A 2020 Pie Roundup

31 Thursday Dec 2020

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

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Tags

apple, blueberry, buttermilk, chess, coconut, cranberry, creme brulee, meringue, nectarine, peach, pear, rhubarb, saturn peach

2021 is upon us, and, arbitrary though it may be, it feels good to move forward. It feels good to set new goals and intentions, to re-dedicate ourselves to our core beliefs and values and relationships, to know that any pain and struggles we experienced in 2020 will carve space for deeper joys to come, if we let them.

This is going to be a long post. The format was the most recent guest baker (aka Levi)’s suggestion so if you get too the end of this and think “THIS WAS TOO. MUCH. PIE.,” you can take it up with him. I was intrigued by the idea of starting my blogging life somewhat afresh in 2021, so I went for it. Without further ado, here is a roundup of eight dessert pies I baked in 2020 that had not yet been blogumented.

Yep, I just made that word up.

Indiana Buttermilk Pie

August 2020. First of three pies from when our friend Matt was in California to visit us for slightly over a week. Three pies in a week, that’s well above my usual pace. To put it in perspective, if that was my standard pace, this project would have been over by 2013. This was my first buttermilk pie (there are three buttermilk pie recipes in Pie) but not my last in 2020, as you’ll see. Simple, basic, uncomplicated flavor. 1 teaspoon of vanilla is the only real flavoring agent, and the tartness of the buttermilk shines straight through. I loved this.

“White” Summer Fruit Pie…sort of!

August 2020. Second of three pies in aforementioned week. We really wanted one of them to be a fruit pie, and Matt (Pie Hype Man) really wanted me to make progress in the cookbook, so we chose this “White” Summer Fruit recipe. It called for Rainier cherries and either white peaches or nectarines. As it turned out, we weren’t able to locate Rainiers so late in the summer, so we followed the recipe exactly but used zero cherries, white Saturn peaches, yellow nectarines, and rhubarb (of which I freeze lots each spring). While it was absolutely divine and we ate it with homemade vanilla ice cream (extra divinity points) my overactive conscience won’t allow me to check this pie off my list until I make it again with Rainier cherries. *Avoids eye contact with Matt, who totally thought this one counted.* But look how pretty!!

Little Crème Brûlée Pies

August 2020. Third of three. Unusual and unforgettable mini pies. My first time making Ken’s “Extra Flaky” pie crust recipe, which calls for cake flour. (Also my first time purchasing cake flour! A few of the pies in this post had ingredients outside the typical realm of my pantry, as you’ll see.) The pastry was lovely to work with and yielded enough for four miniature pie pans, pictured below. After these pies are baked, they are topped with a layer of brown sugar and blow-torched to perfection. I mean, what could be better?

Coconut Cream Pie with Coconut Meringue Topping

October 2020. More ingredients I ~~never~~ hardly ever buy: sweetened flaked coconut and cream of coconut (as in, the stuff in piña coladas, not to be confused with coconut cream aka thicker coconut milk). My cousin Martin’s family visited us for a weekend and I wanted to make a great pie to enjoy all together. When we were growing up and on summertime vacations in Vermont, Martin and I were the little kids who would order coconut almond ice cream without fail when we’d all go to our favorite ice cream shop (our grandparents’ treat). Our shared love of coconut led me to choose this pie for the occasion. Decadent. A coconut lover’s dream come true; yet, not overpowering or artificial in any way.

Three Sisters Coconut Buttermilk Pie

October 2020. Remember that sweetened flaked coconut I’d just bought? Me too…so I looked for another recipe that called for it. Since making the Indiana Buttermilk Pie and absolutely adoring it, I had been looking forward to trying a second buttermilk pie – this was an easy pick. Like a coconut custard pie but with the tang of buttermilk to take it to the next level; a real treat. We shared this pie with our good friends Brad and Deb at our big outdoor table. It seats 18, but we’ve been so grateful for the few times this year that we’ve used it to seat even 4. ❤

