her the pie *smile*.

Rolling the dough went very well with my new pin, I just love it! Also it was good to make the pie for someone else. This is the pie I made to trade for the raspberry jam for the Linzertorte. I went out to Battle Ground to take the pie to Ellen and got to visit with her and Roberta and Jennifer and Elisa. It was a lot of fun and if they enjoy the pie half as much as I enjoyed their company I would be quite pleased. I asked them to make a comment on this blog entry as to how they liked the pie...or not.

There was a little more darkening on the crust than I like to see, but I was writing the previous post on quiche while it was baking and lost track of time, oops.

By the way, Roberta, if you read this thanks so much for the big bag of frozen blueberries. I was planning to make a pie with them, but my wife took them and said they are for her lunches to make up for all the pies I make she does not get to eat. On that same note my sweet daughter, Rachel asks me the same thing every time I bake, "Do we get to eat this one?" Poor thing, I asked her to pick a pie and it will be just for her. She choose the peach, so this summer when peaches are ripe I will bake one just for her!

Quiche Lorraine...does it count if I fail?

My pal Mike has chickens and they laid more eggs than he could use so he gave me a couple of dozen. I thought what a great time to make a quiche. So I set out to make one for him.

As you can see by the pictures I failed in my attempt to make Quiche Loraine. I am so glad I put that pan under the tart pan, what a mess that would have been.

The problem was that I rolled the crust too thin and it shrunk down on one side of the tart and developed a hole during baking. It has an egg yoke glaze baked on the crust to help to seal it, but it was not enough.

The color and flavor were very good and the wife 'o my life very much enjoyed the crust and the filling on the small one, although it had shrunken sides too.

I am going to go ahead and scratch it off the list as done even though it failed. I will attempt it again, only next time I will have to use store-bought eggs.

I got a french-style rolling pin and I am loving it! It is so much nicer to use than the one my mother used. I thought it would take a little getting used to, but it was better right out of the gate. I also got four small removable-bottom tarts and used one in the quiche disaster. They will take a little practice. Irma says to double over the edges of tart crusts that are 3 1/2 to 4 1/2-inch pans, but not if they are very small pans with sloped sides. Well my new pans are 3 1/2-inch, but they have sloped sides...I am going to double the sides next time, we will see how that works out.

Well, I have Apple Pie II in the oven right now. I am baking it for Ellen, a friend at church. I put out the word that I needed 12 ounces of home-made raspberry jam to make the Linzertorte because I did not want to use store-bought jam to fill a tort I have worked so hard on. Ellen gave me a whole quart of jam made by her mother, who she says makes the best jam, from home-grown raspberries. I just hope the rest of the Linzertorte can live up to that!

My Book Is Here!

The book I am baking these pies from, The Joy of Cooking; All About Pies and Tarts, is a library book and I figured I could just keep renewing it all year, but the library will not let you renew if it has a hold on it. I decided I would just buy the book on line.

I found the Joy of Cooking "All About" series in several places on the web and the prices vary on different editions such as All About Cookies or Chicken or Whatever, they were all in the range of $3 to $8...except All About Pies and Tarts. The new copies were $85 and up to $115. Wow, that is a bit much. The used copies were not much better at $45, 50 or 65.

Perseverance pays off. I have continued to look on line and finally found a copy for under $20 including shipping. It said it had "minimal underlining" and was in "good" shape. Well, I thought it would be OK no matter how much writing was in it or whatever.

It arrived the other day and it is in better shape than the one I got from the library!

No writing or underlining to be found. Funny thing is it came from a used book store in Bothel, Washington through http://www.thriftbooks.com/ and the stamp on the book says it was "withdrawn" from the Omaha, Nebraska Public Library. That is a well traveled book.

By the way, I have purchased several books from thriftbooks.com and I have always been pleased with the service and the goods.

Key Lime Pie

My son, David asked me to make the Key Lime Pie for him because he relly likes the key lime flavored yogurt...well, it works for me!

This was different in that I have never made a citrus pie, but I was game. I had to buy a citrus juicer and I wish I had bought a squeezer in stead, maybe I will get one before I make the Lemon Meringue Pie.

Those little, tiny key limes do not have much to them, I had to zest a dozen of them to get the 3 or 4 teaspoons of zest I needed and I had to juice 16 to get the half cup of juice. I did learn my lesson making the French Yeast Galette and used my zesting tool and not the grater to avoid the bitter flesh of the peel.

