A is for Apple... E is for?

(Oh yeah, that's why I stopped blogging. No time!)

Me to 4yo: "Eat a bit more meat."
4yo: "I just want kale!"
Me to 4yo: "One more piece of meat and then all the kale you want."
4yo: "And broccoli?"
...
6yo: "Can I have more kale?"
7yo: "Look! I just finished it."

These are the people that I'm trying to convince to eat pie.  These beautiful, strange people who would rather eat freshly made kale chips.  Actually, this pie adventure (pieventure?) has been beneficial. They are more likely to try new foods. Of course, that could just be because we make them try new foods all the time.  Still, we've gone from our boys eating pie NEVERNOTINAMILLIONYEARSHOWDISGUSTING to two of them having a favourite pie.

Our daughter, on the other hand, will eat all of the pies but the kale she shredded and dropped on the floor. It's cute but irritating when she finds a food she doesn't like. She sneakily* drops the food on the floor instead of just ignoring it. Then gets more and drops it.


Without further ado, let's talk pie! I have not made the pies in alphabetical order, but will tell you of them in that order.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Apple Crisp Pie
Apple crisp pie is something that happens when you want apple crisp but you've made some stupid plan to make a lot of pies, you are behind in making all of the pies and you have accidentally over purchased apples.**

When I make apple pie I use the method that involves cutting up the peeled apples very finely and then coating them in the sugars/flour/cinnamon/nutmeg mixture. Apple crisp is a much easier beast as you just peel and cut the apples and have the seasoning come from the crumb on top. In deference to it being pie, I did add a bit of liquid to the apples as well as butter (which is what you do with apple pie, but not with apple crisp.

Vague ingredient list/Prep

Cut some peeled apples. Put them into a pie shell (unbaked), or if you are lazy, a sheet of puffed pastry in a pie dish. Add a couple of tablespoons of milk and a bit of cubed butter. Cover with crumble topping (scant 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup flour, 1/2 cup rolled oats, 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 1/3 cup softened butter). Bake at 180 (375) until it's done, approximately 40 minutes.


Banana Cream
Banana cream is a pie that reminds me of home. It was one of the first pies made, way back in January. In a homemade pie crust, you put in a layer of sliced banana, cover with a homemade custard and then top with lightly sweetened meringue. Bake until the meringue is lightly coloured. And awesome.

As this isn't a food blog, that's all the info you get, dude. Want a recipe? I'll give it you.




Citrus Coffee
This was a bad idea.***

Not enough?

Okay, so it was a citrus custard****. I wanted to use oranges, but we only had mandarins and I figured, what's the difference? Answer: punch of flavour. Oranges have a much stronger flavour and zest, so the citrus was a bit weak. The other problem with this is that I tried to be fancy and put it in a "crust" made of ladyfingers soaked in espresso. Tiramisu with a twist! Or, you know, a bit of a sodden mess. It tasted okay, but in a "well, it could've been worse" sort of way. I don't know about you, but at the end of a cooking adventure I like to have the bar higher than "this was edible". Also orange + chocolate = yum. Mandarin + coffee = meh.

Date
All I can say about this is that I "made" it. That is to say, we were visiting my family and Mom and I made a pie, except I actually played with my daughter and then made the meringue to pretend I was helping. My boys were fishing with their father and grandfather. A good pie, a good memory.




Everything
That's right. With five letters left in the alphabet (E, F, J, Q, Z), it's time to get creative. Egg pie? Isn't that a quiche? Or egg tart? I've got a similar one coming! Everything pie was a triumph. It was good and fully made from me standing in the kitchen and adding whatever I could find that seemed pie-ish.

This everything pie:
baked pie crust
with a layer of cream cheese blended with icing sugar,
finely sliced banana evenly spread,
slivers of fresh, juicy mango,
topped with small pieces (rectangular) of apple, cooked with smashed blueberries, the juice and zest of a lemon and a lime and a bit of powered sugar and water.

It looked like beetroot. It had a yummy zing. Each mouthful had a slightly different taste. Served with ice cream or cream (two different days) just to prove that it was made of everything available.

So that's the pie du jour!


*not sneakily, but super obviously but she thinks no one notices
**accidental apples: when you and your spouse run to the shop for a few things (over a couple of days) and both buy a large bag of apples, believing you are out
***I have MANY bad ideas, but like a fool, will follow them through assuming it will work out. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don't, spectacularly.
**** Oh, there was cardamom too, which was the saving grace, as I recall.

Alphabet Pie

Hello!

It's been awhile. This blog is nearly as dusty as my high heels! I had good reasons for not using either, as I recall. The one hurts my knees and the other - well, I wanted to tell funny stories of things that my children got up to, but it seemed unfair to write things that they would one day be upset that I'd shared. It's one thing to tell a funny story about your child pooping on the side of the road to a friend, but different to share it to the internets in general. Not saying that my children have ever pooped on the side of the road. My children don't even poop. Stop starting rumours like that.

(I've just realized that this post was meant to be about food and it started with poop. It's an interesting thing to have to segue. Like, should I start singing the "Circle of Life" or...)

So, this year to shake things up, I decided to make my new year's resolution doable. None of this self-improvement malarkey, this year was a challenge: Alphabet Pie.

See, even though I've lived in this country for 9 years, I still miss sweet pie. Pie tends to be savoury down here. If you casually mention to someone that you'd like pie, they won't hand you a piece of cherry. More likely steak and bacon!  I quite like pie (both sweet and savoury) and I like cooking/baking. Why not put these things together?

The challenge: Make 26 pies over one year. A pie a fortnight. Easy. Except, have you looked at the alphabet lately? That thing is crazy with its x and w and q and e. And h. It actually has been a challenge to accomplish. I got a bit of a slow start, however, at this point I've made 19 different letters of pie.  Some were tasty. Some were shared. Some were just a bad idea.

You would think, "Alphabet pie, that's easy! Apple, blueberry, cherry, doughnut, eggplant, fish.." but you have to remember that I can't do anything the easy way and tend to decide to make pie before I look in my pantry/fridge.  It's been unusual.

Oddly enough, this plan to eat has backfired and I've actually worked out pretty regularly and try to eat healthily.

It's been fun, this pie adventure and I want to share it. But how? That's where this blog came in. While it is not transmogrifying into a food blog, it could be the place where you look into my pies. (Ha. Look into my pies - you are getting hungry, hungry!) But if you don't want to read about my pies, I'm not wasting my laundry folding time typing about lemons and coconut. Let me know. Should we give it a go?

[First up, Apple Crisp Pie]