Mixed Feelings

20 Wednesday May 2015

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

Tags

apple, bourbon, caramel, crumb, pecan, spices, whiskey

It’s always a little bittersweet, baking pies for auction. I imagine it must feel like when painters sell their art; there is consolation in knowing that someone else will enjoy your creative work, but isn’t that joy sometimes mixed with the sentiment, “but…but…I want to keep it!”?

I’ll be honest, it’s borderline maddening when you’ve made your whole house smell like apples and caramel and cinnamon and know you aren’t getting a single bite.

It’s okay though. Really, it is. Not only did someone else (my super-fun 3rd grade student Sam’s uncle, Jeff) have the kindness to place the highest bid on this pie and support a wonderful school in the process, I got to bake it. And if that sounds like a paltry comfort, let me put it this way; if the only part of the pie-making process I cared about was the eating, I would have given up on this whole thing a long time ago. Baking and sharing are at least two-thirds the fun.

Jeff requested an apple pie, and since he was open to a few tweaks on the old classic, I decided to start with a recipe I’d done once before in 2011 (it’s #56 in the gallery)…Liz Reiter’s All-Granny Slug-O-Bourbon Spiced Apple Pie. To that, I made a few more changes: a pink lady apple mixed in with the grannies, a pecan crumb topping, and a little bourbon pecan caramel sauce on top of THAT! (Caramel sauce made by the lovely Carmel, who you’ll meet in a post in the very near future.)

I have a feeling you’ll be seeing a lot more of this beautiful craftsman cutting board that we recently bought from Karveware, our good friend Jamil’s company. All of their boards are fully made from end-grain wood pieces (scratch-resistant, as they’re self-healing), fitted together to create what almost looks like a wooden mosaic. I’m loving having enough space to chop everything I need for pie/dinner/etc. on my extra-large board. If you’re interested in getting one for yourself, scroll down to the bottom of the page and send me an email, and I’d be happy to get you more details. (Mental note: maybe I’ll post a Karve giveaway someday when I’m a full-time blogger and have more time to generate interest and amass followers and that sort of thing…)

Here’s the finished product, and as I alluded to before, the smell coming out of the oven towards the end of the hour it baked was just mean. Cruel.

I heard tell that this boozy pie may have been destined for Jeff’s bachelor party (he’s getting married soon!) Here’s hoping it was a big hit. And thanks again, Jeff, for supporting a great group of kids.

Recently

09 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Berry Pie, Mini Pie, Pie Destinations

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

apple, blackberry, Richmond, The Proper Pie Co.

Hi everyone! I hope you’re all having a fabulous fall. I’d like to share a little milestone of late. As you know (unless you’re brandy new to reading this blog) I figured out a while back that pies can be baked in glass jars and shipped rather easily. Sometimes the post office does a better job with the speed of delivery than other times, but I have definitely mailed and/or carried onto planes a decent number of pies in jars now. Maybe fifty? Anyway. Here’s the milestone. Last month I filled an actual order for a pie shipment. I.e. a lovely lady I know asked me to mail her son pie for his October birthday, and so I made two little apple blackberry pies and mailed them to Wisconsin and she paid me. So if I ever get around to starting a legit pie-in-a-jar business, Jaci and Croix can have the honor of being my first ever customers. Thanks so much! I hope they were delicious!

In other recent happenings, Levi and I visited Richmond, VA last weekend, primarily for my girl Liz’s wedding. It’s one of the special places in my heart and it was so good to be there and to spend the weekend with a bunch of my favorite people.

On Sunday afternoon, we went to a delight of a place called The Proper Pie Co. My word. We bought savory hand pies and sweet slices, headed to a park with a load of blankets, and ate and traded bites with each other (Butter Chicken, Broccoli and Cheese, Lamb and Vegetable, Curried Lentil and Spinach, Key Lime, Sweet Potato and Pecan, Peach and Blackberry…I mean, really.) Afterwards I laid down with my head on my best friend’s lap and declared (to no one’s surprise) that I was in my happy place.