I had the choice of making it with a meringue topping or whipped cream, I opted for the meringue. The meringue Irma had for me to use has a corn starch paste in it which is suppose to keep the meringue stable for several days...we will never know since Susan took the left-over pie to work and they leave nothing to destablize, ha ha.

The wife 'o my life, Susan said she was surprized that it was not green in color. I had not even thought of that because I saw the picture in Irma's book and it was yellow with just a hint of green, which is just what my pie looked like.

My pie did not look exactly like the book. I tried to "anchor" the meringue to the crust as instructed, but it seperated a little and the pie did weep a bit, the next morning it had maybe a half teaspoon of liquid in the bottom of the plate. They can not all come out perfect, now can they!

One strange thing I noticed was that Irma called for a 15oz can of sweetened condensed milk and both brands at the store come in 14oz cans...weird.

His peace,

Lewis

French Yeast Galette

Well it has been a while, but I finally got back in the kitchen!

My 10th grade daughter, Rachel had us scheduled at her school for student-led conferences, which never go well for us. I do not know if it goes well for others, but Rachel's always seems a little rushed and a little scattered. I did secretly enjoy it though. The reason I bring that up is that her "advisor" at school is a French gal so I decided to make the French Yeast Galette since Irma says that throughout France different regions have varied versions of the galette, but they all have some version it would be interesting to present it to a French native and get her input on how I did. I have asked her to comment on this blog...I hope she will, good or bad I would like to know what she thinks of my galette.

The galette was fun to make in that it was real different from a pie. It was described as a cross between cake and bread. Unlike the apple galette it has no fruit, or any filling at all. It did call for lemon zest. I made two of the galettes and on the first one I used my grater to get the zest from the lemon and I think I dug in a little too deep and got some of the bitter flesh of the peel in the mix. The second one I used my "zester" tool, which takes more time, but renders a better not bitter result.

After mixing the yeast and sugar and the rest you are suppose to cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let the dough stand in a warm place for 3 hours. I always wonder how they made these recipes years ago when there was no plastic wrap...hmm.

To bake the two galettes I had to put them together and then refrigerate them for 10 minutes and then bake for 10 minutes. Which turned out pretty good because I could put one together and refrigerate it while I put the next one together and bake the first one while the second one chills. This worked out OK until I took the first one out of the oven. I was instructed to pat the very sticky dough out to an 11-inch circle under plastic wrap and then to turn up the edges about three-quarters of an inch to form a rim all around. I did not take that very seriously and made a haphazard rim around. Well, the first one I baked on my 15" round baking stone and it grew out over the edge and the second one I made on my 12" stone and the dough was so sticky and delicate that there was no way to transfer it to a larger stone, so I made a very definite rim on the second one. It turned out beautiful, I wish I would have done them both that way. The first one tasted grand, but it was not as pretty.

We ate the first one, the ugly one and gave the second to her advisor, Mrs. Lawrence.

His peace,

Lewis

Not Baking...bummer

Ugg, I have not baked anything in so long. I am going to have some serious chatching up to do to stay on schedule.

The problem is that I have hurt my leg, I do not know even how I hurt it, but there is an open sore on my stump and I can not wear my artificial leg for a while. I do not know for sure when I will be getting back on two feet. It is so hard to just get along doing life; cooking dinner, shopping, cleaning up the kitchen and working on the drawings I have to do. Baking seems out of the question.

I will try and get some done this week end come what may!

I have an appointment with my prosthetist (leg man) on Wednesday and perhaps he can get me back in the saddle!

On a happier note I have found some work to do. Not a job to go to, but I am talking to a couple of different companies about doing contract work out of my home for them. I have done bits and pieces out of my home before, but this is serious amounts of work...pray for me!

His peace,
Lewis

Empanadas, Pizza Rustica and Apple Galette

It has been crazy busy for me this past couple of weeks. I got a contract to draw a machine called the VersaLift for a local company and that has been a real fun challenge and I got a chance to speak to the teens out at Camp Yamhill at a retreat called Leadership Seminar. That was a blast, but it took a lot of my time in preparation...well worth it. I drove out there today and I had planned to drive right back home when I was invited to stay for lunch, I was told the food had improved dramatically and i can attest to that from being out there for Junior Teen the last few years. The improvement has been the result of new management of the kitchen. A lot less prepared food, a lot more "scratch" food and some real knowledge of food preparation. Alex and Pam run a pretty tight ship. No more mid-night raids on the goodies in the kitchen, no more lounging in the kitchen after hours playing Trivial Pursuit, but the trade off is some really great food and a legal kitchen.



