This has been a hard winter. Even now that it's spring, it is hard. The weather is cold, not in a crisp, renewing way, but in an invasive, corrosive, mildewy way. Cherry trees bloomed late this year, and even their blossoms look a little washed out and tired.
Golden Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
2 T olive oil
1 small yellow onion, small dice
2 stalks celery, small dice
2 large carrots, small dice
1 sweet potato, cubed
3-4 small golden beets, cubed
2 C dry sherry
1 C vegetable stock
16 oz heavy cream
2 T kosher salt
1/4 tsp. black pepper
2 T Berbere or similar spice mixture
2 T vinegar, such as red wine or cherry
3 large eggs
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Heat a heavy bottomed pot over medium high flame. Add olive oil when the pot is hot, then saute the onions, celery, and carrots, seasoned with salt, until they have released their moisture and begun to color a bit. Deglaze the pot with sherry, and reduce by half.
Add the sweet potato, beets, and vegetable stock, and bring to a boil. Then cover the pot and place in the heated oven for 1 1/2 hours until the vegetables are tender.
Meanwhile, reduce the heavy cream by half. Pour the cream into a cold, large, heavy bottomed sauce pan, and heat to a boil. The cream will foam and rise a few times during the process. Make sure it does not boil over. When the cream takes on a slightly nutty aroma, remove it from the heat and season with salt and pepper.
When the vegetables are tender, remove from oven and add the reduced cream. Puree the mixture in a blender or food processor until smooth, then pass through a food mill or press through a tamis to refine the texture. Add the Berbere, and season to taste with salt, pepper, and vinegar.
Mix the eggs together, then pour into the vegetable mixture and combine thoroughly.
Pour the filling into the crust and bake until the edges are set and the center of the pie jiggles slightly. Cool at least one hour before serving.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Banoffee Pie
I have seen my future happiness and it is a barbecue joint on the northern tip of the Orchid Isle.
On the cusp of rain forest and desert, ocean and mountain, grassland and beach, a little shack with some picnic tables and an open pit sounds just about right. One of the largest and oldest cattle ranches in the U.S. deserves a little 'que down the street. And there's already an established and fervent devotion to slow smoke of the porcine variety, why not the bovine? Hawaii even has a hardwood related to mesquite - it's kismet.
Here's the menu:
Brisket
Beans
Rice
Macaroni Salad
Sweet breads from the Punalu'u Bakery, southernmost bakery in the United States
Onions
Cucumber and Jalapeno pickles
Coconut cream pie
I seriously considered coleslaw, because cabbage is a close second to beets in my favorite vegetable category. But that would really put a damper on advertising plate lunch. The macaroni salad won out - I'd like a side of starch with my starch, please. Maybe I will have both.
In tangential honor of my huli future, here is an imperialist pie with a tropical fruit. This is not for the faint of heart, and it is probably advisable to eat a very small wedge with a cup of very strong, black tea to counteract the high chance of falling into a diabetic coma. What is with the British and their sweet tooth?
Banoffee Pie
Pastry for a single crust pie
4 oz sweet butter
1 very ripe banana, frozen and peeled
1/2 C Brown sugar
14 oz sweetened condensed milk
1/2 tsp. Salt
1 tsp. Vanilla
4-6 barely ripe bananas
Lemon juice
Good quality, unsweetened cocoa powder
Vanilla ice cream
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 10" circle and place into an 8" tart plate with a removable bottom. Press the pastry into the edges and trim any excess. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove tart plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Mash the frozen banana until it becomes a smooth paste.
Melt the butter over medium high heat in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Add the banana to this and saute lightly. Sprinkle the brown sugar over the bananas and heat until the sugar melts into the mixture. Pour the sweetened condensed milk into the mixture, stirring constantly.
When this mixture begins to bubble, reduce the heat to medium, or the lowest level of heat needed to maintain the bubbling. Stir constantly with a heat resistant utensil. The mixture will steam and then begin to darken in color. When the color has changed to a light caramel, stir in the salt and vanilla, then remove from heat and immediately pour into the waiting tart shell.
Do not serve until completely cooled.
To serve, cut the bananas cross-wise into 1/4" slices and sprinkle with lemon juice to preserve color. Arrange a layer of slices over the top of the tart, then arrange another layer of bananas over this. Dust the top of the tart with unsweetened cocoa powder. Garnish conservative slices with vanilla ice cream.
On the cusp of rain forest and desert, ocean and mountain, grassland and beach, a little shack with some picnic tables and an open pit sounds just about right. One of the largest and oldest cattle ranches in the U.S. deserves a little 'que down the street. And there's already an established and fervent devotion to slow smoke of the porcine variety, why not the bovine? Hawaii even has a hardwood related to mesquite - it's kismet.
Here's the menu:
Brisket
Beans
Rice
Macaroni Salad
Sweet breads from the Punalu'u Bakery, southernmost bakery in the United States
Onions
Cucumber and Jalapeno pickles
Coconut cream pie
I seriously considered coleslaw, because cabbage is a close second to beets in my favorite vegetable category. But that would really put a damper on advertising plate lunch. The macaroni salad won out - I'd like a side of starch with my starch, please. Maybe I will have both.
In tangential honor of my huli future, here is an imperialist pie with a tropical fruit. This is not for the faint of heart, and it is probably advisable to eat a very small wedge with a cup of very strong, black tea to counteract the high chance of falling into a diabetic coma. What is with the British and their sweet tooth?
Banoffee Pie
Pastry for a single crust pie
4 oz sweet butter
1 very ripe banana, frozen and peeled
1/2 C Brown sugar
14 oz sweetened condensed milk
1/2 tsp. Salt
1 tsp. Vanilla
4-6 barely ripe bananas
Lemon juice
Good quality, unsweetened cocoa powder
Vanilla ice cream
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 10" circle and place into an 8" tart plate with a removable bottom. Press the pastry into the edges and trim any excess. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove tart plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Mash the frozen banana until it becomes a smooth paste.