(New Zealand friends, please appreciate the verbiage under the coffee column…:))

I was told that this pie is made with vanilla poached slices of sweet potato. Because, why not.

We are blessed. Check back for another (not-so-recent) pie story later this week!

West Coast Pie

12 Thursday Jun 2014

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Berry Pie, Original Pies

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

apple, blueberry, strawberry

I’m such a dork sometimes. I think that’s what makes me a good teacher.

I’ve had a lot of fun with my 3rd-4th-5th social studies class this year. We’ve been learning about the regions of the United States, which has included making detailed maps labeled with funny sounding places (Okefenokee Swamp is a crowd favorite), memorizing the states and capitals through the use of a catchy song, filming our own music video set to said song, Skyping with my parents to learn about the Northeast and the Southeast, examining Native American pottery, conducting hands-on investigations of resources from across the country, and writing and thinking about how where we live affects who we are (a question I’ve thought about a lot in relation to my own life). I gave my students their final test on the Western region of the United States this past Wednesday…and did I mention that, as of this week, the kids are out for the summer?!

Oh yeah. Oh yeah oh yeah. (I’ve still got plenty of grading, planning, and curriculum writing on my plate…but I see a definite increase of free time in my near future. As in: I see myself doing some laundry. I see myself taking Obi for more walks and writing blog posts that make no references to ancient history. And maybe sneaking off to Magic Mountain for a day.)

Anyway, back to the thesis statement about how I can be a dork. Really though, I’m the kind of teacher who makes kids groan in agony and say things like “How did you sneak MATH into this?” and “Why do you have to turn EVERYTHING into SCHOOL?” Which makes me feel very successful because I like to trick my students into learning even when they aren’t looking for a lesson. So, after I gave my kids their final test (which they took like champs, without complaining) I fed them a pie. I called it West Coast Pie. And here’s what they figured out by the time they were done eating it, with just a touch of guidance from me.

1. It was really, really delicious.

2. The filling was made up of strawberries to represent California, blueberries to represent Oregon, and apples to represent Washington.

3. I had used other ingredients that related to the Western region of the country, if not specifically the West Coast. The pie was glazed with milk and honey, representing the dairy farms and beehives that are an important part of agriculture in the West. The sugar the pie contained represented the sugarcane that grows in Hawaii, probably the coolest state in the West (if not in the entire country) in the eyes of my students. The lemon was a nod to the huge amount of citrus fruit grown in Californ-i-a. The wheat stood for the Great Plains, which lie partially in the Midwest but also spill into the Western states of Montana, Wyoming and Colorado.

I told you I’m a dork. But I’m turning them too, because they honestly figured out 95% of that on their own. Promise.

As a special School’s Out treat, and so I don’t forget it, I’m sharing the recipe for the pie here.

West Coast Pie

Crust:

Ken Haedrich’s Basic Flaky Pastry. 3 cups flour, 1 tbs. sugar, 1 tsp. salt. Mix together by hand. Cut a stick of butter into small pieces and add into the dry ingredients. Rub with your fingers until the butter is incorporated. Have at the ready 1/2 cup of shortening. Add into the mixture in small pieces until fully incorporated. Add 1/2 cup of cold water, a little at a time, until pastry can be packed together. Make two balls, flatten them, wrap in wax paper, and refrigerate. (For a more detailed recipe instead of my paraphrase, see Ken’s book Pie.