Well I have not been blogging for two weeks, but I have been cooking!
I made an Apple Galette that was so light and delicate that it shocked me. The whole family loved it and it was light in flavor and in sugars, I had two pieces and still kept my glucose levels within reason. The Galette is like a "free-form" pie with, like I said, very little sugar and it was fun to eat, because the recipe said you could serve it with whipped cream I ate it like a pizza and my sweet little girl, Rachel dipped hers in the whipped cream.




The Pizza Rustica (Italian Meat Pie) was nothing like what we call pizza. It was instead a meat pie with sweet Italian sausage, prosciutto, pork loin, cheese and more cheese. It called for two pounds of ricotta cheese, where a 9 x 13 pan of lasagna only calls for one pound and this pie was only an 8 x 8! It was a lot of cheese. The family liked it...well, not so much. I, on the other hand thought it was delicious. OK, I would cut the ricotta in half next time, but it was a very good dinner, for me. The most fun was making the crust. For this pie Irma had me mix the dry ingredients and then gave me the choice of mixing it with the wet ingredients in a bowl or right on the table. Of course I choose to make it on the table. What fun to crack the eggs in the well, beat them with a fork and then mix with the flour mixture. It was messy, but I had a blast. You can see the pictures.



The other recipe I made was Empanadas. Irma said that you can fill them with anything from fruits to nuts, but mostly they are filled with meat. That is what I chose. I made them the day before I had to go in for a medical procedure and was on a liquid diet and could not eat them. When I made the filling with ground beef, potatoes, tomato, raisins, green olives, oregano, etc. it nearly drove me nuts not being able to even taste the darn things. I decided to make them for lunch and take them to Sues' work and let them eat them. The unusual flavors of beef, raisins, olives, etc. were a big hit, as a matter of fact one of the gals is having some kind of event this Sunday (wedding, maybe, IDK) and she wanted the recipe so she could make them for the event. I also asked our Youth Minister's wife if she would like to get together and make them some time. We made pies together before and she is a delight.

Must run. Busy weekend. Back soon. I will be baking!

Pumpkin Pie With Brandy Sauce

With Brandy Sauce

Braided Edge









Well I finally got around to making another pie.




I had to visit my diabetes doctor, Dr. Orr, this week and told her about my pie challenge and asked her what her favorite pie is. She told me it was pumpkin. So I made a couple of pumpkin pies, one for her and one for having Scott and Susan over for Thursday night.
In the normal course of events when I make a pumpkin pie I buy Cool Whip® because that is the way The Wife ‘o My Life enjoys it. In keeping with my challenge I needed to make the recipe for the brandy sauce, which is how Irma says it should be served. The brandy sauce starts with ¼ cup or 2 ounces of brandy or cognac so I had to go to the state controlled liquor store. The first task I had: find one. I found one downtown and was surprised how quiet and neat it was. The little “airline” bottles, I was told by the liquor store worker bee, hold 1.7 ounces. Since I needed only two ounces I thought it would be fine to just buy two bottles at $1.50 each and make two batches of sauce; one for us and one for Dr. Orr. As it turned out we used very little of the brandy sauce I made for us because we did not like it, so I just put the remainder in a jar and took it to Dr. Orr this morning. Her receptionist was surprised, but it was not the regular receptionist…I was hoping she would be there, she is really nice and always has an encouraging word.

This recipe called for more pumpkin than there is in a can of pumpkin so I had to buy two cans. I froze two cups of the remainder and will enjoy the other small portion with my dinner tonight. I like to put a little butter and some fake brown sugar on it and heat it in the oven or the microwave, yum!
The pie did not turn out looking like the pumpkin pie I usually make; it was darker and had deep cracks in it after cooling completely. I am not sure if that was due to the recipe or to the fact that I tried to save a little and bought store-brand pumpkin instead of Libby®. In either case Sues and Scott really liked the pie and Scott even liked the brandy sauce. I liked the pie and could take or leave the sauce. Scott’s Susan tried neither as she does not like pumpkin pie and instead had some pizza that we had left from dinner.

Did you notice I tried to make my first "braided" edge on a pie. It did not work a easily as I thought it would. It is hard to make the strands to braid and imposible to braid them...it was a twist not a braid, but it did give the pie a nice look so I guess it was worth the trouble!

There are two more pie crusts calling me from the refrigerator so I will likely be building another in the next day or two…

Winter Peach Pie and Cornish Pasties

Today I made Winter Peach Pie in the morning and took it to Sues, the wife o’ my life, at work and all her co-workers really enjoyed it!

