Monthly Archives: February 2021

Calvados-Apple Custard Pie

28 Sunday Feb 2021

Posted by in Apple Pie, Custard Pie

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Hello everyone! Happy March. The most recent addition to ye olde Pie Gallery is…Calvados-Apple Custard Pie.

There are several reasons that certain recipes in Pie have languished for so long without being tried. One that I’ve mentioned previously is how elusive certain fruits are (loganberries, for example). Another common roadblock is that the pie requires a liqueur or liquor that we don’t have handy. Like apple brandy.

Calvados was brand new to me! If, like me, you need a bit of background, Calvados refers to apple or pear brandy from Normandy (apple, for the purposes of our pie of the day). It has a really pleasant flavor, and we’ve discovered that it’s quite nice just mixed with sparkling water. I’m going to be honest here: I just spent about 7 minutes perusing the Calvados Wikipedia article and found it super interesting. Take a look if you’d like (i.e. if you’re a nerd like me).

On to the pie. A partially pre-baked pastry is needed (I had two takes this time – read to the end of the post to see my faux pas). The filling is made by first sautéing large slices of apples (I used Honeycrisp) in butter, a little sugar, and a quarter cup of Calvados. The apples are placed aside to cool and then arranged in the bottom of the pie pastry. In a small pot on the stovetop, cream, more sugar, eggs, salt, vanilla, and 2 more tablespoons of Calvados form the custard. The custard is still a thin liquid when it is poured into the pie shell – it sets as it’s baking. Here’s a little photographic representation for ya!

The finished product as it came out of the oven was puffed slightly and had a gorgeous golden color. We cooled it to room temperature before partaking, and it did not disappoint; most especially for a pie we had mainly curiously and no real expectations towards! Levi threw in an overly superlative comment (“I think this really must be at least in my top five…”). However, if this was true every time he said it, we’d be looking at 57 pies in his top five. The flavor profile was complex, yet refined – despite the amount of brandy, it cannot be described as boozy. On the whole, this pie is a very elegant dessert, something I could imagine myself enjoying at a non-fussy French café.

In other news…I have pie failures sometimes! (I hope you’re not too surprised.) Let us analyze the poorly lit photo of a sad partially pre-baked pie crust, below, and see what we can learn together.

Observations: The crust has shrunken, while baking, to a shape that would never contain a custard filling. The edges are poorly defined (no attempt at fluting and very little at crimping). There is also a color/pattern that I might call “Pie Stretch Marks”.

Hypotheses: This was an All-Butter Pastry. I rarely use this recipe, as I like the flakiness that comes from half butter and half shortening or oil, not to mention that plowing through a whole stick of butter per single pastry isn’t super cost-effective. However, the Calvados-Apple Custard Pie recipe did suggest using this recipe based on the unbeatable flavor of the purely butter crust, and I liked that idea. The real thing I’m not sure of is how often I’ve pre-baked an only-butter crust. It’s probably not happened many other times, and I’m curious if that’s a factor. My other thought was that this pastry was probably a little bit overworked, and tighter gluten strands started to form, causing the crust to pull together and shrink. (Hence, Pie Stretch Marks). Finally, I know for sure that I did not roll this pastry out as wide as I should have. When you put a pie crust in a dish, you want it to feel very roomy- if you’re pulling and stretching at the edges to try to make your pie tall enough (as I was here) you can anticipate problems.

Conclusion: I could have probably done something with this, we talked briefly about getting some whipping cream and berries and making a funny pavlova-type situation, but the bottom line was that it was a busy day, we didn’t really need more dessert, and it was best to just move on. Bye bye, shrunken buttery pie.

Here’s an aerial shot to sign off with. Peace, love, and board games. ✌️

Champagne Grape Pie

19 Friday Feb 2021

Posted by in Summer Fruit Pie

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The pie featured in this post, similar to the Eggnog Chiffon Pie I recently shared with you all, was a quiet pause in a whirlwind season. August 2019. Let me tell you about August 2019. August 2019 was the last full month before I began a several-month resignation process from my amazing job. It was also the month we took then 14-month-old Pippa to Spain for two weeks to celebrate Mommy and Daddy’s 10th anniversary in Madrid and meet her little British buddy Apphia in Barcelona, but mostly to attend the wedding reception of her honorary aunt and uncle Gee Gee and Tio Stinky in beautiful seaside Alicante. If that weren’t enough for one month, in the final days of August 2019, we took Pippa to Minnesota for her first fishing vacation! (A truly momentous occasion for a descendant of the Sweeny family.)