Melt the butter over medium high heat in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Add the banana to this and saute lightly. Sprinkle the brown sugar over the bananas and heat until the sugar melts into the mixture. Pour the sweetened condensed milk into the mixture, stirring constantly.
When this mixture begins to bubble, reduce the heat to medium, or the lowest level of heat needed to maintain the bubbling. Stir constantly with a heat resistant utensil. The mixture will steam and then begin to darken in color. When the color has changed to a light caramel, stir in the salt and vanilla, then remove from heat and immediately pour into the waiting tart shell.
Do not serve until completely cooled.
To serve, cut the bananas cross-wise into 1/4" slices and sprinkle with lemon juice to preserve color. Arrange a layer of slices over the top of the tart, then arrange another layer of bananas over this. Dust the top of the tart with unsweetened cocoa powder. Garnish conservative slices with vanilla ice cream.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Chess Pie
My practicality and impulsiveness are in a fight. It's rough.
Practicality has had the upper hand by a slim margin since the winter '07/'08 series, when the triple combination of a panic over no health insurance, a fellow line cook with chronically untrimmed, unclean fingernails, and rats in the cocktail lounge took impulsiveness down in an upset. Before that, the Big I enjoyed a nearly unchallenged three and a half year reign. The last year or so it's done some rebuilding, recruited a few promising rookies, made some trades, and it's giving Ol' P a run for its money.
I don't know enough about sports for a good metaphor.
Every few years or so, I begin to chafe in my daily routine. It's like I am a plant that requires a larger pot. Maybe not a larger one, necessarily, but a different shaped one. Maybe I unconsciously adopted David Rakoff's book title as a directive - Don't get too comfortable. Who knows. I'm not flighty. Not really. I don't know. I research things. I stew about them. I run simulations and make contingency plans. And every 14 months or so I either get a new job, get a promotion, learn a new trade, or in extreme cases, take 6 weeks off to drive across the country. I like to have my fingers in a lot of pies, so to speak. I only have 10 fingers, though, and there are many more pies than that to muck about in. Lately, I've been feeling the itch in the form of dreams about traveling in Europe. There's the usual lounging on a piazza with a glass of wine, but my dreams come complete with detailed planning about the minimum number of items I can carry in one shoulder bag and still be prepared for any eventuality. This time, it'll have to be travel that satisfies the urge. My capriciousness in this situation, though, is tempered somewhat by my significant other, who is significantly more rooted than I. He's a tree, I'm crabgrass.
This is not to say I don't enjoy comfort. I am an accomplished couch potato. I enjoy actual potatoes in mashed form and the occasional scoop of vanilla bean ice cream. I have recently discovered the illicit joy of that guiltiest of pleasures, a Sloppy Joe sandwich (you think I admit that to the people I work with? and yes, I make them with Heinz ketchup).
Chess pie kind of embodies this internal conundrum. Sure, it's a rich, buttery sugar pie, the epitome of easy to eat indulgence. But what's with the corn meal? Vinegar! What gives? If those weren't impulsive improvisations, I don't know what is. You can tell the difference. Instead of a one dimensional sweetness, there's a little grit at the bottom and some zing at the top to complement the happy butter tart in the middle.
Chess Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
4 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
1 2/3 C sugar
3 T yellow corn meal
2 T cider vinegar
6 oz sweet butter
1 T vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Place the whole eggs and yolks in a bowl. Break all of the yolks and stir lightly. Add the sugar, corn meal, vinegar, and vanilla and mix just to combine.
Place the butter in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Melt over medium high heat, swirling occasionally. Leave the butter on the heat until it has foamed and the milk solids have fallen to the bottom and begun to brown. It will have a slightly nutty aroma. Arrest the browning process by submerging the bottom of the sauce pan in cool water. Allow the butter to cool a bit before adding it in a slow stream to the egg mixture while stirring constantly.
Pour the filling into the pie shell. Bake the pie at 350 until the top has browned and the filling is mostly set, about 45 minutes. Allow to cool for at least one hour before serving.
Practicality has had the upper hand by a slim margin since the winter '07/'08 series, when the triple combination of a panic over no health insurance, a fellow line cook with chronically untrimmed, unclean fingernails, and rats in the cocktail lounge took impulsiveness down in an upset. Before that, the Big I enjoyed a nearly unchallenged three and a half year reign. The last year or so it's done some rebuilding, recruited a few promising rookies, made some trades, and it's giving Ol' P a run for its money.
I don't know enough about sports for a good metaphor.
Every few years or so, I begin to chafe in my daily routine. It's like I am a plant that requires a larger pot. Maybe not a larger one, necessarily, but a different shaped one. Maybe I unconsciously adopted David Rakoff's book title as a directive - Don't get too comfortable. Who knows. I'm not flighty. Not really. I don't know. I research things. I stew about them. I run simulations and make contingency plans. And every 14 months or so I either get a new job, get a promotion, learn a new trade, or in extreme cases, take 6 weeks off to drive across the country. I like to have my fingers in a lot of pies, so to speak. I only have 10 fingers, though, and there are many more pies than that to muck about in. Lately, I've been feeling the itch in the form of dreams about traveling in Europe. There's the usual lounging on a piazza with a glass of wine, but my dreams come complete with detailed planning about the minimum number of items I can carry in one shoulder bag and still be prepared for any eventuality. This time, it'll have to be travel that satisfies the urge. My capriciousness in this situation, though, is tempered somewhat by my significant other, who is significantly more rooted than I. He's a tree, I'm crabgrass.
This is not to say I don't enjoy comfort. I am an accomplished couch potato. I enjoy actual potatoes in mashed form and the occasional scoop of vanilla bean ice cream. I have recently discovered the illicit joy of that guiltiest of pleasures, a Sloppy Joe sandwich (you think I admit that to the people I work with? and yes, I make them with Heinz ketchup).
Chess pie kind of embodies this internal conundrum. Sure, it's a rich, buttery sugar pie, the epitome of easy to eat indulgence. But what's with the corn meal? Vinegar! What gives? If those weren't impulsive improvisations, I don't know what is. You can tell the difference. Instead of a one dimensional sweetness, there's a little grit at the bottom and some zing at the top to complement the happy butter tart in the middle.