Filling:

2 cups strawberries, hulled and sliced.
1 cup blueberries
2 cups sliced apples
(I had just barely this much fruit, perhaps a little less. It was just all the fruit I had in the house at 5:30 in the morning that day. You know. Feel free to use a little less or more of something.)
1/3 cup turbinado sugar, plus 2 tbsp
Juice of 1/3 of a lemon
large dash of cinnamon
2 tbsp cornstarch

In a bowl, combine the fruit, 1/3 cup of sugar, lemon juice, and cinnamon. Allow to sit and juice for ten minutes. (You can roll out the bottom crust in the meantime and line your standard-size pie pan with it.) After the filling has been sitting, mix 2 tbsp each of cornstarch and sugar in a small bowl and add to the fruit mixture. Stir in. Turn entire filling into pie crust, wet edge around rim with water, and place rolled-out second crust on top. Press firmly around the rim to seal the two crusts together. Trim excess crust with a sharp knife and cut several vents in the top of the pie. In a small bowl, combine roughly 2 tbsp of milk with 1 tsp of honey. Mix well until honey dissolves. Use a pastry brush to brush the glaze over the top of the pie. Bake in a 400 degree oven for half an hour, then rotate and bake for another 25 minutes. You’ll know the pie is done when the top is a nice shade of brown and you see juices bubbling. Strawberries are notorious for making pies bubble over, so you may want to use a baking dish to protect the bottom of your oven.

I loved this pie. I really did. But I think the real reason you should try this pie is because these cool kids endorse it. I would totally trust their judgement.

Okay, they’re a little nutty. But they can be trusted when it comes to pie-tasting.

They know what they’re talking about.

Have we sold you yet?Really though, whatever region of the country you’re in, get up and go make yo’self a West Coast Pie.

Pies, Pies, and More Pies

08 Saturday Mar 2014

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Berry Pie, Mini Pie, Mixed Fruit Pie, Original Pies

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

apple, blueberry, Christmas, ginger, honey, pear, pie-in-a-jar, raspberry, travel

It’s March already? You’ve got to be kidding me.

Let’s get down to business. First of all, I would like to announce that the Five-Spice Pear-Apple pies I mailed out during Thanksgiving week made it safely to their destinations.

Ironically, I’m pretty sure that standard mail to Australia is faster than priority mail to Georgia, Illinois, or Virginia. What in tarnation?! Lesson: The United States Postal System is an abject failure.

Eric Lange, my official domestic tester in Virginia, sent me this lovely ditty after receiving and consuming the pie:

“O Apple-Pear 5 Spice

You are so good and nice

You make my taste buds sing

You are the greatest thing!

A brown box in the mail

Delivered, without fail

A complete, delish pie

I was one lucky guy!”

Eric, you are the greatest thing.

Following that mini-pie episode, I embarked on another of epic proportions before Christmas, making about 30 pies to give as holiday gifts to the wonderful and devoted teachers I work with and some of my faraway family in New Jersey and Georgia.

Just one of the fillings I used was a recipe from Ken Haedrich’s book: All-Pear Pie with Maple and Candied Ginger. I’d been meaning to try this pie for so long (it’s one of my cousin Carly’s favorites, and she gave me the cookbook so she ought know). Funny thing is, I didn’t gift myself one of these pies, so I’ll be no doubt re-doing this recipe so I can actually have some. (I did have one bite of a friend’s, to be fair. But it wasn’t enough.)

The next two fillings were my own made-up combinations. Here’s the Cran-Apple Spice; I love how beautiful the fresh cranberries are and the sourness they bring to the table. I choose sour flavors over sweet every time and I have to say that I thought this pie was a win-win combination of both.

And here is the Honey-Apple-Raspberry filling, looking like a bit of a mess. But yum.

Mini-pie manufacturing is no piddling job. By the time you make multiple batches of crust, a few fillings, crumbs for the topping, labels for the tops…you’re looking at a long night.

The three pies below traveled not by car, not by mail, but by carry-on. This conversation happened.

TSA agent: I’m going to have to re-run your bag, miss.

Me in my head: Crap.

TSA agent: What are these?

Me: They’re pies….in jars.

TSA agent: Pies in jars?? That’s the coolest thing I’ve ever seen!! (Calls other TSA agents to marvel over the coolness that is pie-in-a-jar.)

