MMMMMM, PIES!

Ah yes, time for good foods and pies. For some reason, for me anyway, pies seem to suit this time of year. The time of year you celebrate good things, family and tasty foods. We also take the time to remember to be thankful for those in our lives and all the good things in life.

So, as I was busy today making pies for two celebrations this coming week, I had a request to post them. I didn't quite get as many made as I'd have liked and I now have a smaller oven than I used to. No matter I got at least 4 pies total made, which is a start. So I figured would share all three recipes.

This first one is a family favorite and one of my two favorites. It's so good and creamy, never lasts long.

Buttermilk Pie

1 pie crust for 8.5 to 9 inch pie pan
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 T arrowroot starch
3 large eggs
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F, prebake your crust for 10 minutes until it is just starting to turn golden.

In a sauce pan over medium low heat, melt the butter and stir in the sugar and arrowroot. Cook just until the sugar is melted and it's smooth. Remove from the heat and set aside.
In a mixing bowl, beat the eggs on medium high until fluffy. Whisk in the buttermilk and vanilla and then gradually add the butter and sugar mixture. Whisk until smooth. Pour into the crust. Place pie on a baking sheet and tent it with foil. Bake for 50-55 minutes until the center is set.
Let cool fully then refrigerate. Serve chilled


This one has always been my father's favorite, and one of mine. However, most pecan pies are made with corn syrup, so I learned to make it better and corn free. It's hard to leave it alone. Yum!

Pecan Pie

2 cups whole or pieces of pecans
3/4 cup honey
1 cup packed brown sugar
5 T melted unsalted butter
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 tsp sea salt
3 eggs, room temp, lightly beaten
1, 9 inch pie crust, prebaked.

Heat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Mix the sugar, honey, vanilla and salt. Add the eggs and beat until smooth and a little airy.
Pour the filling into the pie crust and sprinkle the pecans on top. Place the pie on a baking sheet and bake in the center of the oven for 40-45 minutes until the edges are set and the center is a bit loose. Cool fully on a wire rack.


Recently I was the recipient of some fresh quince. I had never worked with quince before and I was looking forward to making good things with them. They are a very hard dry fruit. The texture is like an apple, only much drier and firmer. They look like a cross between an apple and a pear. They are a good fruit, but really must be cooked to be enjoyed. And they're a very fragrant fruit, especially once you start cooking with them. So my first attempt with them was a vanilla quince butter, Oh My Goodness! Such an exquisite fruit butter, I love it better than apple or peach butter!  As I had some fruit left over I decided on a pie based on a tart recipe I found. I didn't have the large quince some of the stores sell, so I had some smallish to medium sized and this is based on that size.

Maple Caramel Quince Pie

6 to 7 quince, washed well, cored and sliced moderately thin
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup maple syrup

Heat the oven to 375 degrees F. In a large stockpot, melt the butter into the syrup over medium to medium low heat. Bring to a simmer and add the fruit. Stir to coat the fruit and simmer until the fruit is quite tender and soft.

Pour into a 8 1/2 inch pie crust that has been prebaked a bit. Spoon in the fruit into the cooled pie shell and pour the maple caramel mixture over. Make your lattice top or place a solid top on with slits in the top.

Place on a baking sheet and bake for 40 to 50 minutes, tenting the top to keep it from getting too brown.

Let cool well before serving.

And yes, my first attempt I got the outer shell too brown, no matter, it is so fragrant and I cannot wait to taste it.

Wow! The Holidays Are Upon Us Once Again! How About Some Beets?

I am a little taken aback at how fast this year has flown. I have been remiss in posting recipes, especially as I now have a real kitchen again, and am no longer living in the RV. I must admit that living in a motor home leaves much to be desired if you are a cooking type person. Learning to deal with little to no counter space or oven capability is frustrating at best.

However! I am now getting settled in my new house and getting back on track slowly but surely. I've even had my first houseguest! Which was wonderful and I think we had a good time.

A little thing about me. I absolutely LOVE to try new recipes or read some and come up with my own variation of them. I love wholesome foods and the fact that I now live in a state where there is so much produce (fruits and veggies) available to me either at the farmer's markets, in the local markets, or even in the wild! Wild things to enjoy like all kinds of berries throughout the year, wild mushrooms, wild veggies. Sometimes I think I died and went to food heaven when I moved here! Even though I'm getting a late start, it's been fun to try new things.

I recently discovered new fruits I hadn't heard of that are completely edible growing all over, things like the Strawberry Tree fruit, Japanese Dogwood, etc. Which you can make jams, jellies and liqueurs from. I can't wait to get out and pick and can and create with all these goodies next year. Though I am proud to say, I did get some quince for the first time ever, and made vanilla quince butter. I think I have a new toast spread favorite now. I have enough fruit left to make a maple caramelized quince tart or two also.

Anyhow, as I've strayed off the goal of what I set out to write about today (hey, I got excited talking about all the new tasty things around here!), I guess I'll get around to it now.

I got this recipe in my email inbox a few weeks ago from Saveur. As I absolutely LOVE beets, and love goat's cheese this looked like heaven to me. And I happened to have a bunch of gorgeous organic beets in my fridge from the University's Agricultural Students' organic growing club (1 buck a bunch! ). So I set out to make this for my houseguest and myself for supper one evening. Except, like usual, I modified it!

First let me give you the link for the original from Saveur: Smashed Beets with Goat Cheese

And this is what I did, or my variation of it:

4 medium red, orange, or yellow beets, scrubbed, ends trimmed (I had those gorgeous dark ruby reds)
4 tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
2 sprigs fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste (I used freshly ground pink Himalayan sea salt)
2 to 4 tbsp. coconut oil (I only needed 2)
4 oz. soft goat cheese
6 or 8 cloves of roasted garlic, sliced

Put the scrubbed beets, 4 tbsp. vinegar, 1 tbsp. olive oil, thyme, and bay leaf into a 4-qt. saucepan. Pour in just enough water to cover the beets by about an inch and season them with some salt and pepper. Bring them to a boil and then reduce the heat to medium-low and let them simmer until they are tender and a fork slides easily into them, around 40 minutes. Drain the beets and let cool slightly. Working with one beet at a time, put a beet between 2 sheets of parchment paper and press with your hand or a bottom of a dessert plate (if they're still too warm to smash with your hand), to partially flatten it so that it still remains mostly intact. Repeat with the remaining beets and set aside.

Heat the coconut oil in a 12" cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat until very hot and a drop of water sputters. Gently set in the smashed beets, season with a little more salt and pepper, sprinkle the garlic slices, and sear the beets, flipping once with a metal spatula, until the skins (or the bottom and top) are are crisped, which is about 3 minutes a side. When you flip them, place the sliced soft goat cheese on top and let it heat up some while the other side crisps.

Serve.

This recipe says it serves 4, however, they were so delicious, in my humble opinion it was enough for two of us! I'll definitely be making them this way again! Heating the cheese on top when you flip the beet over made it creamier, and was the perfect compliment to sweet ruby red beets. I think we preferred them over the crab we had with supper that evening!

It was an easy dish to make. I do imagine you could do this with blanched sliced beets that you may have put away in the freezer. That will be how I try it next, just perhaps cook them for just a few minutes in the seasoned water (like above) and then fry them with cheese and garlic. Oh boy!

Yeah, sorry, I am always thinking about new ways to create, so sometimes my thought processes are hard to follow. Maybe the next project will be the maple caramelized quince tart, or a beet and goat cheese tart. Although I just realized I need to prebake a bunch of pies for next weekend, so quince tart and pecan pie and my silky buttermilk pie are probably going to be made.

I'll honestly try to remember pictures next time!