Homestead Chess Pie

November 2020. I was looking for something very simple, with pantry ingredients, as I decided to put this pie together at the last minute. This fit the bill: eggs, sugar, butter, vanilla, a bit of vinegar and cornmeal. In my last blog post, I mentioned that I made a (correct) executive decision to bake my Tarte au Sucre an extra 15 minutes past the time given in the recipe. I initially took this pie out at 35 minutes (recipe calls for 30-35) but ended up putting it back in the oven later, cause it clearly was underbaked. Yikes. Perhaps my oven does run cold and I am just waking up to this fact? I shall ponder this further. A delightful pie in the end, for all its simplicity. The fifth of the five Chess Pies in Pie – I’ve now exhausted that category. I confess, I did secretly wish this was a Lemon Chess Pie when I was eating it. Levi probably did too because he is Mr. Lemon Dessert.

Crock-Pot Fall Fruit Pie

November 2020. The name above ruins my punch line. Which of the desserts pictured below do you think was my Thanksgiving pie this year? That’s right, it’s the only one that looks nothing like a pie! This oval-shaped semi-imposter, though not what you would expect of me, was a popular and tasty dessert table choice that I’d recommend any of you try. It’s made with baking mix (like Bisquick – I used Birch Benders Organic Classic Pancake and Waffle Mix), fresh cranberries, pears, apples. Super Thanksgiving-y and great with a dollop of homemade whipped cream.

Apple and Blueberry Crumb Pie

December 2020. This was an important pie for me. I didn’t follow a recipe. I made it for my dear Linda (Pippa’s former nanny) and her family. My apple pie is Linda’s favorite, my blueberry pie is her daughter’s favorite, and they both love crumb topping. Linda had filled a pie dish with homemade tamales for us shortly before Thanksgiving. After the tamales sustained us for several days, I was left with this empty dish (it says Blessed on the bottom – I’d actually given it to her as a gift the last week she worked for us). I couldn’t picture giving it back like that, so I made this pie while Pippa took an afternoon nap one day. This has been a season of grief, and that was an afternoon when the grief was more present than I realized. There was something so visceral in making that pie with my hands, both painful and healing at the same time. I didn’t expect to react the way I did to peeling and coring the apples, to breaking up clumps of butter with my floury fingers – each familiar step generating a physical heartache – but perhaps I should have. Linda said her whole family agreed it was the best pie they have ever had.

Through that experience, I recognized that pie making has become a way to let my heart speak what is on is mind. It is a path I can walk any time, in any weather. And it is a way I can return blessings on the givers in my life, of whom there truly are many.

Be blessed in 2021, my friends, though it may look different than you expect. Happy New Year!

A few editorial notes:

You probably got this already, but a pie named in bold type is a pie from Ken Haedrich’s Pie baked for the first time. The two fruit pie titles are not in bold, denoting that they aren’t counting towards my count to 300.
While at this moment I’m feeling 96.5% sure that I covered all of 2020’s sweet pies, there were also a couple savory pies I’d like to tell you a bit more about another day. Also, there are still some pies of yesteryear that will occasionally pop into my mind or out of old photos which have yet to claim their rightful place in the gallery. So, if you had any fear that I was completely done with flashbacks…fear not.

Dragonfruit Sea Creature Angel Pie

12 Tuesday Jun 2018

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Berry Pie, Meringue Pie, Summer Fruit Pie

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Tags

blackberry, blueberry, creme anglaise, dragonfruit, meringue, raspberry, whipped cream

Angel Pie with Berries, Cream, and Custard is the “real” name of the showstopper featured in this blog post, but Dragonfruit Sea Creature Angel Pie is so much more descriptive and enticing, don’t you think? Let me show you how it was done.

First, let’s define “angel pie”. I’m still trying to figure out what the technical difference is between an angel pie and a pavlova…both feature a large meringue base as the main event. From what I have seen, angel pies typically are filled with a cream filling (like my Grandmother’s Chocolate Angel Pie) while pavlovas feature mainly fruit. This particular angel pie is meant to be filled with both whipped cream and fruit and topped with a sweet Creme Anglaise sauce made with lots of egg yolks (genius, when you need so many whites for the meringue!)

