notes from my food diary

These pies were made for the bake sale and they were similar to what was called galette.  I’ve made galette before and when I made that I used all butter crust.  This time I used half butter half shortening.  Even though I’m not a fan of shortening in baking, I found that the crust is usually crisper and flakier.  

The flavor combination is pretty much spell fall, with cranberries starting to come in the market this pie would be perfect to make anytime this year.  Tart, not overly sweet, and crumble in the mouth the minute you bite into it.  And when I look at the color of the pie I couldn’t help but wonder why I’ve always loved fall season.

Cranberry-Apple-Orange Freeform Pie

Makes about 4 small pies

Crust:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces

1/4 cup cold vegetable shortening, cut into pieces

1/4 cup cold water

Filling:

2 cups fresh cranberries

2/3 cup sugar

3 large firm apples, peeled, quartered, cored, and sliced crosswise

1/3 cup orange juice

Grated zest of 1 orange

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

8 teaspoons unsalted butter, divided up

Glaze:

1 egg yolk, lightly beaten

Coarse sugar

To make the crust:  Put the flour, sugar, and salt in a food processor.  Pulse several times to mix.  Scatter the butter over the dry ingredients and pulse the machine 5 to 6 times to cut it in.  Scatter the shortening over the flour and pulse 5 to 6 times.  Drizzle half of the water over the flour mixture and pulse 5 to 6 times.  Fluff the mixture from the bottom of the bowl, then sprinkle on the remaining water.  Pulse 5 to 6 times more, until the dough starts to form clumps and resembles coarse crumbs.  Dump the contents into the a large bowl.  If it’s a bit dry, sprinkle with a teaspoon of cold water and work it with fingertips.  Pack the pastry into a ball, knead the ball once or twice, divide the ball into four small balls, then flatten each ball into  3/4-inch thick disk on a floured work surface.  Wrap the disks in plastic and refrigerate at least an hour or overnight before rolling.

To make the filling:  Combine the cranberries and sugar in a food processor and pulse until the cranberries are coarsely chopped.  Transfer to a large bowl and add all the remaining filling ingredients, tossing well to combine.  Set the mixture aside for 30 minutes.  Preheat the oven to 400 degree F a few minutes before you start to assemble the pie.

On a lightly floured surface, roll one ball into an approximately 6 to 8 inches circle with a floured rolling pin.  Spoon 1/4 of the filling into the center of the crust.  Fold the edges of the dough in overlapping pattern, exposing the filling, don’t worry if they’re not very neat.  Do the same with the rest of the ball of crust and filling. 

Transfer the pies to a baking pan lined with parchment paper or silicone baking mat.  Brush the edges of the pies with the beaten egg yolk, and sprinkle them with coarse sugar.  Dot the filling on each pie with two teaspoons of butter.

Bake the pies for 15 minutes on the center oven rack.  Reduce the oven temperature to 375 degree F and rotate the pan 180 degrees.  Continues baking until the juices bubble thickly up through the center of pies, about 15 minutes more.

Transfer pies to a wire rack and let cool at least 30 minutes before serving.

Source:  adapted from Pie by Ken Haedrich

I haven’t been participating in any food blogging event for a while and I think it’s time to do it again. For this month I chose to participate in Sugar High Friday event which was created by Jennifer of Domestic Goddess back in 2004. The event is very fun, always a treat to the eyes and mouth, and there’s no pressure of winning it or not. This September edition is hosted by Candice over at Mmm, Tasty!.  Thanks Candice!

The last dessert I’ve made in the past few weeks was this Black-Bottom Peach-Almond Tart. The inspiration, of course was from the abundance of local peaches in September, especially the Maryhill peaches. These tasty and juicy peaches are locally grown and they’re perfect for the tart that I wanted to make. If I’m asked the reason why I made this, the answer was somewhere close to "because I have to". Summer is not summer without at least one kind of pie or tart. I love both, and I love fruit pies or tarts. Those are the kinds that warm my heart and have a long lasting impression in my tummy

Black-Bottom Peach-Almond Tart

Serves 6 to 8

Crust:

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, diced and chilled, plus extra for greasing pan

3/4 cup sliced almonds

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

6 tablespoons sugar

1 egg yolk, beaten

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling:

1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

2 tablespoons peach preserves

6 tablespoons sliced almonds, divided

1 1/2 pounds ripe peaches, peeled, cut into 1/2-inch thick slices

3 tablespoons sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons grated lemon zest

To make the crust:

Butter a 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom.  Coarsely grind almonds in a food processor, add flour and sugar and continue processing until nuts are finely ground.  Add 6 tablespoons butter and pulse machine until mixture resembles coarse meal.  Pour egg yolk into mixture and vanilla over flour mixture, and pulse again until mixture forms large moist clumps.  Remove dough from food processor.  Press dough evenly onto bottom and up sides of tart pan to form a crust.  Cover and freeze for 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 degree F and place a rack in the center position.  Bake the crust for about 15 minutes or until golden brown.  Remove, but maintain the oven temperature.  Quickly sprinkle the bottom of the crust with the semi-sweet chocolate chips.  Wait about 5 minutes or until the chips look glossy.  Spread the chocolate with an offset spatula until it covers the bottom of the crust.  Cool the crust for 5 to 10 minutes.

