Category: Yummy things

Pie Crust

Pies make the world go round. And one basic thing is common in nearly all pies. The crust.

Many different recipes.

Not for ME.

I use one recipe that I got from my Mom and I stick with it.

No sense in tangling with perfection.

Here’s the recipe that I use without fail. Memorized since I use it so often.

Pie Crust      

2 — 8 or 9 inch crusts

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup shortening

4 to 5 tablespoons COLD water

Stir flour and salt in large bowl until blended. Cut shortening into flour mixture using pastry blender or fork until shortening pieces are the size of peas. 

Gradually add just enough water, 1 tablespoon at a time, stirring with fork just until dough holds together and forms a smooth ball.

Let dough sit for one hour. Divide dough in half and shape into two balls for two pie crusts. At this point the balls of crust can be frozen.

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I hope you’re able to use this recipe and thoroughly enjoy it.

Cherry Custard Pie

George Washington’s birthday was just a few days ago. A celebration took place in my kitchen and the end result was a cherry custard pie. Not my usual pie and certainly not my usual CHERRY pie. But I’d say it was quite a success. Another of the household would prefer the recipe for cherry pie that I normally bake. I guess when you’re used to perfection it is hard to accept anything else. For me though, this recipe was totally yummy.

BTW if you are fortunate enough to have a Montmorency cherry tree that provides you with fresh cherries in the summer. Lucky you. I’ve got one in my yard, but it is for the birds. I don’t get any. That’s fine. I love birds.

Give this recipe a try and let me know what you think.

CHERRY CUSTARD PIE

1 – 9 inch unbaked pie shell

2 cans (14.5 to 16 oz each) Montmorency or sour pie cherries

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup flour

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Mix sugar and flour. Add eggs, milk and almond extract and mix well. Place drained cherries in unbaked pie shell. Pour custard mixture (sugar, flour, eggs, milk and almond extract) over cherries. Bake at 425º for 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 325º and continue baking for 55 more minutes.

Catbrier and Beautyberry

It has been so dry, but yesterday brought a glorious 1/4 inch of rain. Hallelujah! That rain brings a brief moment of relief to suffering vegetation.

The rain also brings beauty to the landscape. I love what rain does to colors, deepens them, makes them more rich. But of course more rich! Those colors are decorated with DIAMONDS. Here a Catbrier leaf, Smilax bona-nox, sparkling with rain drop diamonds, set against berries of Japanese Beautyberry, Callicarpa japonica.

Those berries will go begging for a while. There are more yummy things to tempt the birds right now, but as the days get shorter until we reach the dead of winter, birds will gather in the branches of these bushes and strip them bare.

Keep in mind if you are interested in Beautyberry, there is a highly recommended native, Callicarpa americana. Keep that scientific name in mind as you shop. Natives are the way to go.

 

 

Pi or Blueberries

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This pan will do the job of representing two words: pi and pie. Pi is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, and this pan is a circle. A Pie is usually a sweet, baked good which often is cooked up in a pan such as this. Many people look to me as a pie baker and I mention Pi Day because of that connection.

2-7-1997

Whether you are a bird . . .

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Whether you are a baby . . .

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Whether you are a baker . . .

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Whether you are a botanical connoisseur . . . chances are you have an interest in blueberries. As a baker, I love them for their ease of use. I just pull them out of the freezer and pop them into the batter for muffins, or pancakes, or pour them into a pastry lined pie pan and I am nearly done.

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As a naturalist and photographer, I love the blueberry bushes in my gardens for their beauty in every season. Even in the middle of winter they are simply gorgeous.

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A native shrub, which is easy to grow, with a bonus of yummy berries, I cannot recommend them highly enough.

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Just be sure, as harvest time arrives, that you have enough room in your freezer, and enough time to stay one step ahead of the bear.

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Happy Pi Day.