During our 8 month stay in Los Angeles, I only made one “new” pie from Ken Haedrich’s cookbook Pie while AT our apartment (the others were all made during travels). There’s something poetic about an angel pie living on in memory as the pie of the City of Angels.

The meringue is shown above, ready to be baked low and slow. Forming a shape out of meringue, even if it’s just a basic bowl shape, is something I find tricky yet enjoyable. The texture is just so wild. It’s hard to believe that egg, sugar, and cream of tartar can turn into this pliable, bouncy, expansive substance. I also pretended that I was on The Great British Bake-Off while I was preparing this base. Paul Hollywood probably wouldn’t have been pleased with my final product, as there was a slightly visible hairline fracture, but I was pleased enough.

IMG_6509 2.jpg

As usual, my biggest pie-making challenge is timing. I rarely leave hours in between stages of baking as suggested, as the need to eat the pie always seems pressing…but I let this base cool as long as humanly possible before filling and decorating.

IMG_6510 2.jpg

As far as the decorating, I can take very little, if any, credit. This pie was for our dear friend Matt’s birthday. He had been visiting us in LA for a week and we made the pie on the last night of his stay (which we wished we could extend indefinitely/forever). Matt is one of my top pie sous chefs, a sculptor, and a lover of whales and giant squids, so naturally he set to work carving intricate sea creatures out of dragonfruit purchased from the Japanese market across the way.

Another artistic touch by Matt…halving blackberries to line the pie’s border. Excellent.

Here we see the pie really coming together–the basin has been filled with homemade whipped cream, waves of berries are crashing from within, extending over the shore, and a dragonfruit sea turtle surfaces for a quick hello.

Finished creation featuring four sea creature friends: a whale, a turtle, a seahorse, and a starfish.

I am not embarrassed to report that the four people eating pie that night (I’m not counting the baby-Levi’s mom helped us out, his dad having decided that chocolate ice cream from Salt and Straw was more his speed than Dragonfruit Sea Creature Angel Pie) decided to simply quarter the whole thing and FULLY consumed it in one sitting. All that was left over was some of the Creme Anglaise, which I totally forgot to take pictures of, but which we did enjoy drizzled onto our pie quarters, as well as on Matt’s birthday breakfast pancakes the next morning.

I can’t help but smile every time I think about Dragonfruit Sea Creature Angel Pie. Thanks Matt for the ways in which you light up our life. ❤

Grandmother’s Chocolate Angel Pie

22 Wednesday Jun 2016

Posted by jessica@peace-of-pie in Chocolate Pie, Cream Pie, Meringue Pie, Original Pies

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Tags

chocolate, cream, meringue, Minnesota

Goal: Catch up on stories from last summer before embarking on this summer’s adventures. Okay. Go.

Our last visit to Minnesota was in August. We’re going again in exactly one week. I can’t wait. Last August’s trip was wonderful, but bittersweet. My Granddad passed away a year ago, and it makes me sad that I will never fish with him again, or do the Bible readings with him again, or hear his funny songs again. But, as my dad said at the funeral, Granddad believed in a hope that was reasonable: the resurrection. God created us with the ability to reason and created a world full of order and beauty for us to all marvel at. So, “why is it considered incredible among you people if God does raise the dead?” as Paul asks in Acts. We will see Granddad again soon.

On this particular trip, in the day and half we spent alone together, I asked my Grandmom to sit with me for a couple hours and let me record some of her stories…about growing up on a farm in Vermont, moving to the Midwest as a young woman, becoming a chemist during a time when women simply didn’t do that, being asked on lots of dates (as being practically the only woman at her workplace put her in a good position for!), meeting and marrying my Granddad and learning the Bible together. If you didn’t know this about my grandmother, she still volunteers at a nature center and does pond walks for children. She also spent many years volunteering at the Minnesota Science Museum; seeing the latest exhibit there was always a highlight of my childhood visits (okay, and my adult ones–who are we kidding here?) Of course, she is also a pie-maker extraordinaire. I am so thankful for the legacy that she and Granddad are leaving for our family.