To make the filling: 

Spread the preserves over the top of the chocolate.  Coarsely chop 4 tablespoons of the almonds and sprinkle over the bottom of the crust.  Arrange peaches in an overlapping spiral pattern in shell, and sprinkle them with sugar, then with lemon zest.  Dot with butter and sprinkle with remaining almonds.  Bake until peaches are tender, about 35 minutes.  Cool slightly.  Serve warm or at room temperature.  This tart is best eaten the day it is made.

Source:  adapted from The Big Book of Backyard Baking

The calendar will turn to September tomorrow so before it’s too late I’m going to write this piece of good news.

About two months ago I was approached by ThinkSpain.com editor, Anita, to write a recipe for the guide for the month of August.  She likes what I do in my food blog and she would love to feature my recipe in the guide.  It was totally unexpected and I was in a position where I could try a recipe, bake something sweet and write it for a different audience.  ThinkSpain.com is a guide published in both English and Spanish language and it also has both Internet and printed editions. 

One of the thing to keep me focused on what recipe I would like to write at that time was what an appropriate baked goods to eat in the month of August.  Anita also mentioned that I had to consider the ingredients, not all of the ingredients I use here would be available in Spain.  Blueberry was my first choice because it was readily available during summer months and galettes would be nice and something easier to make for friends or family gathering. 

My timing was slightly off during the month of July because my family had a vacation and the house remodeling started soon after we came back from vacation.  In between those time I had to move my house stuff so finding time to bake was one the hardest thing to do   I’ve came up with the recipe long before I planned to bake it, so at least that part was done already.  Tweaking a recipe was not an easy thing to do especially when you’re facing with a deadline, vacation and remodeling.  

If a blessing was disguised in form of friends then I was lucky.  In the weekend before I left for vacation, my church friends invited me to have a picnic.  Because I had to bake the galettes right that week, I could not be happier than to have a handful of testers.  My church friends were very supportive in that they helped me finished the galettes and made comments on how they tasted.  They were my best reviewers ever!

I am not posting the recipe but you could see go here to see it.  I am sharing all the photos I made that session and hopefully you will enjoy them as well and big thank you for Anita for featuring my recipe in the guide this month!

Last Saturday my family and I were invited to a house of a church friend.  They didn’t insist that I brought something for the lunch, but knowing me, I couldn’t resist not making a dessert to bring.  I was planning to pick some strawberries this summer.  I wouldn’t want to miss some U-picking, especially if the weather was good.  What I proposed to make was a strawberry-lemon chess pie.  This old-fashioned dessert was one of things that I wanted to try from a book and it uses strawberry as part of the ingredients

On Thursday I then went picking strawberries with my son to a farm in Oregon City which was about 20 minutes from my house.  The farm’s name is Albeke Farms and they’re still have strawberries to pick.  The day was a bit overcast but not overly cold which I actually was glad.  I only brought several containers because I didn’t have any freezer space this time.  Any berries we picked would end up eaten fresh or made into some kind of desserts.

The strawberries were big and juicy.  For some reasons, they’re not so sweet though, the ones I picked last year at a different farm were much sweeter.  But since we’re there anyway and my son just couldn’t resist picking, we stayed for a while.  On Friday I made the pies, yes, I wrote pies because the recipe yielded two pies.  Might as well made two pies, especially since my husband has been asking me to make some desserts since last week. 

I brought one of the pies to the lunch at my friend’s house and it was a big hit (lucky for us, we still have one more in the fridge!)  People who loves lemon would love this puckery-sweet pie.  Pardon my photos, as I was trying to find a good pose for the pie, but most of the strawberries on top just slinked away. 

Strawberry-Lemon Chess Pie

Yields one 9-inch pie

One 9-inch single piecrust of your choice

Lemon filling:

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter

1/2 cup fresh lemon juice (2 large lemons)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tablespoon cornmeal

1 tablespoon cornstarch

4 large eggs, lightly beaten

Strawberry Glaze:

One 1-pound bag frozen strawberries, thawed, plus 1-pint fresh berries, washed and stemmed

3/4 to 1 cup sugar

3 tablespoons tapioca flour

2 teaspoons lemon juice

Pinch of salt

To make the filling:  Melt the butter and stir in the lemon juice, salt, sugar, cornmeal, and cornstarch.  Add the eggs and stir until mixture is well combined.  Pour into the unbaked pie shell.

Bake the pie on the bottom rack of a preheated 375 degree F oven for 40 to 50 minutes, or until the center is set.  The top should be golden brown.  Remove the pie from the oven and allow it to cool for several hours before topping.