 

A Bush To Love

I’m in love with a bush that’s growing in my yard. Actually I have 14 of these bushes growing along the edge of my front porch, bordering the vegetable garden, and creating a shrub island by the wood shop. I can’t recommend them highly enough. Here in the mountains of central Virginia, they are a perfect shrub, lovely and trouble free.

After being planted, it was just a matter of sitting back and waiting. I do admit to being concerned when they were baby shrubs, and new to this mountain. I diligently watered them. I stopped doing that years ago, and they are not complaining in the least.

Native to Eastern North America, I can easily find blueberry bushes as I hike up the mountain. It always gives me a thrill to find this crop plant growing wild.

In the spring they show off with their creamy white, to blush pink blooms, enticing bees to come pollinate them. The blueberry bush, with its yummy berry, provides benefits to an incredible number of insects and animals, including at least 30 species of birds, along with many mammals. Browsers love to chomp on the leaves, but are not a problem. I’m thankful though, to have very few deer.

As the berries think of ripening, they create inspiration for me. Inspiration to take photographs of the still green fruit. I find them beautiful whether green or blue.

As they mature into frosty looking, deep blue orbs, there is more inspiration. Inspiration to bake. Bake pies, bake muffins, make pancakes. Although there are plenty of berries, I have to pace myself and not use them all up. Many, many quarts of berries are frozen, for treats throughout the year.

As summer turns to autumn, so do the leaves of the blueberry bush, creating another treat. The brilliance of the season is reflected in the foliage of the blueberry bush. Another season to inspire — more photographs!

And then comes, what is perhaps my favorite season, winter. The twigs of the blueberry bush in winter provide more spark for me, particularly when the ice storms hit — bright red branches, covered in ice. As others stress over the weather, I think, “Soon it will be spring again. Don’t stress over that ice. Just go get photos!”

More Pie Heritage

 

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Okay, my title says, “More Pie Heritage.” Some time ago, I wrote a blog referring to my “apple pie heritage”. This blog is about Funny Cake.

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So, am I talking about pie, or am I talking about cake? It is in a pie crust, but it is a cake, made with all the requirements for cake. And once you cut into the cake, you’ll find a surprise treasure of chocolate, a bit like icing, on the bottom.

I’d like to point out something that you’ll see in a couple of these pictures – the rolling pin I use. It is a must for me, for making my pie crusts. It was made by a dear friends of mine, at Phineas Rose. You can find this rolling pin, made in many different types of wood, at the Noon Whistle Pottery.

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The recipe for Funny Cake has come to me, down through the generations. It is accompanied with a legend. My Grandmother Bertie died when my Mom was very young. Grandpa remarried a wonderful woman, who of course, I and all my cousins called Grandmom. This is “Grandmom Maude.” Grandmom Maude found Grandmom Bertie’s recipe for Funny Cake, and wanting to make dessert for her family, got to work stirring up the ingredients.

The recipe that she was working from did not have any notation that the ingredients must go into 2 unbaked pie shells. So she just put the ingredients into a pan and baked it up. The results, at least in the legend, were quite a disappointment. But Grandmom Maude, being the determined individual she was, made the corrections and continued making Funny Cake for many years.

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Here is my recipe for Funny Cake. It is in my handwriting, in a little recipe notebook that my Mom’s sister, my Aunt Kay gave to me shortly before I got married. So what you see was written about 46 years ago.  I wish it was in Grandmom Bertie’s handwriting, but no such luck. At least I have been able to pass the recipe on to my son and daughter-in-law, and one of these days, perhaps their daughter will be getting it as her birthday cake!

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Don’t forget – divide the chocolate and batter into 2 unbaked pie shells!

Thinking About Maples And Syrup

Sugar Maple, Acer saccharum
Sugar Maple, Acer saccharum

Sweet Memories

Vermont and a telescope making conference, Stellafane, used to draw me to the land of black and white cows, Ben and Jerry’s, Sugar Maples, and maple syrup.  I went up there for Stellafane for nearly 20 years straight.  It was an education.  An education in telescope making and astronomy in general, an education in country living, an education in Ben and Jerry’s ice cream and an education in maple syrup.  Before those trips to Vermont I was quite happy to buy any old brand of pancake syrup, no care that it was mainly high fructose corn syrup.  Now I know better.  Only Vermont maple syrup gets set on my breakfast table or poured onto my ice cream!

