pie – Cooking the Books

November 21, 2020

I’m strong to the finish, cuz I eats my spinach

I hope and pray that people have a safe Thanksgiving. To will that into the world, I decided to do a slightly more complicated dish this week since hopefully most readers are not traveling or planning on feeding a large number of guests on Thursday.

However, fret ye not about the level of complication. In fact, the reason I chose this one is because I wanted to make it more simply than the New York Times recipe suggested. Plus, I love spanakopita, and have made variations of it over the years of this blog.

I was super excited to find that this spanakopita pie fit in a 9- to 10-inch skillet!

The downside, if you’ve ever worked with fresh spinach, is the sheer amount of it you need to buy to get the amount you need to fill a pie, say. So, rather than worry about that, I just bought frozen; plus, it cut down on cooking.

The other ingredient that caught my eye as troublesome in this particular fancy recipe was getting a block of feta in brine. Now, I love it when I’ve gotten it from my local Middle Eastern store; however, usually I get it when I need to use the brine as well. It’s less easy to find in my usual grocery stores, and since the brine wasn’t used, I skipped it and went for the pre-crumbled container I usually get.

Everything else was more or less standard for what I expect to be in a spanakopita, and it worked out to be quite the delight. A little skimpy on the phyllo dough, but it was a pie, not a roll; but that also made it less work.

All in all, it was worth the effort, and where else do you need to be this weekend? May as well spend it in the kitchen.

Hidden underneath this tasty flaky crust is a wonderful spinach mixture.

Here’s what I did:

Ingredients

8 T. unsalted butter, divided
2 medium leeks, white and green parts only, halved and sliced
6 cloves garlic, chopped
Salt and pepper, to taste
20 to 24 oz. frozen chopped spinach, thawed
¾ c. fresh parsley leaves, chopped
½ c. fresh dill, chopped
½ c. grated Parmesan
Zest from one lemon, plus juice from the lemon
Pinch of ground nutmeg
2 large eggs, beaten
8 oz. crumbled feta
10 sheets phyllo dough, thawed

Directions

In a 9- to 10-inch skillet, melt 3 T. butter over medium heat. Add the leeks and garlic, and season generously with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes. Add the spinach, sprinkle lightly with salt and pepper, and cook for about another 5 minutes. Remove from skillet and let cool.

Heat the oven to 400 degrees.

In a large bowl, combine the parsley, dill, Parmesan, lemon zest and juice, and nutmeg. Stir to combine. Working about 1 c. at a time, transfer the spinach mixture to a fine mesh strainer and set in the sink to press out as much liquid from the mixture as possible. Add the strained handfuls to the parsley mixture, repeating until all the spinach has been added to the large bowl. Stir to combine, and add any additional salt and pepper as desired. Stir in the beaten eggs, and then fold in the feta, trying to leave larger chunks intact.

Melt the remaining 5 T. of butter over the stove top on low or in the microwave. Meanwhile, wipe the skillet clean with a paper towel. Brush the bottom and sides of the skillet with some of the butter. Then, working quickly with 1 sheet of phyllo dough at a time, lightly brush the top of one sheet with butter, and then lay it in the skillet, butter side up, with an overhang on either side. Repeat with 7 more phyllo sheets, rotating each sheet in a different direction as you add it.

Spoon the spinach mixture into the skillet, spreading into an even layer. Starting with the top layer of phyllo dough first, lift it over the spinach mixture toward the center of the pan, and repeat with remaining overlapping dough to create a top crust.

Crinkle on top the remaining 2 pieces of phyllo dough, and brush with any remaining melted butter.

Cook over medium heat on the stovetop for about 5 minutes to crisp up the bottom crust. Transfer skillet to the oven and bake until the phyllo dough is golden and filling is warmed, about 20 to 25 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let cool for about 10 minutes. Slice into wedges and enjoy!