I’d had my eyes open for champagne grapes for years already, knowing that this pie would be delicious and a snap to make as soon as I could find this elusive fruit. Trader Joe’s must have had them when I shopped after our return from Spain, and I probably baked this pie after a LONG week at week (helping to facilitate trainings more or less every day, as I can remember) and it was probably just what I needed to do on August 26th, 2019 – e-mail pileup from being on vacation be darned!

This is one of those perfectly simple recipes. Some sugar, lemon juice, cornstarch. A little milk and sugar glaze on the top pastry. That’s it, folks. Keep this one in your memory banks, and if you spy some champagne grapes this summer, just remember, “Jess said to make a pie with these.” In fact, I’m going to include the recipe below, so you’ll have no excuses. I’ll try to remember to link back to this post at a seasonally appropriate time as an extra reminder. Please do send me a photo if you try it yourself! 🙂

Bonus healthy living points if you eat your pie topped with cottage cheese. My sweet little baby!

A few relevant tidbits:

  • Champagne grapes, when labeled as such, are also known as Corinth or Black Corinth grapes. They are not “the grapes Champagne is made from”. As far as I can tell, the name “Champagne” is just a fun name designed by marketers. Kind of like “Cotton Candy” grapes. If you want to learn more about what grapes you should make your own champagne with…well…you might be reading the wrong blog. 🙂
  • The only other grape pie I’ve made, to date, was this delightful and storied Grape and Fig Pie.

Champagne Grape Pie

Ingredients: 

A double crust pie pastry (Basic Flaky or Extra Flaky from Ken’s book, if you have it, work well – or, use your own!)

For the FILLING:
4 cups champagne grapes, stemmed
1/4 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
21/2 tablespoons cornstarch

For the GLAZE:
Milk or light cream
Sugar

  1. If you haven’t already, prepare pie pastry and refrigerate until firm enough to roll, about 1 hour.
  2. On a sheet of lightly floured waxed paper, roll the larger portion of the pastry into a 12-inch circle with a floured rolling pin. Invert the pastry over a 9-inch standard pie pan, center, and peel off the paper. Gently tuck the pastry into the pan, without stretching it, and let the overhang drape over the edge. Place in the refrigerator for 15 minutes.
  3. In a medium-size bowl, combine the grapes, 1/4 cup of the sugar, and the lemon juice. Mix well and set aside to juice for 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
  4. On another sheet of floured waxed paper, roll the other half of the pastry into a 10-inch circle. Combine the remaining 11/2 tablespoons sugar and the cornstarch in small bowl, then stir the mixture into the fruit. Turn the filling into the chilled pie shell, smoothing the top with a spoon. Lightly moisten the rim of the pie shell. Invert the top pastry over the filling, center, and peel off the paper. Press the top and bottom pastries together along the dampened edge. Using the back of a butter knife or pastry knife, trim the pastry flush with the edge of the pan, then pinch the edges together to seal. Poke several steam vents in the top of the pie with a fork or paring knife. Put a couple of the vents near the edge of the crust so you can check the juices there later. To glaze the pie, lightly brush the pastry with milk and sprinkle with sugar.
  5. Place the pie on the center oven rack and bake for 30 minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 375°F and rotate the pie 180 degrees, so that the part that faced the back of the oven now faces forward. Just in case, slide a large aluminum foil–lined baking sheet onto the rack below to catch any spills. Continue to bake until the top is golden brown and any visible juices bubble thickly through the steam vents, 25 to 30 minutes.
  6. Transfer the pie to a wire rack and let cool for at least 2 hours before serving.

Makes 8 to 10 servings.

Recipe from Pie: 300 Tried-and-True Recipes by Ken Haedrich, published by Harvard Common Press.