Pie Squared

When I said earlier that there’s a lot of “it’s that time of year again” in my life during the autumn months, I should have included in the list the annual pie-making ritual that is His Lordship’s birthday.

I usually spend the weeks before his birthday with my ears open for any new options, and this year I happened upon the episode of America’s Test Kitchen on apple desserts. The Skillet Apple Pie not only looked perfect but also provided a ready-made gift idea: a 12-inch oven-safe skillet, which we did not have. (I know! Kitchen equipment I don’t own! Inconceivable!)

The idea here is that the filling is pre-cooked on the stove, then covered with just a top layer of dough and baked for a much shorter-than-usual length of time. The sheer brilliance of this is that it sidesteps the double-hassle of rolling, fitting and crimping, and avoids the largely inevitable risk of a soggy and/or tough bottom crust. You also don’t have to worry about finding an oven temperature that will soften the fruit, set the liquids, bake the dough, and avoid burning or overbaking any of the components. Since the filling is already mostly cooked, you’re free to flash-bake the crust at a temperature so high that the layers of dough “EEK!” away from each other and create beautifully crispy strata.

I did have to make some important changes to the procedures to accommodate the special needs of non-hydrogenated shortening, but even so, this was as effortless as pie could ever possibly be. The outcome was, if I may say so, even better than the birthday pie I deemed perfect a couple of years ago. This one may not be quite as refined as that standard double-crust apple pie, but it has its own kind of beauty, and by every measure it was a smashing success. The apple filling was sweet and juicy, neither gummy with too much thickener nor runny with too little. The pastry was utterly perfect: flaky, tender, shatteringly crisp. His Lordship positively adored it, both the day it was baked and the next morning for breakfast.

I love the ease, speed and deliciousness of this recipe so much that the birthday apple version was followed two weeks later by a pear and cranberry version (see the notes in the recipe below). Pretty much anything that would work as a cobbler or crisp will work here, so I’ve been dreaming up zillions of other filling possibilities ever since. I just found a new source for quinces and may have some left over for pie experimentation even after making jam, and I’m also eager to try cherry and peach when summer comes back around.  Don’t be surprised if pie makes repeat appearances in the next several seasons!

Best-Ever Birthday Apple Pie
(Adapted from America’s Test Kitchen’s Skillet Apple Pie)
Serves 6-8

For crust:
1 cup (5 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons non-hydrogenated shortening
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
3–4 tablespoons ice water

For filling:
2 1/2 pounds of various kinds of apples (about 6; see notes)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup apple cider
1/3 cup maple syrup
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

To bake:
1 egg white, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons granulated sugar

Cut the butter into 1/4 inch pieces and place into a small bowl with the shortening. Cover and refrigerate until the fats are very cold and firm, at least 20 minutes.

Place the flour, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor, and pulse several times to combine. Add the cold fat and pulse again 10 times, until the mixture resembles crumbs. Err on the side of leaving visible pea-sized bits of butter.

Dump the flour and butter mixture into a medium bowl. Sprinkle 3 tablespoons of ice water over it and fold with a rubber spatula, pressing down gently. If the dough isn’t sticking together, add the extra tablespoon of water and fold again. Transfer the still-crumbly dough onto a large sheet of plastic wrap and press out into a small disk. Wrap tightly and refrigerate at least 1 hour, and preferably overnight.

Fill a large bowl with cold water, and squeeze in some lemon juice. Peel and core the apples, and cut them into 1/2-inch-thick slices. Place the peeled slices in the acidulated water to keep them from browning while you’re working on the rest.

Heat the butter in a 12-inch oven-safe skillet over medium-high heat. Lift the apples out of the water and toss into the pan. Stir infrequently until they’re starting to caramelize but not cooked all the way through, about 5-7 minutes, then turn off the heat. Whisk together the cider, maple syrup, lemon juice, cornstarch and cinnamon and pour over the apples, stirring gently to coat. Set aside to cool while you’re rolling out the pastry.