Chess Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
4 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
1 2/3 C sugar
3 T yellow corn meal
2 T cider vinegar
6 oz sweet butter
1 T vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Place the whole eggs and yolks in a bowl. Break all of the yolks and stir lightly. Add the sugar, corn meal, vinegar, and vanilla and mix just to combine.
Place the butter in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Melt over medium high heat, swirling occasionally. Leave the butter on the heat until it has foamed and the milk solids have fallen to the bottom and begun to brown. It will have a slightly nutty aroma. Arrest the browning process by submerging the bottom of the sauce pan in cool water. Allow the butter to cool a bit before adding it in a slow stream to the egg mixture while stirring constantly.
Pour the filling into the pie shell. Bake the pie at 350 until the top has browned and the filling is mostly set, about 45 minutes. Allow to cool for at least one hour before serving.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Shoofly Pie
Let me just say, I was wrong. For this I apologize. I was wrong, but so was Marion Cunningham. Not Richie and Joanie's mom, silly, but she of The Fannie Farmer Baking Book. Shoofly pie is not merely a sugar pie. Nor is it a translucent custard. It is something altogether more dark and complex and strange.
Have you ever had chocolate pudding cake? Mind you, this is not a chocolate lava cake - the kind that was popping up on nearly every menu for a time, from fancy-dancy view restaurants to greasy spoons - which is really just an underbaked chocolate cupcake. No. Chocolate pudding cake is a science project that took an unexpected turn. A proto-brownie, sprinkled with cocoa and sugar, drenched with boiling water then shoved in the oven until you end up with a fluffy, rich chocolate cake floating on top of a molten lake of fudge sauce. Who thinks of these things?
As it turns out, shoofly pie is something akin to a molasses flavored coffeecake concealing an obsidian custard in a tender flaky pie crust.
By the way, today's pie crust was on the right side of perfect.
These kinds of desserts really highlight the dominance of French cooking techniques in our modern kitchens. Auguste Escoffier and Fernand Point and Julia Child really did a number on those weird English recipes you find poking around cookbooks from the teens and twenties. Boiling water used to be a key ingredient. So did dried fruits, especially raisins. A few months ago I had a cookie consisting of a lemon dough wrapped around raisins that had been boiled within an inch of their lives and then highly spiced. It was an interesting snack, and somebody's granny was famous for them. But when is the last time you ran into something like that at your local corporate coffee shop? Another one that intrigues me is mock apple pie, made with soda crackers and lemon juice. This is probably just my current fascination with Depression make-do cooking talking. Of course, a lot of these old recipes are unbearably heavy. No wonder dyspepsia was such a common ailment. Mincemeat pie with actual meat and a little beef tallow thrown in for good measure, anyone? It's an acquired taste, I'm sure.
Some of these weird concoctions are worth saving, though. Shoofly pie is certainly one of them.
Shoofly Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
1 C A.P. flour
1 C brown sugar
4 T butter
1 C black strap molasses
1/2 C golden syrup
2 eggs
1 1/2 C water
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
Preheat oven to 375. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Mix flour and brown sugar to combine. Cut the butter into the flour sugar mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs. Set aside.
In a small bowl, beat the eggs together. Pour molasses and golden syrup into the eggs and beat to combine. Set aside.
Bring the water to a boil in a heavy saucepan and then add baking soda and salt. This will foam and bubble as soon as the soda is added.
Temper the syrup and egg mixture with the boiling water, then pour this into the rest of the water, stirring constantly. Pour the crumb mixture into the molasses mixture all at once. Mix lightly until just combined - it will be lumpy.
Remove the pastry from the freezer. Prick the crust in several places with a fork or paring knife to prevent air bubbles. Pour the filling into the crust.
Bake the pie at 375 for 10 minutes. Lower the oven temperature to 350 and bake an additional 20-35 minutes, until the edges are puffed and the center is set but jiggles slightly. Remove from the oven and allow to cool at least 30 minutes before slicing. Serve with a dollop of unsweetened whipped cream.
Have you ever had chocolate pudding cake? Mind you, this is not a chocolate lava cake - the kind that was popping up on nearly every menu for a time, from fancy-dancy view restaurants to greasy spoons - which is really just an underbaked chocolate cupcake. No. Chocolate pudding cake is a science project that took an unexpected turn. A proto-brownie, sprinkled with cocoa and sugar, drenched with boiling water then shoved in the oven until you end up with a fluffy, rich chocolate cake floating on top of a molten lake of fudge sauce. Who thinks of these things?
As it turns out, shoofly pie is something akin to a molasses flavored coffeecake concealing an obsidian custard in a tender flaky pie crust.
By the way, today's pie crust was on the right side of perfect.
These kinds of desserts really highlight the dominance of French cooking techniques in our modern kitchens. Auguste Escoffier and Fernand Point and Julia Child really did a number on those weird English recipes you find poking around cookbooks from the teens and twenties. Boiling water used to be a key ingredient. So did dried fruits, especially raisins. A few months ago I had a cookie consisting of a lemon dough wrapped around raisins that had been boiled within an inch of their lives and then highly spiced. It was an interesting snack, and somebody's granny was famous for them. But when is the last time you ran into something like that at your local corporate coffee shop? Another one that intrigues me is mock apple pie, made with soda crackers and lemon juice. This is probably just my current fascination with Depression make-do cooking talking. Of course, a lot of these old recipes are unbearably heavy. No wonder dyspepsia was such a common ailment. Mincemeat pie with actual meat and a little beef tallow thrown in for good measure, anyone? It's an acquired taste, I'm sure.
Some of these weird concoctions are worth saving, though. Shoofly pie is certainly one of them.
Shoofly Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
1 C A.P. flour
1 C brown sugar
4 T butter
1 C black strap molasses
1/2 C golden syrup
2 eggs
1 1/2 C water
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
Preheat oven to 375. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Mix flour and brown sugar to combine. Cut the butter into the flour sugar mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs. Set aside.
In a small bowl, beat the eggs together. Pour molasses and golden syrup into the eggs and beat to combine. Set aside.