Once again, we visited Minnesota at the wrong time of year to pick the ever-elusive red currants and make a pie out of them. Nonetheless, there were plenty of pie opportunities. One that I had been meaning to pursue for some time was a legendary recipe I had heard stories about but had never tasted myself; Grandmother’s Chocolate Angel Pie. My cousins and aunts and uncles had long talked about this wondrous concoction and I knew that I wanted…no, needed…to learn how to make it in order to continue climbing the ladder to Pie Mastery. It was the next achievement to unlock.

Grandmom didn’t have a recipe written down for this pie, per se. She uses elements of a recipe for Chocolate Dream Pie that she got from her roommate’s aunt when she was young Marie Gerdon and had just moved to Michigan from Vermont (the aunt was a high school Home Ec teacher). She also referred to a recipe for an unbaked Chocolate Cream Pie from the Joy of Cooking, as well as a pamphlet from the 60’s entitled “Betty Crocker’s Merry Makings: Fine Foods for Happy Entertaining”.

This pie comes together quickly and is fun to make. Although it requires the use of an oven, the temperature never gets set higher to 300 degrees, so it’s a good summertime choice if you’re trying to avoid heating your house up. The final result is very yummy…a slightly chewy, nut-studded layer of meringue crust filled with light whipped chocolate cream…and I think you should all try it. So much so that I took detailed notes and am writing up the recipe below. After all, pie is meant to be shared.

Grandmother’s Chocolate Angel Pie

Preheat Oven to 300 degrees F.

For Meringue Pie Shell:

2 egg whites (beat until shiny with electric mixer)

1/4 tsp cream of tartar (add to egg whites while beating)

1/2 tsp vanilla (add to egg whites while beating)

1/2 cup sugar (slowly add and gradually beat in. Turn off beaters.)

1/2 cup pecans (gently fold into egg white mixture)

Use a spatula (we used a spoon and our fingers!) to round the meringue into a pie shell (in a pie dish). It should touch the top rim of the pie dish all the way around. Bake for 55 minutes, making sure it doesn’t get too brown (rotate the dish halfway through baking).

For Chocolate Cream Filling:

1 4 oz. bar of baker’s chocolate (Grandmom uses German’s Chocolate Baking Bar, 48% cacao)

Melt chocolate. If using a microwave, melt on high for 30 seconds, stir, microwave for 30 seconds more, stir, and continue heating and stirring in 10 second increments until the chocolate is completely melted.

Whip 1 cup of whipping/heavy cream and fold in the melted chocolate. Spread chocolate cream in cooled pie shell. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

The Summer 2015 Ice Cream Pie Files: Strawberry Basked Alaska Pie

25 Sunday Oct 2015

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

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Tags

baked Alaska, ice cream, meringue, strawberry

We’re all busy pretending it’s fall here in California. I made pumpkin pancakes this morning, and I’m wearing jeans although shorts would be a better choice. I’m currently waiting for the weather to cool down from 84 degrees to 79 at dusk so I can take my dog for a walk. And then I’ll probably light an Autumn Spice candle. It’s a real conflict, I tell you.

Since it’s still a pre-sunset 84 F, I guess you guys won’t mind if I post about a seasonally confusing ice cream pie. Right? Thanks.

I got on rather an ice cream pie kick this year. There are several on deck to share with you. This happened partially because I’m running out of summer fruit pies to bake (they tend to be my favorite, and I still bake plenty, just not with recipes from Ken’s book) and partially because, YAY ICE CREAM! Who doesn’t like ice cream? Ice cream pies are also appealing because they’re typically pretty easy…the bulk of the work tends to be scooping ice cream into a crust…but be sure you’ve set aside enough time for the different phases that are involved. (Making crust, cooling crust, filling shell, freezing pie, making topping, yada yada.)

Even if you’re dairy-free, you could have enjoyed this particular ice cream pie I made last Memorial Day. I used the recipe for Strawberry Baked Alaska Pie but substituted Trader Joe’s divine coconut-milk strawberry ice cream. Good stuff.

I baked a graham cracker crust ahead of time, then filled the shell with this deliciousness (the Strawberry). Right before serving, I made a huge old pile of meringue to top the pie with (the Baked Alaska).