Adjust the oven rack to the upper-middle position and preheat to 500F. While the oven is heating, roll out the dough to an 11-inch circle between layers of plastic wrap or parchment paper. Transfer the dough to a large cookie sheet, still encased in the plastic or parchment, and place in the freezer for the last few minutes of the preheating to re-chill the shortening.

When the oven is hot, peel the top layer of plastic or parchment off the pastry, flip the dough gently onto the apple filling in the skillet, and peel off the second layer. Fold under or trim off any edges that are hanging over the sides, brush the top with the egg white, and sprinkle evenly with the sugar. With a sharp knife or pizza cutter, cut the dough into six quadrants (once down the middle, and twice across). Bake until the crust is a deep golden brown, 20-25 minutes.

Let cool 15 minutes before serving warm with vanilla ice cream.

Notes:

ATK said to combine sweet and tart varieties, so I used equal amounts of Macoun, Empire, Jonagold and Cortland. Using apples with different characteristics gives you a more complex apple flavor and ensures that some apples will stay firm while others are almost applesauce-soft and add more body to the filling.

I use an apple corer/divider to segment the apples, which gives me eight wedges that can each be halved to get the perfect thickness.

Non-hydrogenated shortening can be found at health food stores and some bigger supermarkets. If you can’t find it and have to resort to regular shortening, you can skip the freezer step since it’s more forgiving of abuse.

If you don’t have an oven-safe skillet, the filling can be spooned into a shallow casserole or 9×13 Pyrex dish before being covered with the dough.

For the cranberry-pear variation, substitute pears for the apples and add one cup of cranberries plus 1/3 cup of sugar and the maple syrup once the pears have begun to soften up. Cook until the cranberries are just starting to pop, but be sure to turn off the heat while at least a few are still intact. Before you add the cider and thickener (I left out the cinnamon, but it’s your call), taste the filling and add a little bit more sugar if it’s still too tart. Proceed as usual with the recipe.

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More North and South Stories

Cranberry-Quince Pastafrola

Thanks to multiple rounds of entertaining over the Thanksgiving, I only had about a cup of cranberry sauce left this time around. This was just the right quantity to allow me to write a tidy little epilogue to my American story about the melding of my Southern Hemisphere roots, my New England sojourn, and all the years between and since.

As I’ve mentioned before, pastafrola is a typically Argentine afternoon snack and casual dessert, somewhere between a tart and a bar cookie.  It’s composed of a thick layer of quince preserves (membrillo), sandwiched between layers of a slightly eggy pastry used extensively in Italian baking, pasta frolla, whence the name.  If you’d like to see what the real deal looks like, Pip’s and Katy’s are legit.

This, my friends, is not legit, but it’s closer than the bastard cousin deconstructed version I made during my pre-move pantry clearing efforts.  I’d like to think that if my grandmother ever had transplanted to Boston, she would have come up with a cranberry version like this. I rather suspect my mom would approve, too, since she disfavors highly sugary desserts.

I’m not perfectly content with the pastry here, since it was a little bit more biscuity and puffy than it really needed to be, but I do love how the tartness of the cranberries tones down the sweetness of the quince and pear and richness of the pastry, to say nothing of adding a seasonally-appropriate red sparkle.  I’ll definitely be engaging in further experimentation with the Christmas batch of cranberry sauce.

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You Can Go Your Own Way

People tend to get touchy about any foods deeply tied to holiday tradition, and the humble cranberry sauce is no exception.  What seems like a simple matter of fruit and sugar has the potential to set off firestorms of difference of opinion.

My mother, for example, is a purist.  She insists on the absolute bare basics: berries, sugar, orange juice.  That’s it; no spices, no weird additions, and do not even think about chutney-izing it.  His Lordship is a fan of the congealed kind that plops out of a can in one tubular, sliceable mass — much to my initial horror, although I’ve since come to accept that we all have our food quirks and you can’t fight them.  You, for all I know, might be of the cabernet and cloves persuasion, or one of those people who blitzes raw berries and whole oranges in the food processor to create a salsa, and that’s okay too.