Bring the water to a boil in a heavy saucepan and then add baking soda and salt. This will foam and bubble as soon as the soda is added.
Temper the syrup and egg mixture with the boiling water, then pour this into the rest of the water, stirring constantly. Pour the crumb mixture into the molasses mixture all at once. Mix lightly until just combined - it will be lumpy.
Remove the pastry from the freezer. Prick the crust in several places with a fork or paring knife to prevent air bubbles. Pour the filling into the crust.
Bake the pie at 375 for 10 minutes. Lower the oven temperature to 350 and bake an additional 20-35 minutes, until the edges are puffed and the center is set but jiggles slightly. Remove from the oven and allow to cool at least 30 minutes before slicing. Serve with a dollop of unsweetened whipped cream.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
The Ur-Pie
Lately, I've been thinking about the origins of pie in a purely speculative sense. It must be something like the sandwich creation myth - Evinrude, Subearl of Pie, was playing bones one night, when he felt a rumbling in his tumbling. He turned to his manservant, Throg, and asked for a snack that he can hold in one hand and eat without getting too messy. Throg went out to the cooking terrace and took stock - a little leftover boar stew, some rendered fat, and ground wheat they used for making crackers - and had an idea. What if Throg wrapped the cracker dough around a ladle of stew and then baked it on the stone? Then Evinrude could hold the cracker and the stew would be inside. yada yada yada.
Could be. That's not such a good example, but I like to make up stories about things I like. Early last year, I went to a concert by DeVotchKa, a band I had never heard of. A guitar, a Theremin, an accordion, a violin, a double bass, a sousaphone, a trumpet, and some drums (all these played in various combinations by four people) put on a pretty good show. I’ll just say it, it was awesome. Partly, it was just great to see all the little hipster boys in girl jeans really getting in to pop-polka. Also, near the end there was a girl acrobat who danced on scarves hanging from the ceiling about 10 feet from where I was standing. Mostly, though, it made me so happy to see those people having such fun playing all this disparate music together. You could almost hear their distinct personalities peeking out of the sound as a whole.A few days later, I was poking around the interwebs, absent-mindedly looking for information about the band. I only made it as far as their website, though, because it was so vague and evocative that it tickled my fancy. I imagined three friends in music school together: two of them promising students, serious about their studies, the third a bright but distracted playboy who may or may not have been a regular class attendee, depending on whether the subject matter interested him. These three were taking a traditional music class together, and one evening while they were supposed to be working on a group project, they got to talking, and then maybe a little jamming. It was fun, and even after the class was over for the semester, they continued getting together. Maybe one night, the tuba player’s sometime-stoner friend, who was a drummer (tubas and percussion sit close to each other in orchestra), came over and joined in He confessed an abiding love of mariachi trumpet riffs. And so DeVotchKa was born.
This is most certainly not what happened, but it was exciting to think about.
I’ve been trying to reduce pie to its essence, at least the sweet pies. What is the barest list of ingredients you can have and still have something recognizable? You gotta have sugar, obviously. Then some eggs, to make it stick together. A little bit of liquid, because otherwise you just have sweet scrambled eggs, and some flavor, from the liquid or otherwise. Maybe some fat. Okay, of course some fat. Really, the simplest pie that is pie is sugar pie, honey bunch. Then you’ve got treacle tarts, and shoofly pie, and pecan pie, for when you want to be fancy. I could go on. So I will. Consider this next little while a meditation on sugar pie.
Brown Sugar Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
1 C packed brown sugar
4 T butter
3 large eggs
1 C whole milk
1 T vanilla
1 tsp. salt
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Cream butter and sugar and salt.
Add eggs one at a time, incorporating each completely before adding the next.
Mix in milk and vanilla until well combined.
Pour filling into pie crust. Bake at 350 until edges puff and the center is set but still jiggles, 40 minutes to an hour. Allow to cool completely before slicing.
Serve with sweetened whipped cream, if desired.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Beet Pie
When I was little, I was the kid sitting at the dinner table, long after everyone else had left, after dishes had been washed and dried and put away, after my sister had tired of taunting me about the television she was able to watch and I was not, because I would not eat my vegetables. Lima beans, peas, those fucking Brussels sprouts, I did not have a taste for them.
This was an unhappy coincidence, because my mother loved all vegetables. It was not uncommon for my sister and me to finish setting the table ("forks on the left!"), look at each other wordlessly weighing the pros and cons of a spat in the moments before supper, decide better of it before sliding along the walls of the dining room around the doorway into the kitchen to find not one, but two green things steaming next to the meatloaf or roasted chicken thighs on the stove. It is a testament to my mom's cooking in general, or maybe my optimistic nature, that I did not dread these meals. Eventually I figured out the trick of mixing peas in with mashed potatoes to get through.
The only vegetable I don't remember encountering was a beet. I had a vague notion that they existed, of course, but we didn't cross paths for many years. The first time I actually saw a beet in any form, I was a teenager visiting my mother's brother and his family. It was after supper on a humid but breezy summer evening, and various members of the family were still lingering around the table, conversating, when my little girl cousin climbed up into my aunt's lap and asked if she could have some beets. My aunt looked at her a little quizzically, since we'd all finished eating, and beets had most certainly not been part of the menu, but shrugged and reached into the refrigerator, retrieving a Ball jar full of a dark red liquid with rounded chunks jostling around in it. The little girl pulled out a few chunks, chewing thoughtfully between each one. My aunt reached for the lid to screw it back on, but my cousin emitted a little whine to indicate that she intended to eat some more. I think she ended up finishing the jar.
Curiosity eventually got the better of me. After I moved away and began feeding myself, I gradually retried my old enemies. Yellow squash, eggplant, mustard greens, even sauerkraut turned out to tickle my fancy. On a whim one evening, I bought a can of pickled beets, just to see what it would be like. I know, a can. But I was probably 22 and who really thinks clearly at that age? And anyway, I loved them. I have never looked back. Steamed, roasted, but best of all, home pickled, hiding in the back of the fridge, just waiting for a 2 am date with pumpernickel toast and goat cheese. Beets taste like the earth from which they come, but not hard, cold winter dirt. More like warm, black loam, freshly aerated in anticipation of new seedlings. They taste like potential.
