“Find the thing that makes you happy, and do that” - Me.
Often times people ask me who inspired my love for baking. I don’t think it came directly from my mother, as she was a working mother... and she cooked only on Sundays. She would make a pot of beans and a pot of rice. The rest of the week, we would have some sort of meat with our beans and rice for dinner. But I did love me a good microwave Hungry Man meal & Lunchables (yuck, I know...but yum back then?). We ate McDonalds, and guess what, we are still alive. I would have to say, it was a combination of , my mother, my grandma, my aunts & family (for the Mexican recipes), the food network (Ina Garten, because... she is the best), and my most favorite food blogger and author of two cookbooks now, Smitten Kitchen’s Deb Perelman. And even though I truly only started to love baking when I moved to New York, when I couldn’t really afford to go out to eat every night, I figured I could have friends over and we could do an evening of friends dinner. Not to further manifest my own destiny, I saw the movie “The Waitress” in 2007, loved it so much, and thought, I want to bake pies with my baby. But that will never be me, I’ll never fall in love with an alcoholic man who doesn’t see me for my worth. Then after I had Penelope, and was like, Holy Shit, that’s me and it’s happening. It’s really was so similar to my life, that I even found my love for pies around this time, and when I lived in NY, a cute pie shop called “The Blue Stove” (this was even prior to Pea). I would walk in there when I was pregnant and just eat a slice of whatever was in season pie, by myself. It was off the route of my work (going backwards actually), but I woke early to stop by and have a cup of decaf coffee and slice of pie. I have to show you images of this adorable little cash only pie shop, that would be my dream pie shop if I could open my very own one day. Even the girls outfits and “head wraps” were all “Monica” (if you know me, you know what that means). If you should find yourself in Williamsburg Brooklyn NY, pop by for a tiny pie that is always using the freshest in Season ingredient ...🥧🥧🥧🥧...thank goodness for Pie Emoji’s. By the way.
As I realize that Thanksgiving is a little over a week away... I wanted to start prepping some pie crusts to freeze in preparation for the pie baking about to happen in a week.
A few pies I have been wanting to try, for the Holiday season, in addition to the obvious traditional pies... here is my list
1) Thanksgiving Leftover pie
2) Figgy Pudding Pie
3) Butterscotch pie
4) Cheesecake marble pumpkin slab pie
5) Cranberry Apple Pie
A few pies I have been wanting to try, for the Holiday season, in addition to the obvious traditional pies... here is my list
1) Thanksgiving Leftover pie
2) Figgy Pudding Pie
3) Butterscotch pie
4) Cheesecake marble pumpkin slab pie
5) Cranberry Apple Pie
Caramel Apple Pecan Streusel Pie . Tomorrow’s Pie- 11/13.
*Pictures and actual recipe to follow...
Last night we prepped the pie crust dough. My favorite Pie recipe book - The year of Pies - has 2 basic recipes for crusts. One with butter and one with shortening. We only use butter from now on. And you can read below why. I’ll leave the proven recipe to the expert.
It was as if Deb Perelman /Smitten Kitchen was reading my mind, because her post today on IG was just this... the perfect flaky pie crust recipe. What I love about her recipe is that she is exactly correct when people say they are intimidated by pie crust, myself included. I usually just run to the local market and buy a red Pillsbury box of pre-made crust (which is 100% delicious and okay in my book... there I said it moms). BUT... let’s just try this. If you want to trust anyone on her recipe, it’s this gal. She’s not only a mother, but works in a tiny kitchen, and is just simple and real.
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