Beautiful Dallas Buddhist/Christmas Pies!

Made by Stacy's friend Shannon's mother-in-law for a party at the Buddhist Center in Dallas.

Karma Cloud

Christmas Pie

What beauts!

HAPPY NEW YEAR TIDINGS TO ALL! Oh the pies we can create in 2008!

Let's Talk About Root Crops...

Veggie Pot Pie

For a Christmas dinner side dish, I made roasted root vegetable/goat cheese packets (wrapped in phyllo dough), adapted from the Williams-Sonoma cookbook, Cooking from the Farmer's Market. They were a big hit, but I had a lot of roasted root veggies left over, so we put them into pot pies! I made a veggie pot pie, and my parents made a chicken pot pie. 

The roasted root veggies included:
1 yellow onion
3 leeks
3 turnips
1 rutabaga
4 potatoes
3 parsnips
4 carrots
You could also use 1 bulb fennel or 1 celeriac, though they didn't have it at the grocery store!

Marinate in olive oil and sprinkle with thyme, rosemary (or herbs de provence) and salt and pepper. Let sit until pie crust and gravy is ready.

Veggie gravy:
Make a rue with butter and flour. add veggie stock and thyme & rosemary or herbs de provence.
Put root veggies into the pie crust and mix in gravy. add top shell and bake for about 45 minutes at 350.


ENJOY (with white wine and a fireplace, if possible)!

Christmas Pie

From wikipedia: Christmas Pie is a village, in Surrey, England. Named after Christmas Pie Farm (1823) a name probably associated with the Christmas family that is mentioned in 16th century records.

What kind of Christmas pie will you be making?

Pies Oh Mies, By Marina

Louis with a tart

For the Tivoli Craft day last weekend, I baked and sold some pies and tarts. The pies were Apple Green Tomato, and the tarts were Apple with Almond Cream... so scrummy both.

 

Pies in the oven

I got one lovely testimonial from a lady the day after she bought the Apple Green Tomato pie "We had your pie for dessert last night and it was delicious! (in a whisper) I even had some for breakfast." Sophia's choice quote was "Pie is always good in a pinch."

Alen Newman with pie

Also, before the craft fair I went to the bakery to buy some pie boxes, and Mikey said I should sell them for $12, or $2.50 per slice. When Sophia went back on Sunday to get two more boxes, Mikey asked how much I was selling them for, she said $12, and that they were selling fast, and he - very uncharacteristically - got very excited saying "Yes! Good for her! Right on!" and such and such.

The Pie Stand

HOORAY FOR PIES!

Jill's Thanksgiving Pies

Apple

Pecan (with maple)...her first attempt!

Portland Pies: Thanksgiving 2007

apple and maple pie, fresh from the oven

For the third year in a row, I spent The #1 Pie Day of the Year (Thanksgiving) in Portland, ME with Robert & Talya and the Portland crew. The first year I made a maple walnut pie, last year I made a cranberry pie, and this year I baked two: a maple pie and an apple pie. Talya made a delicious pumpkin.


The apple pie was pretty standard...I used Northern Spy apples and improvised the filling--brown sugar, a bit of flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and lemon juice. For the crust decor, I cut out and added a turkey with my turkey cookie cutter.

I got the recipe for the maple pie from Epicurious, but modified it just a tad. Here's the recipe I used: 

Maple Syrup Pie 
Ingredients: 
Pie crust 
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup heavy cream (I used 1/2 half and half, 1/2 whipping cream)
1/3 cup pure maple syrup, grade B
2 teaspoons unsalted butter, melted

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Roll out crust and place in pie dish. I used a turkey cookie cutter and placed cut-out turkeys all around the perimeter of the crust.
3. Whisk together brown sugar and eggs. Add cream, syrup, and butter, and whisk until smooth. Pour filling into pie shell.
4. Bake pie until crust is golden and filling is puffed and looks dry but still shakes, 50 to 60 minutes. Cool, Enjoy!

We topped ours with whipped cream. The pie is already so sweet, I would recommend not sweetening the whipped cream.