Here are some more pictures of the pie-making process and a lovely gathering of friends celebrating the beginning of summer.

*I feel the need to clarify that there are NO beets or peonies featured in this pie. I was putting together a candy beet and potato salad while working on the pie and apparently found myself obsessed with the abundance of pink that was presenting itself to me. Although it does make me consider; my friend Ruth makes delicious beet muffins. Could a beet pie also have a place in this world? Deep thoughts to ponder.

Pie & Beer, Chocolate & Whiskey

13 Friday Mar 2015

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

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Tags

chocolate, meringue, toffee, whiskey

I store too many pictures and messages on my phone, with the result that I’ve come to the very annoying point of being told every time I want to take a new photo that my storage is too full. As I was going through my camera roll and deleting some old photos today, I realized that I’ve been holding onto these, from my 26th birthday, for quite a while, and that I never shared them with all of you. So here’s a peek back to last end-of-May; a simple but very delicious dinner at our house with my cousin Martin and his girlfriend Jessica. I made this Chocolate and Whiskey Cream Pie with Toffee Meringue, a recipe from Donna Hay magazine (shout out to the Aussies!) and Martin made us the best birthday card ever. A happy night!

Success!!

30 Sunday Nov 2014

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

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

meringue, raisin, sour cream

That was the subject of Nancy’s email to me yesterday letting me know that her Sour Cream Raisin Pie had turned out and her dad loved it! This is a Thanksgiving pie story with a happy ending. (If you missed the beginning of the story, check it out here.)

Nancy was kind enough to share some pictures of the pie success and I thought you all might like to see them too!

Great job, Nancy! I hope while this was your first pie, it won’t be the last!

If you want to read some more Thanksgiving 2014 pie stories, check out the latest post Ken’s put up on the Pie Academy blog. My friend Tim’s pie is pictured, and I’ll be writing soon about the Maple Pecan Pie I made that’s mentioned at the very end of Ken’s post!

Sour Cream Raisin Pie for Nancy’s Dad

22 Saturday Nov 2014

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

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

meringue, raisins, sour cream

Dear Nancy,

Last week you wrote to me, introducing yourself as a colleague of my Uncle Joe. Your words about my blog were so kind. You were wondering if I had any advice on sour cream and raisin pie, as it’s your dad’s favorite and you’d like to make him one for Thanksgiving, even though you’ve never made a pie in your life. He asks for sour cream and raisin pie wherever he goes (finds it almost never) and since this is the first Thanksgiving your mom will not be present at your family dinner, you want to do something special for him. I hope your Thanksgiving dinner, though it will doubtless be bittersweet (dementia has taken a toll on both our families), will create happy new memories for all involved.

Now, to get you started on this pie!

I had NEVER tried a sour cream and raisin pie myself, but there is a recipe in Ken’s book (Norske Nook Raisin Pie) which looked like a great bet. Norske Nook is a restaurant in Wisconsin, not too far away from Minnesota-sounds like this is a pie of Midwest origins.

I’ve never before reproduced a recipe from Ken’s book word-for-word on my blog, but I’m going to go ahead and make an exception here. From this point forward, I’ll be writing the text of the recipe in plain type and adding my own commentary in italics. 🙂

I would love to hear how the pie turns out. I have every confidence it’ll be great; it was one of the easiest I’ve ever made, and in my opinion, absolutely delicious. I can’t wait to see what Dad thinks! (I’m sure my readers would love to see a picture of him with his beloved dessert.)

Thanks again for reaching out and I hope you find this post helpful.