Me, I’m of a kitchen-sink bent.  I have been known to do all manner of messing with my Thanksgiving condimentation.  For a few years, I was determined to figure out exactly how much of my spice cabinet I could cram into there. (In case you’re curious, allspice and cranberries get along quite nicely together).  Since then, the mania has dampened and I’ve settled on a variant that is neither Mom-simple nor out-of-control wacky, one that is bright and interesting and seasonal and undoubtedly mine.

More than that, it’s me.  In this one ruby concoction is a snapshot of who I am.  Each component offers a fragment of my story and a hint about my experiences and my tastes:  cranberries for the bog obsession I developed in my New England years and quinces for my childhood, orange for my citrus addiction, ginger for all the Asian influences in my California upbringing and adult life, and vanilla bean for my food snobbery.  It all works together and, unlike my earlier spicy pyrotechnics, won’t clash with your turkey.  It’s also versatile enough to spoon over ice cream or use in my favorite post-Thanksgiving leftover application: grilled cheese sandwiches with cranberry sauce.

You’re welcome to try my story, or stick with your own.  Either way, I wish you a rich and vibrant start to your holiday season.

(Unless you’re Canadian, in which case keep up the good work!)

Cranberry Sauce with Quince, Pear and Vanilla
Makes 4 cups

One 12-ounce bag cranberries
2 fresh quinces, peeled, cored and diced OR 1/2 cup quince jam
2 ripe pears, peeled, cored and diced
1 cup granulated sugar
Grated zest of one orange
Juice of one orange, plus enough water to make 1 cup
1 pinkie-sized knob of ginger, grated (approximately 2 teaspoons)
1/2 vanilla bean, split
Pinch of salt

Pick over the cranberries and remove any squishy ones.

If using quince jam, set aside for later addition.  Combine all (remaining) ingredients in a saucepan.

Bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer until the cranberries have popped and the quinces and pears are tender.  Remove from heat and let cool. If using quince jam, stir into the sauce as soon as it comes off the heat.

Cover and refrigerate or freeze until needed.

Notes:

Dumping the cranberries into a large bowl of cold water will help you sort them, since the really squishy ones will sink to the bottom while the good or mostly-good ones will float on the surface.  I then scoop small handfuls of the floating berries and run them between my fingers to catch the partially-squishy ones.

If you can find fresh quinces, they are absolutely worth buying, but some waste is inevitable because of the toughness of the peel and core.  If necessary, use a paring knife instead of a peeler, and slice as close as you can to the core without cutting into it to get as much of the fruit as possible.

If you can’t find fresh quinces, quince jam or paste can frequently be found at Latin American, Indian, Pakistani, Greek and Middle Eastern groceries.

Since this makes a large amount of sauce and we’re a small household even with holiday guests, I usually freeze half the batch for Christmas.  It will keep perfectly well for even longer than that month in the freezer, and that’s one less thing to do when you’re up to your eyeballs in holiday cookie baking and gift wrapping.

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Breakfast on the Run and on the Cheap

You’d think I’d have more time on my hands now that I’m a student, but if the past two weeks are any indication, you’d be wrong.  I’d forgotten how students don’t really have down time, how you’re constantly shuttling between campus and off-campus, and how all off-campus time is time that could and ideally should be devoted to studying.  I’m not complaining; this is what I wanted, and it’s also going to be over sooner than I think.  It does two things simultaneously, though.  Contrary to my usual breakfast-denying norm, it makes me actually want to have breakfast before morning classes so I can have the energy to think my way through to lunch, and it also cuts the amount of time I have available for fixing and having breakfast.