It was interesting that I was just saying yesterday how I was having such a hard time with rolling out the crust and so I went back and re-read the instructions that Irma had written. The thing that intrigued me was that I was always trying to use as little flour to roll out the crust as possible and she said that experienced bakers use very little while a novice should start out by using more, so I did. She also said (did I miss this before?) that when you roll out the dough you should not roll all the way to the edge of the dough, but stop short a little and turn the dough not the pin to roll out even round crust. Today my crust rolled out with an ease that made me literally smile out loud!

The pie itself had an interesting combination of raisins and canned peaches with tapioca and the usual spices. I was surprised that the pie came out as solid as it did, not as solid as the apple, but it was very fluid when I put it in the oven.
Like I said the crust gave my no trouble at all and one of Sues’ co-workers said that she makes really good crust, but mine was better. I guess I will stow that away for when it gets really frustrating.

For dinner tonight we had Pasties. I spent a few years in Butte, Montana and it was always a mining town and the Cornish came to The Midwest and then to Butte and brought this wonderful dish with them. It is a sort of a turnover filled with beef stew. It is a crust like pie, but with a little vinegar and an egg in the dough. You are suppose to make the crust real thick where it comes together so that you can eat the “pie” and then toss the crust-handle that has all the coal dust on it because you can not wash your hands to eat lunch while you work n the coal mines. They did not have coal mines in Butte, just copper and silver. But the pasty still was very popular, in fact when I lived there you could order a pasty at almost any eatery in town and since you could they all had gravy, because you would not serve it to some folks without gravy, while others enjoyed theirs with catsup. All of this gave birth to one of the strangest food combinations I have ever seen…French fries and gravy, not my first choice.

Beyond all that I had a very hard time with putting the pasties together according to Irma’s recipe. I mixed up the ½-inch cubes of beef steak, potatoes, turnips and carrots and the chopped onion. Then I rolled the dough (nice soft malleable dough) out into 6 8-inch circles and I had enough filling for about two more pasties and when I tried to assemble them the dough proved quite fragile. I did preserver through it and baked then to a golden brown and they were very tasty. In order to get the full effect I had half of mine with catsup and half with gravy. I can not decide which I liked best…I could have eaten three of them, but only ate one.

Apple Pie I

Cooled and ready to eat

Well I guess that's all folks!

The Apple Dumpling is not in the book, I just made it up











It is a slow, late start because it is a little scary to make pie and have folks eat it and compare it to the whole world of pie.

The Crust: I made the Flaky Pastry Dough. After reading about how different fats (butter vs. shortening) and the amount of water and the degree of blending and the ambient temperature and humidity can all affect the gluten in the dough and therefore affect the flakiness of the crust. I decided to use the alternative of half butter and half shortening and to cut the fats in with a pastry blender and not use the food processor.

The crust, after being in the refrigerator for a day was rather difficult to roll. I had a very hard time and after some frustration gathered the dough and smashed it all into a ball again. I then repented of my foolish behavior, stopped yelling at the dough and attempted to roll it out again. It went OK, but I need to work on getting a basic round shape to my crust as I roll it...I am sure this will come with time and practice.

The Filling: I started with a recipe for apple pie that is titled Apple Pie I. I noticed that Apple Pie II has a filling that starts out on the stove top, but we will get to that at another time.

I have determined that I will not let any preconceived ideas into the process of going through this book, so I am reading all the notes and hints and when Irma wrote about the different kinds of apples I almost skipped that because I know that apple pie calls for Granny Smith Apples, by golly! Well I went ahead and read her recommendations and she went on about texture and sweetness and how fluffy a Rome Beauty is when it is cooked, the tenderness of the Jonagold and how thick the Newton Pippin’s applesauce is, then she said the Golden Delicious is among a few splendid varieties that are suited to both eating and baking. She also said that smaller apples will be less mealy than large ones, I remember my grandmother saying that as well.

So I went to the market (I use “market” because it sounds cooler than “store”) and chose the nicest looking smallish Golden Delicious apples in the bin; two and one-half pounds or about seven apples. When I cut the apples on my Pampered Chef® Apple Peeler Corer Slicer (APCS) it turned out that I had about two extra apples since I was suppose to have six cups. I always cut my apples with the APCS because I have been told, from different sources such as Irma and also the America’s Test Kitchen that when you bake you should have all your fruit, meat, vegetable or whatever very close in size and it will cook more evenly. If you have never used an Apple Peeler Corer Slicer you should have or attend a Pampered Chef show and get one or at least see one used. They are amazing.