Love,

Jess

Norske Nook Raisin Pie

Overall ingredient list: Flour, Butter, Shortening, Sugar, Salt, 2 cups sour cream, 4 eggs, 1 1/2 cups raisins

Crust: Ken Haedrich’s Basic Flaky Pie Pastry (mostly his words, some of my paraphrase)

Single Crust:

Cut up 1/2 stick of cold unsalted butter into small pieces and set aside. Measure out 1/4 cup of cold vegetable shortening and set aside. Combine 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 1/2 tsp sugar, and 1/2 tsp salt in a large bowl. Toss well, by hand, to mix. Scatter the butter pieces over the dry ingredients and toss to mix. Using your fingertips, rub the butter into the flour until it is broken into pieces the size of small peas. Add the shortening and pieces and continue to rub in until the fat is all in small pieces and very much incorporated into the dry ingredients. Fill the 1/4 cup you were using for shortening with cold water. Sprinkle half of the water over the mixture. Toss well with a fork to dampen the mixture. Add the remaining water, 1 1/2 to 2 tbs. at a time, and continue to toss and mix, pulling the mixture up from the bottom of the bowl on the upstroke and gently pressing down on the downstroke. Add a little more water, 1 tsp at a time, if necessary, until the dough can be packed together in a ball. Once it is packable, make a ball and press down to flatten it somewhat into a thick disk. Wrap the pastry (I use a piece of wax paper and fold all the corners under) and refrigerate until firm enough to roll.

This pie requires a pre-baked crust. I roll my pastry into a 12-inch circle between two sheets of wax paper-it makes it very easy to control the pastry. Once you have rolled out your pastry…Invert the pastry over a 9-inch standard pie pan, center, and peel off the paper. Tuck the pastry into the pan, without stretching it, and sculpt the edge into an upstanding ridge. Place in the freezer for 15 minutes, then fully prebake and let cool.

To prebake: You will need some sort of pie weight. I use about a cup of dried beans.

Tear off a piece of aluminum foil about 16 inches long. That’s more than you’ll need to fit into your pan, but the excess makes the foil easy to lift when you’re removing the beans. Center the foil over your pie shell and, just as you tucked the pastry into the pan, tuck the foil into the pie shell. The bottom edge should be well-defined, as should the sides. Basically, the foil should fit the pie shell like a second skin. Let the excess foil on the ends just flare out like wings. Don’t bunch it around the pie pan, or you’ll deflect heat away from the sides. Pour in enough dried beans to reach the top of the pan.

With your oven preheated to 400° F, bake the pie shell on the center rack for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, slide out the rack and slowly lift the foil with the pie weights out the pan. Lower the oven temperature to 375° F and continue to bake the pie shell for 15 more minutes. Check on the pie shell once or twice during this time to make sure it isn’t puffing up; if it is, prick the problem spot with a fork. Look for visual clues that the pastry is properly baked. A fully prebaked shell will be golden brown and look fully baked.

Combine 2 cups full-fat sour cream, 1 3/4 cups sugar, 4 tsp all-purpose flour, 4 large egg yolks (set the whites aside for the meringue topping!) and 1 1/2 cups dark raisins in a large, heavy saucepan, preferably nonstick. (I added a tiny splash of vanilla, per Ken’s recommendation, although that’s not in the original recipe.) Cook the mixture over medium heat, stirring continuously, until it thickens and turns glossy, 8 to 10 minutes. Slowly pour the filling into the cooled pie shell. Let cool thoroughly on a wire rack, then refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Here are some pictures to hopefully show you the difference between the custard when it is not quite thickened and the point after which it’s thickened. It will start bubbling in thick “plops” once it has thickened. Be patient! It really will take about 10 minutes over medium heat. When you make custard and it finally thickens, it happens very quickly and it’s a little magical, because it stays the same consistency for so long before the change happens.)

<Before

After>

Just before serving, preheat the broiler and make the meringue. Put 4 large egg whites (that you saved when you took the egg yolks!) in a large metal bowl over a pan of hot water. (I set the basin of my stand mixer in a pie plate with hot water in it, just for a minute.) Stir in 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 tsp salt. When the sugar has dissolved, use an electric mixer to beat the whites until they hold firm but not dry peaks. (If you haven’t made a meringue before, be patient with this process as well! It’s another magical turning point, just like with the custard!)

Spread the meringue thoroughly over the pie, so that it touches the entire edge of the crust, with no gaps.

Briefly run the pie under the broiler until very lightly browned. Do not leave the oven, as this will take a very short time. (NOT A JOKE!) Serve immediately.

(Here are all my adventurous pie-tasters! They either loved it or, if they didn’t like raisins, said it was great except for the raisins. Which is just such a funny thing to say about a predominantly raisin pie.)