TSA agent: I think I’m going to have to keep one of these…*laughs*

Me: I’ll make an extra one just for you next time I come through *smiles*

Would this have happened at any other time besides Christmas? Doubtful. But I loved it.

While we’re on the subject of mini pies (which, as it turns out, is more often then not…) for the third year in a row, I had the opportunity to contribute pie to a bake sale supporting my students. (Last year I sent this batch of minis…the year before I had not yet perfected the art of sending pie traveling and sent two whole pies to be sliced and sold.)

I made another Honey-Apple-Raspberry filling (since they had been pretty popular the last time ’round) and a Blueberry-Pear filling with cardamom and maple syrup, both my own recipes. I think I have figured out a pretty exact ratio for mini pie filling; the amount of filling that would fit into one largish normal pie fits roughly into nine jars. Okay, perhaps “exact” isn’t the right word, but it’s a helpful rule to follow. So the filling below made 18 mini pies. And the filling overflowed, so I really could have done 19, or 20.

This was the first year I was able to see the bake sale in person (and I forgot to take any pictures, wouldn’t you know!) By the time I got there, the sale had been going on for perhaps two hours and most of my pies were already gone. I hope they were thoroughly enjoyed. Thanks so much to those who bought them or supported the Palm Springs bake sale in any other fashion. Over $1600 was raised for the Christadelphian Heritage School!

As always, thanks for reading. I’ll leave you with a reminder…PI DAY IS NEXT FRIDAY!

$122 - i math math-jokes pi$

Let me know if you’re planning on celebrating.

Better Late Than Never…

26 Tuesday Nov 2013

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Mixed Fruit Pie

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

apple, five-spice, pear

I made another round of Pies-in-Jars today!

Due to certain circumstances, some of which are explained in this post (the rest can be chalked up to the fact that I take a long time to get around to doing things), I hadn’t yet been able to send my official domestic and international testers their Pies-in-Jars that I’d promised them back in April.

But thanks to my school’s week-long Thanksgiving break (for which I am truly, deeply, thankful) I was able to bake, box, and ship the belated little goodies this morning. Phew!

(I should probably mention that we didn’t get a new dog. Rags is just visiting for the holiday week while his mom and dad celebrate their first anniversary in Cancun. The best things about Rags are how much he loves to cuddle and how much he looks like a stuffed animal. Or a mop, come to think of it.)

I used the Five-Spice Pear-Apple Pie recipe from Pie and then just divided it up into my little jars…I ended up with enough filling to make nine. I had leftover crumb topping and used just slightly less than two single pie crusts.

Here’s what the pies looked like straight out of the oven. Super tall and bubbly! They settled down some within a minute or two of resting. I got the lids on, no problem, and tried my best to wipe the sticky off the sides.

Oh. Oops. It’s supposed to be Pear-Apple Pie…meh.

And now, most of these jars are winging their way through the postal offices of the country/world. We await news of their arrival and sincerely hope that they have smooth landings. Stay tuned!

Summer Solstice

30 Tuesday Jul 2013

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Mixed Fruit Pie, Original Pies, Summer Fruit Pie

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

apple, lemon, Minnesota, orange, pear, rhubarb

On the afternoon of the Summer Solstice, Grandmother was taking her well-earned daily nap, Aunt Sarah and cousin Matt were swimming off the dock, and Levi and Uncle Joe were shopping til they dropped at Gander Mountain. Granddad and I worked on a puzzle and made this pie. He has Alzheimer’s and doesn’t remember much of anything these days, but I think baking is a relatively familiar territory for the following reasons.

1. He has eaten possibly hundreds of my Grandmother’s delicious pies (blueberry and apple are the best kinds.)

2. “Grandfather bread” is a term used in my family to refer to the amazing bread he used to make every week in his bread machine. Grandmother has since taken over the breadmaking (Zante currant is the best kind.)