October 24, 2020

Poverty pie uses on-hand ingredients for delightful dessert

One of the things that my sweetie and I both enjoy is looking at old recipes. Among our favorites are cookbooks collected from a local community; for me, my favorite is one from the church where I believe my grandparents wed (or at least was a one-time hometown for one or both of them).

They offer insights into what’s popular in a given time or given location, and they vary wildly in terms of quality, suggesting uncharitably that maybe not everyone can cook or more charitably that different people have some quite different tastes from me.

In that same vein, we also love discovering recipes that are likely from the Great Depression-era, or maybe just ones stemming from home chefs who have made a little go a long way.

As someone who has been very, very privileged throughout this pandemic to both (so far) keep my job and work from home, I count myself extremely lucky that I do not, and have rarely, *needed* to make a little go a long way. But I am still grateful that these recipes survive to remind me both that poverty doesn’t mean the absence of joy and that cheap doesn’t mean gross.

This week’s recipe, in that sense, was a real revelation.

I knew from looking at its ingredient list that it had to be a poverty pie, born of a need to use what’s on hand to make a simple dessert. However, it wasn’t until I tasted it that I figured out the tricks it used to make its bare-bone ingredients seem like something a little more.

Correctly dubbed a vinegar pie, there’s not much to the insides of this pie, but it does use white vinegar as its most unexpected-in-a-dessert ingredient.

I would have been more skeptical but for two facts: (1) I figured Taste of Home wouldn’t promote a recipe of complete garbage, and (2) my Grandma Crippes’ ditalini pasta salad recipe relies on a very simple dressing of white vinegar, oil, and sugar, and it works delightfully well.

Still, some things about the recipe were confusing, and I doubted it would work well. Until I tried it and realized that everything makes sense once you know that vinegar pie is what happens when you want to make apple pie but cannot get the fresh fruit.

That explained the small strips of dough on the bottom layer, and the use of vinegar to add a citric flavor when lemon juice may not be available, and the extra flour — like in a traditional apple pie — to help make an internal goop while baking.

All in all, it was actually quite a delight and is a reminder that it’s possible, if not ideal (hint: Congress pass a GD bill to help people) to make apple-ish pie out of vinegar. Literally.

It’s not pretty, it’s not fancy, but it’s a good enough, tasty enough pie.

Here’s what I did, following the recipe only making it 9-inch instead of 12 and slightly altering the water level as I found it to be too much for my small skillet:

Ingredients

1 ½ c. sugar
2 ¼ T. all-purpose flour
½ t. ground nutmeg
6 T. butter, cut into cubes
½ c. white vinegar
1 to 1 ½ c. hot water
2 pie crusts (homemade or store-bought)

Directions

Heat oven to 450 degrees.

Whisk together sugar, flour, and nutmeg; set aside.

On a floured surface, roll out one-third to one-half of the pie crusts into a ⅛ in. thick circle. Cut into small 2 in. by 1 in. strips (I was hung up on this idea, but if you imagine the strips are replacements for apple slices, it makes it much easier to envision the size and shape). Layer a 9-inch enamel-coated cast-iron skillet or casserole dish with half the strips. Sprinkle with half the sugar and dot with half the butter. Add the remaining half of strips, and repeat the sugar mixture and butter layers.

Roll out the remaining half to two-thirds of the dough into a ⅛ in. circle. Place over filling and press against the sides of the skillet or casserole. Cut a slit in the top.

Mix together 1 c. of hot water and ½ c. of vinegar. Slowly pour water-vinegar mixture into slit. Liquid may (and almost certainly will) bubble up through the crust. If it’s not completely full, add another ½ to 1 c. hot water (for me, it was full with the original amount).

Since it’s likely to spill over a little, place an oven rack lined with foil or an old cookie sheet below the intended rack to bake the pie. Bake the pie for about 1 hour until the crust is golden brown, perhaps reducing the time or covering edges with foil in the last 15 to 20 minutes.

Cool on a wire rack, and enjoy!