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Great Summer Catch-Up

14 Thursday Aug 2014

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

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

lemon, meringue

And so it begins. Now that The Peace of Pie has been around for several years, the time-of-year patterns that show up are almost comically predictable.

I get to August and I’m all like, my blog is non-existent. I’ve been too busy living.

We’re not even going to admit that the pictures below are from March, cause they totally look like they could be taken in the summer (a perk of California).

We have just had so many delightful visits with friends this summer (okay, and spring, and all year.) Our friends Gray and Emily from Virginia came to spend a sunshiny weekend with us and it was just lovely. We walked around Santa Barbara, tasted some wines, ate some Mexican food, explored an entire warehouse full of orchids, and ended the day with a beach sunset and sushi. I’m describing this in detail so that you all desperately want to come visit too.

I’ve got pictures of Gray doing crazy stuff starting from when we were about ten years old. Here he is now.

They’re getting married next June.

I made this Classic Lemon Meringue Pie that weekend. Not to set the excitement level too high, but I’m about to reveal to you one of my hugest Epic Pie Fail moments to date. To preface: I am a still a meringue newbie. For those who were really paying attention while reading my Christmas post, you will note that the cinnamon meringue atop that lovely pie was my FIRST ever, making this my SECOND ever meringue experience.

Today’s take-home point: Respect the Broiler.

I know you all probably know already–never walk away from a broiler–well, I did. Yes, I did. For only thirty seconds, but that was mooooore than enough time for this carnage to take place.

Another point worth noting: burnt meringue smells like a s’more. Pretty good actually. But not so good to eat. So I scraped the top off and re-broiled just a smidge to cover up the battle scars. Goodbye, pretty mound of swirls. Hello, little haphazard pile.

So there’s a bit of vulnerability for you, from one baker to another (or maybe just from one baker to an interested reader, as the case may be. I think all you guys are great for reading what I write, so thanks a lot.) All’s well that ends well though, and I think Emily can vouch for the fact that this pie is an acceptable form of breakfast.

“So, this was Christmas…

09 Wednesday Apr 2014

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

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

chocolate, Christmas, christmas eve, cream, fig, meringue, pear, pine nut

…and what have you done?”

Not kept my blog up to date, that’s for a surety.

Let’s not dwell on the fact that these pies were made at Christmastime. Just ignore Levi’s “Merry Christmas, Ya Filthy Animal” sweater in the picture below, which was supposed to be a selfie with a pie (the pie was in the basket) but instead you can just see Levi and I, so I guess instead of a piefie, I ended up with a spousie.

Also, please forgive the fact that nearly every picture below, taken while putting together the astonishingly beautiful Pear and Fig Pie with a Pine Nut Crust, shows off my glittery holiday manicure.

This pie is made with dried figs, which I don’t love half so much as the fresh figs that my Great-Uncle Benny somehow grew every summer in his concrete backyard. Still, the combination of fig, pear, honey, and pine nut is really a delight.

Trader Joe’s should pay me for all the advertising I do for them. HONESTly.

To make the crust, just roll out a standard crust and then sprinkle the pine nuts over the top and gently press them in, your fantastic fingernails guiding the rolling pin.

When glazed with milk and sugar and baked, this pie truly looks like a masterpiece. Studding the top crust with nuts would be a fun trick for a variety of pies…just keep an eye out for burning and be prepared to tent the pie with aluminum foil for part of the baking if needed.

So here’s something that happens often. (As in, every time I make more than one pie at a time.) I do a swell job documenting the process of whatever pie I start first. Then, by the time I remember that I still have a whole other pie to make and it’s probably past my bedtime already, I don’t bother with all the pictures and just take one token one of the finished product. I have way fewer pictures of this Chocolate Cream Pie with Cinnamon Meringue.

Point to ponder: Is that what’s going to happen when I have two children…?

Let it be known; this was MY FIRST EVER MERINGUE. I kid you not. I’ve been making new pies for going on five years now and I’ve never made a stinkin’ meringue before. And look how purty it turned out. I’m such a proud mama.

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