Red Maple, Acer rubrum
Red Maple, Acer rubrum

Sticky Situation

Maple syrup is made from the sap of the Sugar Maple, and also Red Maple and Black Maple trees.  The trees in northern latitudes or higher elevations such as here in Virginia, store starch in their trunks before the winter months turn the temperatures cold.  In the spring, as the weather warms just a bit, the starch is converted to sugar.  The sap is collected by boring a hole into the trunk of the tree and the sap will seep out, into a galvanized bucket or in more modern times into a system of plastic tubes that are connected to one another throughout the maple syrup production farm or “sugarbush.”

Another Red Maple, the yellow leaves are the Red Maple!
Another Red Maple, the yellow leaves and the silvery bark are the Red Maple!

 

Boil, Boil, Boil

The sap that is collected is boiled down from between  5 and 13 gallons until 1/4 gallon is left.  This takes place in a “sugar house.”  The trees are usually tapped starting at between 30 and 40 years of age and an average tree will produce about 10 gallons of sap per season at about 3 gallons a day.  These maples are sometimes tapped until they reach over 100 years of age.

Nutrition

In comparing calories, maple syrup and sugar come out about equal, but maple syrup is a source of manganese (13 grams contains .44 milligrams) and also contains zinc (13 grams contain .55 milligrams).  It beats out honey with 15 times more calcium and has 1/10 the amount of salt.  Hmmm, I think I want pancakes for breakfast!

Apple Pie Heritage

Apple Pie Made With Lots Of Love
Apple Pie Made With Lots Of Love

Mom’s Family

I grew up with apple pies.  Lots of other pies too, but the standout memory is apple pies.  My Mom is Pennsylvania Dutch, which, in my mind, means she is a terrific cook, but most of all a terrific pie baker.  She tells me of falling asleep in her grandparent’s dining room, while all the adults sat around the table speaking German, a language she didn’t learn.  Interesting to me — these family members had been in America for 300 years but still spoke their German.

The Pie Connection

Mom also tells me of her grandmother baking many, many pies at the end of each week, so that the hard working family would have pies to last throughout the coming week.  They would be set aside in a pie safe.  Years ago I found a pie safe at an antique shop in Leesburg, Virginia.  I was told that the pie safe had come from York, Pennsylvania.  My son now has that pie safe.  We used to keep our stereo equipment in it.  I don’t know what he stores in it now, but I doubt it is pies!

First Apple Pie, First Year At Wm & Mary
First Apple Pie, First Year At Wm & Mary

Carrying On The Tradition

Now both my son and I are pie bakers.  I make crust from scratch all the time.  I think he makes crust from scratch some of the time.  But I think we both do a super job!  Apple Pie?  A must for me, is to use McIntosh apples.  Their flavor just can’t be beat.  Some say the apple, when cooked turns to mush.  I say, “Who cares?!!”  It just plain makes a scrumptious pie!

A New Ingredient

I learned to add a new ingredient, on my first visit with my husband’s grandmother, when we moved to New Mexico.  She added a touch of salt to her apple pies.  I’ve used that touch of salt ever since.

Mom’s Recipe With The Added New Mexico Ingredient

One unbaked 9 inch pie crust

6 medium sized apples, peeled, cored and chopped into 2 inch pieces (or the size that you prefer), place in pie crust

  • 1 cup unbleached flour
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 to 1 teaspoon cinnamon

Cream together flour, sugar, butter, salt and cinnamon.  Sprinkle on top of chopped apples.  Bake in preheated 425 degree  oven for 15 minutes.  Turn oven temperature down to 375 degrees, and continue baking for 45 more minutes.  Let pie cool or serve warm topped with homemade vanilla ice cream.

Thanks Mom, for the recipe and for the heritage!