Everyday Food for Busy People
Thanksgiving means pie. This apple pie fits right in with the required pumpkin and pecan pies. Using brown sugar instead of white makes the filling rich, dark and caramely.
The recipe comes from a small cookbook my Aunt Gerry put together years ago. I bet if she’d had computers and internet, she would have had a food blog! [Read more...]
Last week my neighbor gave me some fresh blackberries. There weren’t quite enough for a cobbler or pie, but I had a few peaches too. I was not sure if this combination would taste good, so I asked for opinions on the Eat at Home Facebook page. A few thought it was worth trying and a few people voted no on the idea.
Curiosity got the best of me and I decided to try it. The verdict? Yum! You can’t go wrong with fresh summer fruit sweetened and baked into a pie.
I woke up one morning, and found myself inventing this pie in my mind. Why I would wake up thinking of pie, is beyond me, but I’m glad I did. The classic combination of graham cracker, chocolate and toasted marshmallows are fantastic in a pie. [Read more...]
My mother-in-law makes the best strawberry pie (and peach using the same recipe). The crust reminds me of sugar cookies and the glaze enhances the flavor of the strawberries and makes the pie look as good as it tastes.
The Kentucky Derby is this Saturday at Churchill Downs in Louisville. Even if you’ve never watched a horse race before, the Derby is the perfect excuse to make this pie. I made two of them over the weekend. They didn’t last 24 hours.
Making this crust is as easy as pie 
Sorry, I couldn’t resist that. I made two cherry pies on Thanksgiving Day to take to my in-laws the next day. They were very yummy!
Here’s what you’ll need for one crust:
1 cup flour
1/2 cup (less) solid crisco or butter
1 tsp. salt
2Tbs. + 1 tsp. water
I always use butter in my crusts and I soften it a bit. Notice that you’ll use a bit less than 1/2 cup. I use about 1 Tbs. less. If you’re making a two crust pie, don’t forget to double the recipe.
The basic directions are to cut the butter into the flour and salt. Add the water and stir with a fork until it forms a ball. Roll it out and put it in the pie pan.
Here are some pictures to go with the instructions.
Use a pastry blender to cut the butter into the flour. The above picture looks like feta cheese crumbles to me, but it’s not.
It will form a ball like this after you add the water, just keep stirring with the fork.
Roll the crust out thin on a floured surface. I use the pie plate to measure if the crust is big enough, like this:
Like the pie plate? It’s Bybee Pottery. It’s available in several shops in Kentucky, but you can buy it here. The pie plates are wonderful, as are their other products. Okay, back to our crust.
As you can see, I didn’t get the crust in there straight and was a little short on one side. No problem. I pinched off an extra piece and patched it in. Just like working with play dough!
If you’re making a single crust pie, at this point you would pinch around the edges and finish it off. Since I was making a two crust pie, that step came after I added the filling and the top crust.
The cherries were a gift from a friend. She has some awesome cherry trees in her backyard.
The filling was really hot and was making the pie crust soft. I should have cooled the filling first.
There it is before I baked it. Here it is after.
And with the left over crust scraps you can make these yummy cinnamon snacks. Roll out the scraps, spread with butter, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, roll, cut and bake.
My husband thinks these are the reason to make a pie in the first place.
I love pumpkin pie. I will eat many pieces of it, even having it for breakfast. Pumpkin is a vegetable, right? I do like my pie spicy though and this one takes care of that.
What you’ll need:
2 eggs
1 can pumpkin
3/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. allspice
1 2/3 cup milk (or 12 oz can evaporated milk)
1 unbaked pie shell
Beat the eggs with a whisk. Add the sugar and then pumpkin, mixing well. Add the spices and mix until the spices are well distributed. Add the milk and mix. (I used 2/3 cup of half and half and 1 cup of milk) Pour the great smelling mixture into an unbaked pie shell. Sometime I’ll share how to make a very easy homemade crust, but I was too lazy for that this time so I used a Pillsbury refrigerated crust.
Bake the pie at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Turn the heat down to 350 degrees and bake another 45-50 minutes or until a knife comes out clean. Try not to eat it all yourself.
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