Beet Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
1 1/2 # red beets (4-5 medium)
1/2 large yellow onion
1 medium fennel bulb
Olive oil
2 C dry sherry
1 C vegetable stock, plus additional for blending
4 T butter
4 oz chevre
1 T kosher salt
1/2 tsp. black pepper
3 large eggs
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Raise oven temperature to 400. Wash and trim beets. Rub with olive oil and sprinkle liberally with salt. Roast until very tender, about 1 1/2 hours.
Meanwhile, finely dice onion and 1/2 of fennel bulb. Heat 2 T olive oil in a heavy bottomed skillet. Sweat onions and fennel until translucent. Raise heat to medium high, and saute until the edges of the aromatics turn golden brown. Deglaze with 1 C sherry. Reduce until almost dry, and then deglaze with 1 C vegetable stock. Reduce by half. Remove from heat and transfer vegetables to a clean bowl.
Return skillet to heat and pour in remaining sherry. Reduce by half. Remove from heat and swirl in butter 1 T at a time. Whisk in chevre until the liquid is completely smooth. Set aside.
When beets have cooled enough to handle, peel away the skins. Reduce oven temperature to 350.
Roughly chop the beets and add them to the bowl with the onion and fennel mixture. Place a third of this mixture in a blender, along with enough vegetable stock to lubricate. Blend until homogenized. Pour the blended mixture into a food mill fit with the finest die. Blend the remaining mixture in thirds and pour into the food mill. Press the beet mixture through the food mill. If desired, you may press this mixture through a tamis for further refinement.
Beat the eggs together. Temper with the sherry chevre sauce. Add this all to the beet mixture.
Pour the filling into the crust. Bake until the sides have puffed slightly and the center has barely set. Remove from the oven and cool for at least one hour before slicing.
This was an unhappy coincidence, because my mother loved all vegetables. It was not uncommon for my sister and me to finish setting the table ("forks on the left!"), look at each other wordlessly weighing the pros and cons of a spat in the moments before supper, decide better of it before sliding along the walls of the dining room around the doorway into the kitchen to find not one, but two green things steaming next to the meatloaf or roasted chicken thighs on the stove. It is a testament to my mom's cooking in general, or maybe my optimistic nature, that I did not dread these meals. Eventually I figured out the trick of mixing peas in with mashed potatoes to get through.
The only vegetable I don't remember encountering was a beet. I had a vague notion that they existed, of course, but we didn't cross paths for many years. The first time I actually saw a beet in any form, I was a teenager visiting my mother's brother and his family. It was after supper on a humid but breezy summer evening, and various members of the family were still lingering around the table, conversating, when my little girl cousin climbed up into my aunt's lap and asked if she could have some beets. My aunt looked at her a little quizzically, since we'd all finished eating, and beets had most certainly not been part of the menu, but shrugged and reached into the refrigerator, retrieving a Ball jar full of a dark red liquid with rounded chunks jostling around in it. The little girl pulled out a few chunks, chewing thoughtfully between each one. My aunt reached for the lid to screw it back on, but my cousin emitted a little whine to indicate that she intended to eat some more. I think she ended up finishing the jar.
Curiosity eventually got the better of me. After I moved away and began feeding myself, I gradually retried my old enemies. Yellow squash, eggplant, mustard greens, even sauerkraut turned out to tickle my fancy. On a whim one evening, I bought a can of pickled beets, just to see what it would be like. I know, a can. But I was probably 22 and who really thinks clearly at that age? And anyway, I loved them. I have never looked back. Steamed, roasted, but best of all, home pickled, hiding in the back of the fridge, just waiting for a 2 am date with pumpernickel toast and goat cheese. Beets taste like the earth from which they come, but not hard, cold winter dirt. More like warm, black loam, freshly aerated in anticipation of new seedlings. They taste like potential.
Beet Pie
Pastry for single crust pie
1 1/2 # red beets (4-5 medium)
1/2 large yellow onion
1 medium fennel bulb
Olive oil
2 C dry sherry
1 C vegetable stock, plus additional for blending
4 T butter
4 oz chevre
1 T kosher salt
1/2 tsp. black pepper
3 large eggs
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Raise oven temperature to 400. Wash and trim beets. Rub with olive oil and sprinkle liberally with salt. Roast until very tender, about 1 1/2 hours.
Meanwhile, finely dice onion and 1/2 of fennel bulb. Heat 2 T olive oil in a heavy bottomed skillet. Sweat onions and fennel until translucent. Raise heat to medium high, and saute until the edges of the aromatics turn golden brown. Deglaze with 1 C sherry. Reduce until almost dry, and then deglaze with 1 C vegetable stock. Reduce by half. Remove from heat and transfer vegetables to a clean bowl.
Return skillet to heat and pour in remaining sherry. Reduce by half. Remove from heat and swirl in butter 1 T at a time. Whisk in chevre until the liquid is completely smooth. Set aside.
When beets have cooled enough to handle, peel away the skins. Reduce oven temperature to 350.
Roughly chop the beets and add them to the bowl with the onion and fennel mixture. Place a third of this mixture in a blender, along with enough vegetable stock to lubricate. Blend until homogenized. Pour the blended mixture into a food mill fit with the finest die. Blend the remaining mixture in thirds and pour into the food mill. Press the beet mixture through the food mill. If desired, you may press this mixture through a tamis for further refinement.
Beat the eggs together. Temper with the sherry chevre sauce. Add this all to the beet mixture.
Pour the filling into the crust. Bake until the sides have puffed slightly and the center has barely set. Remove from the oven and cool for at least one hour before slicing.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Vinegar Pie
I have a confession to make. It's one of those things one doesn't say out loud in mixed company for fear of someone taking it the wrong way, or really for fear of jinxing everyone, not least of all myself. I will whisper it.
I am secretly excited about the impending economic depression.