Let us get back to the pie. I have always made apple pies by putting the recommended sugar, cinnamon and flour or corn starch in with the apples and then mix it up and plop it into the crust. Not this time, Irma said I should mix the sugar, etc. with the apples and let it “stand for fifteen minutes, stirring several times, so that the apples will soften and better fit into the crust.” I was glad I did, because at the end of fifteen minutes the apples were softer. I did not think it would make a difference, but it did.

Baking: The instructions were pretty simple after I assembled the pie I put it in the oven for 30 minutes at 425 degrees and then slide a cookie sheet under it and turn it down to 350 for another 30 to 45 minutes. Well, I screwed up and forgot to turn the oven down. Luckily I did put the sheet under it and it needed it. So I checked the pie after about 20 minutes with the sheet under it and the top crust was starting to burn a little in one corner. I have a hot spot in the back right corner of my oven which causes me to have to turn all my baking halfway through to get even cooking. So I tested the apples with a knife and they were done so I took it out to cool.

I must be rolling out my crust too thin because when I was done with the pie crust I had a lot of dough left. So I took one of the extra apples and since the APCS leaves the apple whole and kind of like an apple slinky I did not cut this one into thirds like the ones for the pie. I left it whole and stuck a small pat of butter in the core hole and then a tablespoon or so of brown sugar a little flour and some cinnamon and then plugged it with another piece of butter. I then rolled out enough of the dough to wrap the apple and brought the dough up like a gift bag around the apple, pinched it around while still leaving an opening in the top, sprinkled it with sugar and cinnamon and placed it in an oven proof saucer and baked it along with the pie. It was fabulous.

I also took the last remaining dough and made cinnamon and sugar crisps like my mom used to. Oh, my word they were great. I could hardly stop eating them and when the wife o’ my life came home from work she hovered over them for a good while herself!

I have never seen an apple pie that held together like this one. When you cut a piece it stayed as a piece, not wandering all over the plate like a puddle. The taste of the filling was the best I have ever had. I do not know if it was the Golden Delicious apples or the resting time before assembly or what, but it was great.

The wife o’ my life was going to take the pie to work, but she waited a day and my kids took care of it for her. Oh, well I am going to make the Winter Peach Pie next and she can take that one!

Inspiration and Motivation

I recently was asked by Sues, the wife o' my life, after making a pie, "Is this your pie crust, or did you buy it?"
Of course I bought it, because two years ago I was living in a fantasy land of thinking my pie crust was great. All flakey and wonderful and enjoyed by all who tasted it. Then my wife told someone, in my hearing, "Oh, Lewis' pie crust is O.K., passable, but not nearly as good as my mom's." Needless to say I have not made a pie crust since. It is a lot of work to go to for mediocrity.

In our recent pie crust conversation the wife o' my life told me, "You should make your own crusts, they are better than these store-bought ones."

How do you like that, a pie crust compliment and a challenge at the same time?

It has been a goal of mine for, well as long as I can remember to be really good at something -- anything.

For a little more background on the inspiration and motivation of this endeavor I was recently, along with Sues, invited to a party. The theme was "Julie and Julia." Each of the guests were to bring an appetizer to share and we watched two or three episodes of old Julia Child cooking shows and then we watched the movie "Julie and Julia." I loved the party. The food, fellowship and the movie were all great.

One more piece of the puzzle: I decided to make a pie every week in order to perfect my skills and also because I am currently not working and it gives me something to look forward to; a challenge. So in week one I made a cherry pie from scratch. Cherries are not in season so I used canned cherries, not pie filling. As a side note, I will never buy cherry pie filling again. It is so easy and the result is far superior. The second week I thought I would try a different fruit so I thought my son David said his favorite was blueberry, but he actually said blackberry, oh, well we are having blueberry pie this week.

I was perusing the cookbooks at the public library while the wife o’ my life was looking at the various magazines and found an interesting book titled “Joy of Cooking; All About Pies and Tarts” by Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker and Ethan Becker. When we were married back in 1984 we received the Joy of Cooking as a wedding present and that is how I learned to cook. What a great book. So I had to check out this small volume in the All About series of Joy of Cooking.

So here is the challenge. Based on all I have just told you I am going to attempt to make every recipe in Joy of Cooking; All about Pies and Tarts. There are about 61 dessert pies and 13 savory pies in the book so if I double up a few weeks and make the savory pies for dinner I should be able to finish the book in a year. So my goal will be to finish all the recipes in 2010.

I do not pretend to be as good a cook or as good a writer as Julie Powell, but I will be better at both, I hope as a result of this project.