To make the glaze:  In a medium-sized saucepan, mix the thawed frozen berries and their juice with the sugar, tapioca flour, lemon juice, and salt.  Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.  When the mixture is clear and thickened, remove it from the heat and set it aside to cool to lukewarm.  Add the fresh berries and mound glaze atop the pie.  Cool completely before serving.

Source:  adapted from The King Arthur Flour The All-Purpose Baking Cookbook

I felt a little guilty about this post.  Especially the name.  Do you want to know why?  Read on.

I intended to make this pies on last Saturday.  That day, after morning’s activity, the afternoon seemed to offer me a few hours of unscheduled time.  So here I went ahead making the pie crust because it needed to chill for an hour.  My hubby came home and he suddenly announced that we were going to see an Oktoberfest here in our hometown.  We went there, but were dissapointed because there’s hardly anybody showed up at the festival.  Since it’s put up in a park, my son decided he wanted to play for a while.  Alright, he’s been asking about playing in the park before we went and since it wasn’t raining anymore, we decided it’s okay.  Time flew, before we knew it, it’s time to go home and started dinner.  My pie crust was still sitting in the fridge. 

After dinner, I decided to tackle one more chore before doing the pie.  I needed to grated several pounds of Cotija cheese for my son’s school festival the next day.  Before I knew it, nighttime came, and it’s time to prepare for my son’s bed.  The pie crust was still in the fridge.

I didn’t panicked.  I figured I could do it real quick before I had to go to the school at 11 o’clock on Sunday.  Sunday morning came, I was busy starting the pie right after breakfast ended.  Before I realized it, it’s time for me to go to the school.  I let the pie cooled on the rack and tried to not worry about them.  Later in the afternoon I came home and wanted to take photograph of the pies.  Once I cut the pie, I realized I didn’t read the instruction carefully.  It said that to serve these warm so the chocolate will flow from the center.  Ohhhh boy…..

So there…I had a chocolate filled pies instead of chocolate lava pie.  I served these with coffee mascarpone and in no time all six of them were gone in two days!   Taste wise, they’re as good as warm, but presentation wise, they’re cuter when warm.

Update (October 15, 2008): upon suggestion by Arfi, I’m sending this entry for the Sweet Pies event hosted by Ivy at Kopiaste.  Thanks Arfi for reminding me to enter the event.

Chocolate Lava Pies

Makes 6 servings

1 recipe Tender Cream Cheese Pastry, divided and refrigerated

Filling

1/2 cup light corn syrup

6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

2 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

1/3 cup sugar

3 tablespoons cake flour, sifted

1/8 teaspon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 large egg yolks

Garnish

Coffee Mascarpone

If you haven’t already, prepare the pastry and divide it in half.  Refrigerate until firm enough to roll, 1 to 1 1/2 hours.  Lightly butter a muffin pan with 6 standard-size cups.  You can use a 12-cup pan, if necessary.

On a sheet of lightly floured waxed paper, roll one half of the pastry about 1/8 inch thick (as thick as you’d roll any pastry) with a floured rolling pin.  Slide the dough, on the paper, onto a bking sheet and refrigerate for 7 to 10 minutes.  Using a 4 1/2-inch diameter cutter of some sort or a 4 1/2-inch circle as a guide, cut out 3 pastry circles.  Gently push each pastry into a muffin cup; the edge of the pastry will nearly reach the top edge of the cup.  Repeat for the other half of the dough, lining a total of 6 cups.  Place in the freezer for 15 minutes.  Preheat the oven to 350 degree F.

Combine the corn syrup and butter in a medium-size saucepan over medium heat and slowly melt the butter.  Turn off the heat and add the chocolate, tilting the pan so that the hot liquid runs over it.  Set aside for 5 minutes, then wisk until smooth and well combined.  Pour mixture into a medium-size bowl.  Add the sugar, flour, and salt, and whisk to blend.  Add the vanilla and egg yolks and whisk until evenly combined.  Using a small scoop or ladle, divide the filling evenly among the chilled muffin cups.

Put the pan on the center oven rack and bake until the chocolate rises up to the top of the cups and bubbles slightly, about 25 minutes.

Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let the pies cool in the pan for 15 to 25 minutes.  When they’ve reached the proper serving temperature, the edges will somewhat set, but the center will be soft and concave.  Serve with a dollop of coffee mascarpone in the center of each pie.

Coffee Mascarpone

Sitr 1 tablespoon sugar and 1 tablespoon Kahluá or other coffe liqueur into the mascarpone.  Stir well with a wooden spoon until combined.  Don’t be concerned if you can still taste the grittiness of the sugar.  As the cheese sits in the refrigerator prior to serving, the sugar will dissolved.  Cover and refrigerate for 15 to 30 minutes or up to 2 days before serving.

Source:  adapted from Pie by Ken Haedrich