3. He used to be a research chemist, and what is baking, really, other than edible chemistry? (Post-Its and Scratch and Sniff were some of the best projects he worked on.)

I told Granddad that we were going to make an “Experiment Pie,” meaning that I had no recipe to follow. He laughed and stirred the filling: rhubarb, an apple, a pear, a little bit of pomegranate-lime juice, a squeeze of lemon juice, lemon zest, orange zest, powdered ginger, and nutmeg.

Butter pats go on top, because more butter is more better.

That evening–the sun didn’t set until ten–there was a Summer Solstice feast of epic proportions at the cabin.

There was a strawberry jicama salad from neighbor-friend Jackie.There was a pile of crispy walleye and bass straight from the St. Croix.

And to top it all off, we enjoyed a trio of pies (Experiment Pie, the Nectarine-Lime Pie of yesterday’s post, and a Grandmother Marie Apple Pie).

Shanghai Pie

08 Saturday Jun 2013

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

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

apple, China, cinnamon, Shanghai, travel

We spent most of my spring break this year in Shanghai.

*pinches self* Yes, that’s true. Wow. Amazing. We are so blessed.

The week was kind of a whirlwind, involving overnight trains and Great Wall hikes and all kinds of culinary…intrigues. But best of all was the time we were able to spend with our good friends Dan and Sylvia and little Grace. On the day before we left, we were ready for some down time, and Sylvia (who is Chinese) asked me if I could teach her how to make pie for Dan (very American). I thought I’d just share a few of my favorite pictures from our baking session with all of you.

I love this last picture because it’s such a perfect image of America in China, apple pie with rosebud tea.

Also…

If you’re interested in seeing more pictures from our China trip, send me an email at the.pie.diaries@gmail.com. I’d be happy to send you a link to our PhotoStream.

Pie and Music

03 Friday May 2013

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

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

apple, crumb, dutch apple, Jenny and Tyler, yogurt

It’s not every day that some of your favorite musical artists come to your house to give a concert. But when that day comes, it’s good form to bake a pie.

I chose a Pennsylvania Dutch Sour Cream Apple Pie, mainly because it sounded wildly delicious. Other factors were: 1. It definitely gives a solid nod to the East Coast, where Jenny and Tyler and I are from. 2. I tend to choose apple pies when baking for people I’ve never entertained before. Because who doesn’t like apple pie?

Five reasons why Jenny and Tyler are super cool:

1. They have a vinyl album.

2. They did a cover of “The Sound of Silence” that you can buy here; proceeds go to the International Justice Mission.

3. They ate my homemade bread without complaining.

4. Jenny has a glockenspiel. ‘Nuff said.

5. Tyler plays a suitcase kick drum and eats pie straight from the dish.

One of my college professors once told me that I should be a music journalist for a living. It’s true that I find it easy to write about music that I feel somewhat detached to. But sometimes you come across musicians who create music that you not only enjoy listening to, but feel that you could have written yourself in the sense that every word resonates so strongly in your heart. And so I won’t try to describe Jenny and Tyler’s music except in a few words: real, God-centered, passionate, fun, alive. You can follow this link to download seven of their songs for free!

If you missed the concert, check out www.jennyandtyler.com for tour dates, music videos, and more.

If you were at the concert, leave a comment and share a favorite moment!

If you were at the concert and I brought the pie out after you left; please do forgive me. If I had had the time and ingredients to make pie for all who attended, I most surely would have.

**A couple of delayed thank-yous:

To Andrew for helping set up.

To Mimi and Danny for helping sell merchandise!

To Mimi and Robin for helping me make the welcome banner. You are such exquisite discerners of patterned paper…

To Russ, for the balloons.

To all of the audience members who contributed to the great vibe of the show.

To Jenny and Tyler for coming out to Simi Valley and performing. We had so many people ask us, “But HOW did you get them to come to your house??!” And we said, “Umm…well, we just asked.” We’re so glad you came. You both have beautiful spirits and we feel blessed to have shared some time together with you. Come back anytime.