This means dealing with the problem of the easy-to-grab, on-the-go breakfast I haven’t had to face since my 45-minute commute days.  In those days, it was usually a fancy cereal bar and a latte from the Starbucks on the ground floor of my office building, but I’m also on a student budget now, and more creative and frugal thinking is required here.  What can I make that’s inexpensive, nutritious, portable, and forgiving of being forgotten on the countertop in my rush to catch the bus?

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Crimson Madness

Damn that real life, getting in the way of blogging. Here’s hoping it will be more respectful in the future.While I was gone, autumn officially arrived. Oh, sure, it’s getting colder and wetter, the days are shorter, and the leaves are turning, but that isn’t what makes it official. What makes it official, for me at least, is the sudden onset of my own particular brand of Seasonal Affective Disorder: the Cranberry Craze. I love all the fall produce, from pears to pumpkins, but I lose all sense of reason or proportion when the cranberries start appearing in the stores. I’m like a moth drawn to the flame, helpless to resist the siren call of these little garnet beauties. I’ll buy two bags at a time, every single time I go to the store, until well past Thanksgiving, until my freezer resembles a gumball machine, until Ocean Spray starts sending me personally signed letters of deep and sincere gratitude. I don’t have nearly enough recipes to use up all those berries, and I’ll end up freezing cups and cups of cranberry sauce (the default option), but it doesn’t matter. All that matters is snatching them up and finding some way, any way, to show off their perfect ruby gleam.

It’s a recent infatuation, this mad passion for cranberries. I hated them for years, never understanding the point of the sour, acerbic, weirdly gelatinous stuff Mom insisted on setting alongside the turkey. Something odd happened when I moved to Boston, though. Overnight, without even realizing it, I tossed aside those years of contempt and fell head-over-heels in love with them, and with the bogs they grow in. There’s just something about how cranberries grow, the sandy, swampy place of their birth, and the way that they’re harvested, that just struck me as wonderfully romantic and so perfectly symbolic of New England itself. What moors were to the Brontes, cranberry bogs are to me, and although I loathe those soul-sucking endless winters and never want to be subject to another one ever again, I might actually be tempted to move back if it meant having my own cranberry bog. It’s a strange little sickness, I know, but there you are.

So you see, with that level of weakness, it was a given that I would buy a gigantic container of fresh cranberries when I saw them at Trader Joe’s this weekend. When I got them home, I flipped through cookbooks and Googled madly, looking for some new and interesting way to showcase these beloved little gems. I finally decided to try a recipe for Cranberry Nut Bars, from Ocean Spray by way of an article in the Detroit News, mostly because I was feeling slightly lazy after spending a good amount of my Sunday baking reserves making scones that morning for breakfast. Since this recipe involved melting the butter and quickly stirring things together, it seemed a great candidate for Sunday baking, and since it wouldn’t use up all the cranberries, I figured I had nothing to lose if they turned out awfully. I went in with low expectations, but I ended up being pleasantly surprised. These bars are simple and quick, but also quite tasty and rather pretty in their craggy, fruit-and-nut-studded poundcake-like austerity, and they were a huge hit with the coworkers this morning. I will probably tinker with the recipe a bit, since I can’t leave well enough alone. I think a few spices and some orange zest, and perhaps a slightly higher ratio of walnuts and a few more berries, would make it even better. I would probably also toast the walnuts first, to bring out more of their flavor and crunch. Still, it’s an effortless and very auspicious start to the season of cranberry-induced temporary insanity.

Cranberry Nut Bars
Makes 16 bars

2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup butter, melted
1 1/4 cups fresh or frozen cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, and grease an 8-inch baking pan.

Beat eggs in medium mixing bowl until thick. Gradually add sugar and beat until thoroughly blended, then incorporate the melted butterl.

Gently fold in flour, then add cranberries and walnuts and mix just until evenly distributed.

Spread batter evenly in the pan. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, or until golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Cool and cut into 16 bars.

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