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01 Sunday Dec 2019

Posted by in Nut Pie, Pumpkin Pie

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Dear friends,

I have new stories to share. Stories about olive harvesting with toddlers and bison lard pie crusts. Stories about champagne grapes, Minnesota fall fruit bounties, family bonds (biological and otherwise), fake Instagram celebrity chefs, first birthday parties, National Park excursions. We’ll get there. For now, suffice it to say: I hope you all had a very happy Thanksgiving, and I’m eager to know what pies you ate this weekend. Please tell me in a comment on this post!

We just got back from visiting my parents in Georgia for Thanksgiving, and I am not ashamed or embarrassed to report that we ate at least one piece of pie per day for six days in a row (four pies to four adults and one baby, so, a pretty reasonable ratio). This time I didn’t knock out any new recipes from Pie (Ken Haedrich’s exhaustive cookbook, which I’m baking my way through; you can see my progress in the Pie Gallery). I chose instead to revisit a few old favorites.

Maple Pecan Pie: Maybe because my dad’s always been partial to a pecan pie, this is the third Georgia Thanksgiving that the Maple Pecan has made an appearance; I’ve also baked this one for my work team, to much approval.

Five-Spice Winter Squash Pie: Butternut squash available from the garden made this seasonally-appropriate pie an obvious choice. And a word about five-spice powder; seriously an underused and underrated ingredient, in my opinion. I just love the little licorice shout out (fennel and star anise are two of the five spices). I say that as someone who loves all things licorice, but for those of you on the other side of the licorice fence, fear not; the flavor doesn’t seem to be strong enough to chase away licorice haters (after all, cinnamon, cloves, and pepper round out the blend).

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That’s two, but I did mention a total of four pies earlier. My mom made an apple pie with an olive oil crust earlier in the week. We also enjoyed a pumpkin pie (pictured above) made with a recipe from my great-Aunt Sally, who we recently said goodbye to. The traditional apple and pumpkin pies alongside the slightly more jazzy pies mentioned above made for a very well-rounded line-up.

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Happy holiday season to all, and don’t forget to share what kinds of pie made your Thanksgiving lineup in the comments! Talk to you soon.

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North, South, East, and West

12 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by in Nut Pie, Pumpkin Pie

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Of his Maple Pecan Pie, Ken Haedrich writes, “I’m a former Yankee with a wife from Charleston, South Carolina, so this pie is right up my alley. I think it’s a truly elegant pie, an arranged marriage of northern sweetness and southern charm that never fails to make pie lovers weak in the knees.”

My parents live in the South, now–an hour out of Atlanta, to be more precise–and I think the maple syrup/pecan hybrid is somewhat descriptive of their new life. To carry this idea further: I don’t particularly identify as a Yankee, but I consider myself an East Coaster, though my driver’s license has been Californian for four years now. Thanksgiving with Levi and my parents, in a place relatively new to all of us, was therefore a serious meld of North/South/East/West. We talked to my grandparents in Minnesota on the phone. We stuffed the turkey with herbs from our very drought-tolerant front yard. We sorted through many of my old notebooks and toys from my childhood in New Jersey. We drank a red blend called Family Tree from our favorite Central Coast winery. We hiked up a waterfall near the border of Tennessee and the head of the Appalachian Trail. I chose this arranged marriage of a pie for Georgia Thanksgiving 2015 not only because it seemed super delicious, but also because it seemed super appropriate.

I made one other pie during our visit, because we arrived on a Tuesday and Thanksgiving wasn’t til Thursday and it seemed a shame to waste all that potential pie-eating time. It was a pumpkin pie–a recipe from my Great-Aunt Sally who lives in that great Maple state of Vermont. For this pie, I made a crust with half butter and half coconut oil for the first time. I wouldn’t recommend a repeat of this tactic if it’s 30 degrees out and your coconut oil has been refrigerated (East), but I’m guessing it would be just fine if it’s 70 degrees out and you keep your coconut oil in the pantry (West). I had to handle the mixture a bit too much for my liking in order to break up the cold oil and even resorted to sunning the bowl, as you’ll see below. Although, I have to say, all’s well that ends well and the pumpkin pie disappeared quickly with no known complaints. 🙂

Without further ado, here are some pictures from our lovely Thanksgiving festivities. Thanks, as always, for reading.

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Resourceful Pie

11 Saturday Jan 2014

Posted by in Summer Fruit Pie

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Do you know what these are?

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How about now?

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Do they look like something to be put in a pie? (Say yes.)

I really, really hate waste. It’s one of my least favorite things ever. Levi likes to play this game with me where he says, “What if you had to choose between throwing out a full plate of (insert a delicious food here) or have someone give you $20?” And then he just ramps the price up until I finally agree to throw the hypothetical food away. It’s a really annoying game. The point is, it usually takes about $100 (depending on what the food is), where thereby proves my original point (that I hate waste).

Because I hate waste, I do weird things including but not limited to: saving rose petals from bouquets of flowers for making homemade rosewater, refilling shampoo bottles with dish detergent and olive jars with castile soap (much to my household’s confusion), making green tomato pie.

That’s what those are, if you hadn’t guessed yet. Well, tomato season was over, and there were a few cupfuls of tomatoes lingering on the vine that certainly weren’t going to turn red. What was a resourceful girl to do?

Luckily Ken Haedrich provides not one, but TWO recipes for Green Tomato Pie in his cookbook. I’m not the only crazy one around here.

IMG_1641Alright, now that you’ve gotten over your initial shock…doesn’t the filling actually look pretty in the bowl, with the contrasting green tomatoes and red cranberries?

IMG_1654Oh yeah, and I used bear lard in the crust. I guess that could also be classified as one of those weird/resourceful hunter/gatherer things I do.

But before I had the chance to bake this pie, there was a slight mishap in which Obi ate three-quarters of a dark chocolate bar and I had to rush him to the animal hospital instead of watching football and eating pie like I was kinda planning on. The Giants lost that game anyway. It figures.

IMG_1655When Obi had finished running into walls (apparently how he exhibits “chocolate toxicity”) and gobbling down his white rice and bland chicken breast, I baked the pie and then took great pleasure in feeding it to various friends and making them guess what they were eating. And hey! They liked it.

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Kind of makes me want to start quoting Dr. Seuss…

“Say! I like green tomatoes and crans! I do! I like them, Jess-I-am!”

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Making the Grade

25 Tuesday Jun 2013

Posted by in Custard Pie

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IMG_0834I followed Obi’s example and took a nap during the making of this pie. (Although I did not take the imitation so far as to nestle down in a pile of laundry.) It was necessary. That morning had been the last day of school for my students, and to say that the week had been ‘busy’ would be quite an understatement.

It’s okay though, I didn’t nap while anything was in the oven. I’m not that foolhardy. I only napped while the pre-baked crust was cooling. (Hint: this should tip you off to the presence of a cream or custardy sort of pie.)

Wanna see the main ingredient?

IMG_0831Yum yum yum. Maple Syrup! Now, for this Maple Custard Pie, Ken says to use lighter syrup, Grade A. I think this turned out fine. As long as you use pure maple, any grade will give it a nice flavor.

I find it ironic that after all my hard work grading and writing report cards that week, I still had to think about A’s and B’s as I made this pie.

IMG_0836Doesn’t it kind of look like a sweet potato pie? The darker syrup definitely lent itself to the color, as did the 4 egg yolks, since my eggs come from happy hens and have gorgeous dark yellow yolks.

We ate this with a bunch of lovely Australians, and it really did feel like summer had finally begun.

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