Especially with the staggering job losses of the last few weeks and the growing number of houses with dark windows and for sale signs, even in my relatively smug little neighborhood, it's a horrible thing to wish on. When I actually imagine the uncertainty of work hours or paychecks or healthcare, not to mention rent checks or food, I fall into a small panic. I have never really known hardship. Sure, I've worked continually since I was 16, held 2 and 3 jobs at times, but I've always been able to sock away a bit - enough for an IRA, enough to pay off credit cards every few years, enough to confidently quit a job that disagrees with me (or with which I disagree) without another immediately lined up, if it comes to that. I am a person who keeps an Excel spreadsheet to budget every penny - living expenses, savings, investments, mad money. I like to know what my future holds. I like to be in control.
At this point my loved ones are rolling their eyes in concert saying, "Tell us something new."
But seriously, losing control of my future because of the decisions of a bunch of guys who have no concept of what it means to make a living, to make enough to live on and with any luck just a little extra, frightens me. A couple of days ago I read an article about the declining meaning of money; about how when Enron gambled away $11.5 million of its employees' retirement, that was a big deal, and now Madoff has made off with $50 billion, yet the top story in the financial pages is the $500,000 salary cap for the asshole CEOs heading those banks that got a piece of the nearing $1 trillion bailout. I guess for a while, I haven't felt all that in control anyway. I feel locked out of the stairwell of upward mobility. Maybe what I'm excited about is that now everyone will have to scrap a little. A depression could shuffle a stacked deck, level the so-called playing field, give the rest of us a fighting chance - pick your metaphor. This is not the first time I could be called a pinko.
When the first really bad news started coming out, around last October, my friends and I began to compare notes about what we were doing to steel ourselves - buying dried beans in bulk and getting to know the fluorescent aisles of Cash'n'Carries. We may have a head start, since the mark of a good cook is not how delicious you make the choice ingredients, but how irresistible you make the scraps. I was flipping through cookbooks around this time when I found a recipe for vinegar pie. I had never heard of such a thing! According to Ruth Reichl, it enjoyed enduring popularity up until the '60s. And who was doing a good amount of the pie making then? All of those Depression moms who scrapped and saved and improvised the last time around. It was worth a try.
What I discovered is that vinegar pie is essentially a custard based on an acid just like lemon curd. I tweaked the recipe a little to add some richness and intensify the flavor. With apple cider vinegar and a little cinnamon, it tastes almost exactly like apple pie without the apples. Why not slap a lattice on top to complete the illusion?
Vinegar Pie
Pastry for single layer pie crust, extra if lattice design is desired
3 large eggs
1 C. sugar
2 T A.P. flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 C apple cider vinegar
1/4 C water
4 T sweet butter, cut into cubes
Egg wash
Cinnamon sugar
Preheat oven to 350.
If you desire a lattice, roll out a 10" circle of pastry and cut 3/4" wide strips from it. Arrange the strips on a flat cookie sheet lined with parchment paper in a lattice pattern with a 9" diameter. Place your overturned pie plate over the lattice and press to make an indentation. Cut away any excess dough which falls outside the circle of indentation. Brush the design with egg wash and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake the lattice until golden brown. Remove from oven and cool completely.
Roll out pastry and place in a 9" pie plate. Blind bake the bottom crust at the same time the top lattice is baking.
In a small saucepan, whisk together 3/4 C sugar with flour, salt, and cinnamon. Pour vinegar and water into the sugar mixture, whisking constantly. Bring mixture to a boil over medium-high heat, whisking until sugar has completely dissolved.
Meanwhile, whisk together the eggs and remaining 1/4 C sugar. When vinegar mixture has come to a boil, temper the egg mixture with it - drizzling the hot liquid slowly into the eggs , whisking constantly.
Return the warm mixture to the saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until the mixture thickens to the point of coating the back of the spoon. Turn off the heat, and stir in the butter, cube by cube, adding a new cube as the old one melts away.
Pour the hot filling into the hot pie shell. If the bottom crust is not ready at the same time as the filling, transfer the filling to a cool receptacle and cover with parchment paper.
Bake the pie until the filling has set, about 15-20 minutes. Cool completely.
Gently and carefully slide the lattice onto the top of the pie.
Serve with sweetened whipped cream.
I am secretly excited about the impending economic depression.
Especially with the staggering job losses of the last few weeks and the growing number of houses with dark windows and for sale signs, even in my relatively smug little neighborhood, it's a horrible thing to wish on. When I actually imagine the uncertainty of work hours or paychecks or healthcare, not to mention rent checks or food, I fall into a small panic. I have never really known hardship. Sure, I've worked continually since I was 16, held 2 and 3 jobs at times, but I've always been able to sock away a bit - enough for an IRA, enough to pay off credit cards every few years, enough to confidently quit a job that disagrees with me (or with which I disagree) without another immediately lined up, if it comes to that. I am a person who keeps an Excel spreadsheet to budget every penny - living expenses, savings, investments, mad money. I like to know what my future holds. I like to be in control.
At this point my loved ones are rolling their eyes in concert saying, "Tell us something new."
But seriously, losing control of my future because of the decisions of a bunch of guys who have no concept of what it means to make a living, to make enough to live on and with any luck just a little extra, frightens me. A couple of days ago I read an article about the declining meaning of money; about how when Enron gambled away $11.5 million of its employees' retirement, that was a big deal, and now Madoff has made off with $50 billion, yet the top story in the financial pages is the $500,000 salary cap for the asshole CEOs heading those banks that got a piece of the nearing $1 trillion bailout. I guess for a while, I haven't felt all that in control anyway. I feel locked out of the stairwell of upward mobility. Maybe what I'm excited about is that now everyone will have to scrap a little. A depression could shuffle a stacked deck, level the so-called playing field, give the rest of us a fighting chance - pick your metaphor. This is not the first time I could be called a pinko.
When the first really bad news started coming out, around last October, my friends and I began to compare notes about what we were doing to steel ourselves - buying dried beans in bulk and getting to know the fluorescent aisles of Cash'n'Carries. We may have a head start, since the mark of a good cook is not how delicious you make the choice ingredients, but how irresistible you make the scraps. I was flipping through cookbooks around this time when I found a recipe for vinegar pie. I had never heard of such a thing! According to Ruth Reichl, it enjoyed enduring popularity up until the '60s. And who was doing a good amount of the pie making then? All of those Depression moms who scrapped and saved and improvised the last time around. It was worth a try.
