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The Peace of Pie

Monthly Archives: March 2020

Jelly Pie

31 Tuesday Mar 2020

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Jelly Pie

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

jelly, red currant

Hello friends. I hope you’re all keeping well. The last several weeks have (strangely enough) held many moments of connection and encouragement for our family, including virtual church services, long video chat catch ups with faraway friends, and also just good quality time (and lots of it) among the three of us. I feel the weight of those who are sick or are caring for the sick, for those spending too much time in unhappy homes, and for those who are in uncertain economic situations…I could go on. I am sure all of this is on your mind also. Let’s all think of new ways we can reach out to those around us with love every day, within the confines of our current norm.

As is the way, we’ve been going out to grocery shop as little as possible. When we do, we are still so blessed in the variety of beautiful fresh food available to us. I am finding my local farm market to be a great place to go (especially first thing in the morning!)

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But even with the abundance of fresh fruit and veg available to us, I did have a thought that this might be a good time to make a pie that features an ingredient I have looked for in multiple stores and never found…and I’m talking BEFORE coronavirus was a household term. Since I’d have to buy this ingredient online at some point, why not now?

This mystery ingredient I’m talking about is Red Currant Jelly, in order to make a (logically named) Red Currant Jelly Pie. I’d like to take a moment to congratulate this pie for being the first in a long time to force me into creating a brand new “category” for a blog post. Because honestly, it doesn’t fit into any of those I’ve created already…it’s close to, but not actually sugar pie…not quite legitimately summer fruit pie…nary a cream, custard, or chiffon involved…so now I have a Jelly Pie category all of its own.

Ken Haedrich is a wonderful writer and I love the detailed descriptions of various pie origins he includes in his cookbook. This was one of those times though that I gotta say Ken left me with more questions than answers. This sentence right here, “Jelly Pie is a relative of transparent pie.” And…? What, pray tell, is a transparent pie? Should I start another post category now?! How closely related are they; cousins? Mother and child? More research is needed on this front.

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Here’s my cute kumquat-eating baby pie blog model, I hope she makes you smile. Some days she’s helpful in the kitchen. This day she was feeling helpful and I let her taste the jelly (in between kumquat bites).

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Sidebar: If I ever were to figure out how to make a kumquat pie, Pippa would be thrilled. (Sidebar of Sidebar, Levi did make kumquat marmalade last night. He’s never made marmalade before. This is one of those things that’s partly related to having more forced time at home but also totally something he would have done anyway.)

ANYWAY here’s what the filling (a lot of butter, sugar, eggs, some cornmeal, and lemon juice, along with the red currant jelly) looks like when you’re beating it.

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I made a mistake in the order of ingredients added, which sometimes happens when you have a 1 3/4 year old as your sous chef; namely, adding eggs prior to the liquefied jelly rather than after. I worried myself that the filling’s consistency wouldn’t be right as a result. But, having never made a pie of the jelly pie category before, I wouldn’t really have known what I expected to see in the first place. Spoiler alert, everything was fine.

As promised in the book description, the surface caramelized towards the end of baking, resulting in an almost crème brûlée type of situation. Really worth noting if you’re going to try baking this pie yourself; ten minutes before it’s done, you peek at it and it’s a strange pale color and you think it’s nowhere near done. And then within a short time the entire surface changes completely and looks harder, darker, and much more “finished”. A magical transformation.

I.e. a chemical transformation. Cause chemistry is magical.

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Serve with whipped cream, unsweetened. It’s important. A cup of tea, too. Maybe a 2-4 player card game.

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Levi described the flavor of this pie as similar to a key lime pie, in that there is both sweetness and tartness. So perhaps that’s the true relative here. Step aside, “transparent pie”, whatever you are.

Have a beautiful day, get some sunshine and fresh air if you can, and maybe bake something delicious. Peace be unto you.

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Nostalgia Pie

19 Thursday Mar 2020

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Chocolate Pie, Ice Cream Pie

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Tags

cherry, ice cream, marshmallows, oreo, Trader Joe's, vegan

How are you, my friends? This post is being written during the COVID-19 pandemic, and right about now, it seems like we’re all longing for days in the past…even a few weeks or a few months in the past. I am doing my best (though I’m not always succeeding perfectly) to cast my cares on the Lord, be responsible and thoughtful of others, and focus on the unexpected blessings that come from suddenly having many canceled plans. I recognize that not everyone has extra time on their hands. Many of you are working much longer hours and/or under more stress than usual. So it is only my experience (maybe shared by a few of you) that I am speaking to when I say, I’m getting around to doing some things that I’ve literally been meaning to do for YEARS. Like, for example, updating my Pie Gallery page.

Check it out; there are still 2-3 pies that have been buried in time that I still need to go back and excavate stories for, so the number is for sure actually past 150. A little disappointing that I can’t nail down yet exactly which pie was the HALFWAY PIE, I’ll announce that exciting information when I’ve solved the mystery for myself. But, what I do know for sure is that I’m over HALFWAY DONE with my 300 pie journey. (Cue applause.) If anyone was curious, my current goal is to finish the book by the time I’m 40, and have a birthday party to which you are invited and for this party I will make the final five pies so that none of them gets the honor/disgrace of being chosen last.

Now for the pie at hand; a pie that was actually baked nearly two years ago now. Chocolate-Cherry S’mores Ice Cream Pie.

I thought I’d try something a little different this time, gettin’ fancy here. The slideshow below tells this story in a nice way, a better way than my typical format would tell this particular story (i.e. It’s the 4th of July. Maggie and Wendy make a pie from my cookbook with some orchestration but little help from Jess, José feeds everyone Spanish-cut Sandia/watermelon, Pippa is the star of the show and gives the pie her best side-eye glances, Sara and Levi are not pictured and it’s no wonder because Levi fainted at 3 am that day and long story short everything is okay but he now has many staples in his head and nurse Sara had to calm everyone down.)

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Footnotes/Other bits of memory:

  • It was about 110 degrees Fahrenheit every dang day that week. Ice cream pie was so so so needed.
  • José also went running every day that week. Consider in light of above detail. Wild.
  • I think I actually did make the Joe-Joe (Sub for Oreo) Crust myself. But also I gave birth three weeks before this pie was made and do not stand by any of my memories.
  • None of these pictures can be real because Pippa was nevvver that tiny (says the mom of the almost-two-year-old with a wail).
  • To make a vegan version of this pie (which we did), use Trader Joe’s Soy Creamy Cherry Chocolate Chip Ice Cream, make sure your marshmallows are vegan, and skip the Warm Mocha Sauce in the topping (it’s optional to the recipe anyway). You can use chocolate covered graham crackers or make your own. Making your own, it’s also easier to ensure that the melted chocolate you use is dairy-free.
  • The topping is supposed to be marshmallow creme. Turns out it’s much harder to find vegan marshmallow creme than vegan marshmallows and hence the creative topping you see in the photos (melted chocolate drizzle and calligraphy, broiled marshmallow hunks, chocolate dipped Joe-Joes).
  • We always have great vegan pies with Wendy. 🙂 Here’s another one. Bonus below, a cute picture of Wendy, Pippa and I much more recently at Magpies Softserve in Silver Lake eating Maple Banana and Peanut Butter Chocolate vegan ice cream pies to end all ice cream pies. If you get on their website and start drooling (and if you’re somewhat local) I’m sure they, like all small businesses, would appreciate it if you impulse bought a pie for pick-up. Just a thought!

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Stay well, stay safe. Angels are real. Talk to you all again soon.

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