Pie-in-a-Jar!

27 Wednesday Mar 2013

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Apple Pie, Mixed Fruit Pie, Summer Fruit Pie

≈ 29 Comments

Tags

apple, berry, blackberry, blueberry, jar, mini pies, pear, pie-in-a-jar, raspberry, spices, strawberry

Pie-in-a-Jar is as exciting as it sounds.

They’re pies. In JARS.
They’re so super cute.
I think they would hold up really well in the mail. Big question is whether they’ll hold up internationally. Now taking domestic and international volunteers to help me test this theory out.

A year ago, I send some normal pie pies (as opposed to pie-in-a-jar pies) to a bake sale in Palm Springs benefitting the school I teach at. You can read that post here. This year, I was asked to contribute again to the same sale. I decided to make mini pies in jars this year after pondering the following key points.

What’s better than a slice of pie? A whole pie to yourself.
What’s more socially acceptable than eating a whole pie? Eating a whole mini pie.
What’s easier to transport than a jar with a lid?…Nothing.

(My points just seem to be rolling out in groups of three this evening.)

This post from Our Best Bites provided me with some inspiration, and even comes with some rather adorable labels to top your jars with. It’s worth checking out if you’re interested in making your own pies-in-a-jar. For my part, I did what I usually do…read some blog posts on the subject at hand, then decided not to follow any of the recipes after all. So, in all accuracy, I probably couldn’t replicate these exact mini pies ever again.

(Awkward silence as you ponder how unhelpful of a blog writer I really am…)

I made two types of pies-in-a-jar; a pretty basic apple pie with lots of spices (cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, lemon and lemon zest) and a pear and mixed berry pie (strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, almond extract).

I love how they look here, all packaged up and ready to travel!

Have you ever tried baking pies (or anything else) in a jar? I would love to hear:

Stories about YOUR mini pie experiences, or questions about mine.
Interest in being a mail-tester for a pie-jar (depending on the number of comments I receive, I’ll put your name in a drawing.)
Which of the two above flavors you would have purchased had YOU attended the bake sale?

Guilty Pleasures

07 Thursday Mar 2013

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

≈ 1 Comment

“What’s YOUR guilty pleasure?” asked the voluntary-but-actually-mandatory name and email sheet next to the free wine in my hotel lobby.

If you give me a free wine hour, I’m happy to answer a question. However, the term “guilty pleasure” has always bugged me, namely because I don’t really feel guilty about the things that I would list as my top pleasures. Such as, macaroni and cheese. Or pie.

(Or macaroni-and-cheese-pie. But I diverge.)

Our hotel (which was awesome and luxurious and I would highly recommend to anyone going to Salt Lake City) was odd in that it had a specified theme. A theme that we did not know when we made our booking. And that theme was “Guilty Pleasures.” What a weird theme. But because of this theme, we got lots of free wine and massages and things like a hot cocoa bar with bacon bits.

So we drove out to Salt Lake City for the weekend (as you do) to see some special friends who we hadn’t seen in five years. Since they were out all the way from Sydney, it was the least Levi and I could do to get out there and meet up with them. Having received some not-so-subtle hints prior to that weekend, I decided that it would be in my best interests if a pie drove out to Salt Lake City for the weekend as well.

Now this, my friends, is what is commonly referred to as Ozark Pie. There is no actual pastry crust; however, the “batter” separates during the baking process to form a harder outer shell which acts like a crust. It’s like, the coolest thing ever. My book said, “If you have only one apple and a desire to make a simple pie, this one is for you.” And then I said, “Heck Yes.”

I must confess that this pie didn’t make it fully intact all the way to SLC. It was a long drive, and I got hungry. But most of it survived, and was consumed one cozy afternoon in our hotel lobby during wine hour, whilst playing an epic game of hearts. (As we clearly believe in compounding our guilty pleasures.)