What I discovered is that vinegar pie is essentially a custard based on an acid just like lemon curd. I tweaked the recipe a little to add some richness and intensify the flavor. With apple cider vinegar and a little cinnamon, it tastes almost exactly like apple pie without the apples. Why not slap a lattice on top to complete the illusion?
Vinegar Pie
Pastry for single layer pie crust, extra if lattice design is desired
3 large eggs
1 C. sugar
2 T A.P. flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 C apple cider vinegar
1/4 C water
4 T sweet butter, cut into cubes
Egg wash
Cinnamon sugar
Preheat oven to 350.
If you desire a lattice, roll out a 10" circle of pastry and cut 3/4" wide strips from it. Arrange the strips on a flat cookie sheet lined with parchment paper in a lattice pattern with a 9" diameter. Place your overturned pie plate over the lattice and press to make an indentation. Cut away any excess dough which falls outside the circle of indentation. Brush the design with egg wash and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake the lattice until golden brown. Remove from oven and cool completely.
Roll out pastry and place in a 9" pie plate. Blind bake the bottom crust at the same time the top lattice is baking.
In a small saucepan, whisk together 3/4 C sugar with flour, salt, and cinnamon. Pour vinegar and water into the sugar mixture, whisking constantly. Bring mixture to a boil over medium-high heat, whisking until sugar has completely dissolved.
Meanwhile, whisk together the eggs and remaining 1/4 C sugar. When vinegar mixture has come to a boil, temper the egg mixture with it - drizzling the hot liquid slowly into the eggs , whisking constantly.
Return the warm mixture to the saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until the mixture thickens to the point of coating the back of the spoon. Turn off the heat, and stir in the butter, cube by cube, adding a new cube as the old one melts away.
Pour the hot filling into the hot pie shell. If the bottom crust is not ready at the same time as the filling, transfer the filling to a cool receptacle and cover with parchment paper.
Bake the pie until the filling has set, about 15-20 minutes. Cool completely.
Gently and carefully slide the lattice onto the top of the pie.
Serve with sweetened whipped cream.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Sweet Potato Pie
The Pacific Northwest does not really have a regional cuisine, unless you count farmer's market fresh sheets, which really they've stolen from California, or hot-smoked salmon, which is delicious, but you can't really hold one protein up to such high expectations. Eating in Seattle is like shopping at a thrift store in the best way - you get the lived in Levi's of meat and potatoes crowd pleasers on the same menu with Japanese silk sashimi, handmade Italian pasta, and jackpot haute couture LaCroix vegetables like watermelon radishes. As in any city, there are a lot of people who live here but are not from here, and we've all brought tastes and textures and smells which have mixed and mingled in unexpected ways.
Sometimes, though, sometimes a recipe falls through the cracks. Sweet potato pie is one of those recipes. Pecan pie at least has a faint representation on the landscape, but for some reason, people here think that sweet potato pie is essentially the same thing as pumpkin pie, and it's not. I have my theories: your typical Seattleite stands diametrically opposed to the Southeastern United States and everything it stands for; sweet potatoes are another of those root vegetables that because of the short growing season we see far too much of in the long grey winter; it's too many words to say with a flat vowel accent. Whatever it is, I have set myself the task of becoming the region's sweet potato pie evangelist.
I am not a drinker so much. Don't get me wrong, I can hold my own after a shift, and the first beer of the weekend always tastes good. Water, though, has always been my preferred beverage, so when others traded juice for soda and then beer, it just didn't occur to me to take it up as a regular habit. I love love love to cook with booze, though. Almost anything improves with a little sharp bitter hotness to round it out. There is no better aroma in the world than a pot of onions sweated in butter and deglazed with sherry and reduced cream. Sweet potatoes cry out for Bourbon to bring them home. That's what they're saying to you when they're whistling and bubbling away in the oven.
Sweet Potato Pie
Pastry for single layer pie crust
1 1/2# sweet potatoes
1/3 C. packed dark brown sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
4 T sweet butter
1 C Bourbon whiskey
3 large eggs
1/2 C. whole milk
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 T black strap molasses
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Raise oven temperature to 400. Peel each sweet potato and chop roughly (you want pieces similar in size to a 2" cube). Place potatoes in a casserole then toss with brown sugar, salt, and nutmeg. Dot with butter. Roast until tender, stirring occasionally, about an hour. Remove from oven and pour the Bourbon over the hot potatoes. Lower the oven temperature to 350.
Puree potatoes through a food mill or with a food processor. Press through a tamis if desired. Beat together eggs and molasses, then add milk and vanilla extract. Pour liquid mixture into potatoes and mix to combine.
Pour filling into pie shell. Bake in the middle of the oven until the edges have puffed and the center is no longer liquid but jiggles slightly. Remove from oven and cool completely before slicing.
Serve with sweetened and spiked whipped cream, if desired.
Sometimes, though, sometimes a recipe falls through the cracks. Sweet potato pie is one of those recipes. Pecan pie at least has a faint representation on the landscape, but for some reason, people here think that sweet potato pie is essentially the same thing as pumpkin pie, and it's not. I have my theories: your typical Seattleite stands diametrically opposed to the Southeastern United States and everything it stands for; sweet potatoes are another of those root vegetables that because of the short growing season we see far too much of in the long grey winter; it's too many words to say with a flat vowel accent. Whatever it is, I have set myself the task of becoming the region's sweet potato pie evangelist.
I am not a drinker so much. Don't get me wrong, I can hold my own after a shift, and the first beer of the weekend always tastes good. Water, though, has always been my preferred beverage, so when others traded juice for soda and then beer, it just didn't occur to me to take it up as a regular habit. I love love love to cook with booze, though. Almost anything improves with a little sharp bitter hotness to round it out. There is no better aroma in the world than a pot of onions sweated in butter and deglazed with sherry and reduced cream. Sweet potatoes cry out for Bourbon to bring them home. That's what they're saying to you when they're whistling and bubbling away in the oven.