Everyone LOVED this pie, which was a pleasant surprise! Next time I'd like to try making it with all maple syrup and no brown sugar.

The dessert table, with the maple and apple pies and Talya's amazing Ukranian cookies. The pumpkin pie was on the 2nd tier of the dessert table!

High on pie, we made up a little song about them:

Dewald Thanksgiving 2008

This year's Seamonster Thanksgiving was totally fun with 7 seamonsters sharing Thanksgiving dinner and 9 seamonsters sharing drinks and dessert. We all got a little goofy on beer and heaping plates of outrageousness, and Meghan passed out again, after a full day at work in the kitchen, waking up to find all the food put away and the house quiet. Well, sort of quiet. Highpoints include EVERYTHING - mashed potatoes, stuffing, squash-apple-cheese gorgeous, turkey, sweet potato-apricot amazingness, rolls, salad, brussel sprout-fennel, a complete line up of delicious drinks, including Meghan's homemade wild grape nectar, and of course, PIES!

Many of us were way too full to fully enjoy pies, but Greg and I did manage to save pie-shaped wedges of stomach space ("pie holes" if you will) in which we delicately slid multiple pieces of pie each.

Meghan won the day with 3 pies, including these two dueling apple pies. One had Dutch heirlooms (on the left) and the other had French heirlooms (on the right). I went for the French, and the pie was perfect.


The pie line up also included a pumpkin pudding pie by Greg which was a little runny this year but absolutely the sweetest tasting thing imaginable. Meghan rounded out the pie bar with a Japanese squash pie, which was unbelievably good with a subtle flavor and great texture and beautiful sheen.



And what's for breakfast? Pie, of course! And for lunch? Apple-squash-cheese gorgeousness and turkey sandwiches!
Thank you, Meghan, Gahlord, JT, Rachel, Rachel, Greg, Tanner and JB! Thank you, farmers and bringers of food! Thank you, plants and animals! Thank you soil, rocks, wind and water! Joy to all!

Da DEEP Dish

A few weeks ago some friends and I made our way to Rokeby for the Superior Concept Monsters puppet workday--to help build puppets for the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade and to make food for the people who help build puppets.

Sara, Heather, and I were on kitchen duty, and in one mad hour of aproned girl talk, loud dance music, and cooking, whipped out a chicken pot pie, vegetable pot pie, chicken stew, chard, salad, and apple pie. Since both pie plates were being used for the dinner pies, the apple pie had to be made DEEP dish style. The deep dish, folks, is not a poor man's pie. It requires plenty of heaping fruit.

But the deep dish= deep delish= deep daze. just ask Brodie:



Unfortunately, no pictures were taken of the savory pies.

Summer Memories of Peach Pie

Texas girl with a peach pie

Awhile back (during the height of peach season) I made a peach pie for Stacy and Chris' going away party at Shelburne Farms. To make the crust, I cut out little hearts with a former-home items cookie cutter, and arranged them in concentric circles around the top. I like the effect!

Indiana Fall: A story in One Act

Last weekend, Michael and I paid a long overdue visit to Elkhart. Thanks to Emily's insistence that we re-live her childhood, we found ourselves traversing the back roads of Indiana in search of an old apple orchard. And then, gold:









Or so we thought. The late frosts this spring and lack of rain this summer have left parts of Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan shy on apples. Jacqueline was comforted by the gourds we found for sale, but Michael was inconsolable.




After we knocked on the door of the old house, however, and J reacquainted herself with the Eberlys, we were told to scavenge for whatever we could find:








In the midst of our frolicking, Don met us with a WWI-era shotgun (and his dog, I think from the same era). In jest, of course--or so he claimed. Walking through the orchard, we heard stories of elephants, crooked politicians, and hardy hibiscus.










The stories continued into the barn, where Don supplemented our meager fruit supply and sent us home with wishes for a delicious evening.

Jacqueline's pie did not disappoint.

Apple Tarts on a Windowsill, or "Roll it, Pat it, Mark it with a B"

On Saturday we put on the "Burlington So-No Please Don't Go" Quest as a send-off for Ben and Angela in their move to Portland, OR. My house was the first sojourn of the quest and I made miniature apple pies for the occasion. They were cooling on the windowsill when Ben and Angela arrived.