May 19, 2018

Getting back to my roots with a timely rhubarb pie

I had family in town this weekend, so I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone by making a killer rhubarb pie to impress my mom and stepdad and also something that’d fit for my year of sheet pans.

Luckily, I came across a rhubarb crostata (if you didn’t know, and I didn’t, it’s basically a free-form pie) recipe from Food and Wine a few weeks ago and ripped out the recipe to make it for their impending visit.

It was the perfect time for a lot of reasons, but mostly because my stepdad loves rhubarb and, frankly, so do the rest of us.

While he’s been the most vocal, I learned from Mom this past weekend that she grew up eating the stalks (home-grown) like they were celery and dipping them into a bowl of sugar. And my stepdad loves another rhubarb pie recipe that my sweetie’s mom made him growing up. And, well, I’m not in the habit of making things I won’t enjoy myself as well.

But another reason it was great is because it was so easy.

Sure, like any pie, it took time, but it was small, bite-size bits of active time followed by plenty of down time to do things like go buy the wine or finally eat lunch after a day of cleaning. It was perfect for being impressive and fitting my schedule.

Oh, and it was amazing.

It probably won’t replace the rhubarb custard that was my sweetie’s childhood recipe, but it is quicker and comes with a creamy topping that makes it a reasonable substitute when we’re in a pinch.

Here’s what I did, sticking close to the recipe:

Ingredients

2 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. and 2 T. granulated sugar, divided
1 t. salt, divided
1 ½ sticks butter
¼-½ c. ice water
2 T. cornstarch
2 lbs. fresh or frozen rhubarb, thawed, cut into ½-inch pieces, divided
1 T. lemon juice
¼ c. chopped candied ginger, chopped (I did a heaping cup because we like ginger too)
Zest from one orange
1 egg, mixed with 1 T. water
2 t. demerara sugar
1 (8 oz.) container mascarpone
2 T. heavy cream
3 T. powdered sugar

Directions

Make the crust: Combine flour, 2 T. granulated sugar, and ¾ t. salt in a medium bowl. Cut butter into chunks and add into the flour mix using a pastry blender, two knives, or your fingers, until pea-size chunks form. Slowly add the ice water and stir until the mixture starts to come together. Pat into a disk, cover with plastic wrap, and let chill in the refrigerator for at least an hour.

Make the filling: Stir together the remaining 1 c. granulated sugar, the remaining salt, and cornstarch in a medium saucepan. Add in 2 c. of the rhubarb and the lemon juice, and cook over medium heat stirring frequently. Cook until the mixture has thickened and the rhubarb has broken down (it’ll look like a lumpy jam). The recipe says this takes about 12 minutes; I didn’t time it exactly but it felt like nothing was happening and then it was totally thick, so keep a good eye on it.

Meanwhile, place the remainder of the rhubarb into a large bowl. When the cooked rhubarb mixture is done, pour it over the raw rhubarb. Add the chopped ginger and orange zest, and stir until well combined.

Put together the pie: Unwrap the dough, and roll it out on a lightly floured surface to 13-14 inches. Transfer to a parchment-paper lined rimmed sheet pan, and cut into a 12-inch round, discarding scraps. Spoon the rhubarb mixture onto the dough, trying to leave about 2 ½ inches around the border; I did less and it was a really full but it worked. Pleat the edges as necessary and press down to secure.

Finish the pie: Brush the dough with the egg wash and then sprinkle with the demerara sugar.

Refrigerate, uncovered, for about 1 hour until the dough is firm. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 425 degrees.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes. The recipe says to cool completely before serving but we liked it better the second day where we re-warmed it, so I’d say cool for an hour or 2 and then enjoy with whipped mascarpone!

Whip mascarpone for serving on top: While the pie cooks, or before serving, mix together the mascarpone cheese, the powdered sugar, and heavy cream. Use a hand blender or a whisk to blend for 1 to 2 minutes until fluffy. Serve on top of the warm pie and enjoy!