Sweet Potato Pie
Pastry for single layer pie crust
1 1/2# sweet potatoes
1/3 C. packed dark brown sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
4 T sweet butter
1 C Bourbon whiskey
3 large eggs
1/2 C. whole milk
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 T black strap molasses
Preheat oven to 350. Roll pastry into a 13" circle and place into a 9" pie plate. Tuck overhanging edges under and press the pastry into your desired edge. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Prick the crust with a paring knife or fork to prevent air bubbles. Line the crust with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. Bake until the sides begin to set, about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and weights and bake a further 10 minutes, until the entire shell is a pale golden color. Remove pie plate from oven and set on a rack to cool.
Raise oven temperature to 400. Peel each sweet potato and chop roughly (you want pieces similar in size to a 2" cube). Place potatoes in a casserole then toss with brown sugar, salt, and nutmeg. Dot with butter. Roast until tender, stirring occasionally, about an hour. Remove from oven and pour the Bourbon over the hot potatoes. Lower the oven temperature to 350.
Puree potatoes through a food mill or with a food processor. Press through a tamis if desired. Beat together eggs and molasses, then add milk and vanilla extract. Pour liquid mixture into potatoes and mix to combine.
Pour filling into pie shell. Bake in the middle of the oven until the edges have puffed and the center is no longer liquid but jiggles slightly. Remove from oven and cool completely before slicing.
Serve with sweetened and spiked whipped cream, if desired.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Some Thoughts on Pastry
In theory, I know what makes a good crust: cold fat, cold water, and for chrissake, don't work it too much. In practice, a consistently perfect crust eludes me. Usually, I can tell if I've fucked it up as I gather the pastry into a ball to rest, or afterward as I roll it into shape. Too gooey, too crumbly, too melty, too something. It is at these times that baking seems to me less science than alchemy, or voodoo; the province of some fickle deity that requires regular paeans and the occasional sacrifice.
I did meet a woman one summer in Iowa who had figured it out. She sent her daughters to Europe and then to college with cinnamon rolls and pie - traveling to farmers markets, county fairs, and RAGBRAI (the (Des Moines) Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa), where I met her, in a camper and borrowing church basement kitchens to bake. That strawberry rhubarb pie was by far the best of the week, which is saying something because the two main food groups on RAGBRAI are pork chops and pie, with each town on the route in competition for the title of favorite. I asked her what her secret was, and in that self-effacing Iowa way, she said practice. But she did reveal that instead of quibbling with the age old debate about butter vs. shortening, she made her crust with oil.
Oil you say? Yes oil. And a flakier, more tender pastry you have not tasted.
I've tried her recipe, at least the recipe she told to me, and it works fine. Perfectly serviceable. For me, though, it has neither the flavor of a butter crust nor the flakiness of shortening. Perhaps I have a mental block. But part of a recipe is the person making it. Whose eyes are measuring, whose hands are mixing, whose tongue is tasting. You know how people sometimes say about their mother's recipe "I do everything the same but somehow it never tastes quite as good?" The Iowa pie lady is right - her secret is practice. Her particular method, refined with thousands of repetitions, combines with flour, oil, and water to make a perfect pie every time.
With each pie I learn something new, tweak ratios, modify techniques. It may not be perfect every time, but sometimes it's tantalizingly close. It's only a matter of time.
Iowa Oil Pastry (for single crust)
1 1/4 C. All Purpose Flour
1/4 C. Vegetable Oil
2-4 T. Cold Water
Add the oil to the flour and mix lightly until it is distributed throughout but not mealy.
Drizzle the water over the flour and oil and stir together. Press a bit into a ball and if it holds together, pull the rest together and wrap in plastic film. If it is still crumbly, add water a little at a time until the dough comes together.
Flatten the ball in the plastic film into a disc and place in the refrigerator to rest for 30 minutes.
Roll the pastry out and place into a pie dish. Blind bake the pastry until set.
Fill as desired.
I did meet a woman one summer in Iowa who had figured it out. She sent her daughters to Europe and then to college with cinnamon rolls and pie - traveling to farmers markets, county fairs, and RAGBRAI (the (Des Moines) Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa), where I met her, in a camper and borrowing church basement kitchens to bake. That strawberry rhubarb pie was by far the best of the week, which is saying something because the two main food groups on RAGBRAI are pork chops and pie, with each town on the route in competition for the title of favorite. I asked her what her secret was, and in that self-effacing Iowa way, she said practice. But she did reveal that instead of quibbling with the age old debate about butter vs. shortening, she made her crust with oil.
Oil you say? Yes oil. And a flakier, more tender pastry you have not tasted.
I've tried her recipe, at least the recipe she told to me, and it works fine. Perfectly serviceable. For me, though, it has neither the flavor of a butter crust nor the flakiness of shortening. Perhaps I have a mental block. But part of a recipe is the person making it. Whose eyes are measuring, whose hands are mixing, whose tongue is tasting. You know how people sometimes say about their mother's recipe "I do everything the same but somehow it never tastes quite as good?" The Iowa pie lady is right - her secret is practice. Her particular method, refined with thousands of repetitions, combines with flour, oil, and water to make a perfect pie every time.
With each pie I learn something new, tweak ratios, modify techniques. It may not be perfect every time, but sometimes it's tantalizingly close. It's only a matter of time.
Iowa Oil Pastry (for single crust)
1 1/4 C. All Purpose Flour
1/4 C. Vegetable Oil
2-4 T. Cold Water
Add the oil to the flour and mix lightly until it is distributed throughout but not mealy.
Drizzle the water over the flour and oil and stir together. Press a bit into a ball and if it holds together, pull the rest together and wrap in plastic film. If it is still crumbly, add water a little at a time until the dough comes together.
Flatten the ball in the plastic film into a disc and place in the refrigerator to rest for 30 minutes.
Roll the pastry out and place into a pie dish. Blind bake the pastry until set.
Fill as desired.
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