On your bikes! Hooray, it's a quest!
Made by your friends who think you're the best
Down the hill for your first surprise
At the home of the girl who loves to bake pies.

table is set, awaiting their arrival

Ben and Angela in the Pie Enjoyment Zone

Hooray! You made it, we're all so sad-glad
to send off two friends so incredibly rad
this quest compressed Burlington in a montage
dance with us and eat cupcakes before your "Bon Voyage!"

11 sojourns later, we all found ourselves at Mandy and Greg's where we celebrated Ben and Angela and ate cupcakes and the rest of the apple tarts (and a pumpkin pie too!).

Sara-Paule in the Pie Enjoyment Zone

me (a.k.a. Ms. Pothole) in the Pie Enjoyment Zone

FARETHEEWELL BEN AND ANGELA...WE WILL MISS YOU EVER SO MUCH!

September Wedding Pie, or, "Peaches in the Summertime, Apples in the Fall"

On Saturday our dear friends Mandy and Greg had their marriage celebration at the Intervale. It was a beautiful, magical ceremony with smudging and droning and readings and singing and crying and laughing and bell ringing and despacho offering. After the ceremony, we all gathered in the barn for the D's: delicious dinner, various desserts made by Mandy's gal pals, dancing...and the Davises.

The dessert table!

For the occasion, I made a peach pie and an apple pie, in celebration of Mandy and Greg and also of the narrow window of overlap between peach season and apple season.

the apple pie, crust decorated with 2 birds...one in positive space, the other in negative space.

See archives from October 2006 for my apple pie recipe.

the peach pie, crust decorated with lots of overlapping tiny hearts

My recipe for Peach Pie filling
adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook: 

3 lbs. peaches, peeled, pitted, and finely sliced
1/4 c. fresh lemon juice
5 Tblsp. all-purpose flour
3/4 c. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
pinch of ground mace

Toss peaches with lemon juice in large bowl. Stir together flour, sugar, salt, and mace in small bowl and add to peaches. toss until combined, and pour into crust.

Greg's dad Rowland cuts the pie!

Dale is about to enter the pie enjoyment zone!

And I know this is a pie blog, but I would be remiss if I did not mention Meghan's PERFECT white wedding cake with homemade candied edible flowers. And while I'm at it, I'll mention the other delicious desserts (though I was too full to try them): cupcakes by Angela, cheesecake by Joe and Lauren, and vegan cupcakes by Babycakes via Stacy!

Blueberry Pie

Last week on Erik and Abra's first day in Burlington, we met Mandy, Greg and Sara-Paule at Adam's Berry Farm to pick blueberries. Since Erik grew up in Chicago, filling his schedule with daily visits to the Art Institute, Holograph museum, and the Burghoff, he never had time for berry picking. This was his first time.

After a visit to Healthy City and a pizza rampage at Flatbread--where we were joined by Dale and Julia-- Erik, Abra, Sara-Paule and I retired to the halfway house to bake a duet of blueberry pies. Sara-Paule had asked me to teach her in the art of pie making in exchange for her teaching me the art of ravioli making.

Above: SP cuts her mandala-top crust
Below: Lattice top in the oven
SP puts finishing touches on the mandala top
baked mandala top
baked lattice top

Abra prepared the filling, with flour, sugar, salt, and vanilla (we didn't have a lemon, though it is highly recommended in blueberry pie filling!) and I showed SP my crust recipe. I did a lattice top, and SP made a mandala-top. Prior to baking, we brushed on an egg wash, and sprinkled the crusts with turbinado sugar.

I cut the lattice top

We enjoyed the pie with single-serving milks (courtesy of Healthy City), while listening to Steeleye Span and playing Scrabble. Erik won, but he was also reading the "10 ways to become a Scrabble expert" guide while playing.

SP snatched her pie from the windowsill the next morning, Erik enjoyed some for breakfast, and I took pieces to work for Mandy and me.