Apple Pie

This was my last apple pie of the fall (and I'm not posting it until now...), so I tried to make it a pretty one:

Apple Pie is best kept simple: thinly sliced, well spiced, not too much sugar and a touch of lemon for brightness:

A detail of the finished crust:

Ginger Apple Crumb Pie

It looks like an average apple pie, but this recipe is loaded with fresh ginger:

I usually have a lot of apples around, so this seemed like a perfect experiment:

I thinly sliced the apples:

And tossed them with the sugar and spices, and prepared the crust:

The crumb topping...well. It was a bit sweet for me, but a nice change. Here it is pre-baking:

Pumpkin-Pecan Pie

Happy Thanksgiving!
With turkey being served in two days, my thoughts are even closer to one of my favorite pies - pumpkin. I tried this variation a few weeks ago to see if there was a way to successfully combine the overly sweet pecan pie into something I would like as much as my favorite.

Once the pie is ready to be baked, it is essentially a layer of pumpkin pie topped with a layer of pecans, and then the sweet pecan filling:

The pie itself is easy to make - just mix together a half recipe of pecan pie filling:

And use your blender to mix up a quick pumpkin pie filling:

The end result, while delicious, cannot compare to a plain pumpkin pie, at least for me. But I'll probably still make it again to make sure!

Bourbon Apple Pie

I visited Mom just after she had gone apple picking:
She helped me pack my bag to head back to NYC with a good number of apples, including some red delicious that she thought might make a good pie. Red Delicious apples are traditionally a terrible pie apple, but something about the ones she picked over the weekend said pie to her - luckily, she was right.

I mixed up a quick crust:

And the spiced my chopped, peeled apples in preparation for the secret ingredient - bourbon:

After dotting the top of the filling with a bit of butter I was ready to top my pie:

The finished product - a little tart, with the sweetness of the apples balanced with alcohol:

Apple Pie

My kitchen was overflowing with fall fruit:

Naturally, I peeled and sliced some apples...

Rolled out some dough...

Crimped the edges after filling my crust...

And made a pie!

Libby's Pumpkin Pie

Pumpkin. Sometimes you just want to transform it to the simplest of pumpkin pies. Here, I've mixed together pumpkin and eggs as a base for the classic recipe from the back of the can of pumpkin you find at the grocery store:
The pumpkin I used here was from a cheese pumpkin that I sliced, cooked, pureed and then stored in my freezer so that I could make pumpkin pie as soon as I felt a chill in the air.

The full set up, before the addition of the evaporated milk:

And once I had given that a good stir, I poured the filling into the graham cracker crust I made earlier and pre-baked:

The finished pie was the perfect classic, aside from a few burnt edges - I had neglected to protect the edges of my pie with tinfoil. oops.

Welcome to My Kitchen: Pumpkin Carving

Happy Halloween!

I'm not much of a traditional pumpkin carver. I like to heat up my oven as I slice a pumpkin in half, scoop out the seeds, and place my pumpkin cut side down on an aluminum foil lined sheet:

And forty-five minutes to an hour later at 375 degrees:

I let my pumpkin halves cool, and scoop out the flesh:

Once it's been run through the blender, I'm really ready for pumpkin pie season:

And I usually have a few extra cups of puree that get frozen for my next pumpkin pie fix:

Sour Cream Pumpkin Pie

It doesn't take much of October to pass before I feel the need to make a pumpkin pie:

For a custard filling like this, I usually blind bake the crust, filling the aluminum foil lined pan with pie weights:

Then, the pumpkin:

This particular filling was a bit tangy and very smooth and rich from the added sour cream:

And the slightly pale finished pie didn't last long in the fridge:

Lemon Meringue Pie

I have fond memories of a restaurant we used to visit at the mall, long closed, called The Pie Plate. I always got Lemon Meringue:
I'm not sure how I had never made a lemon meringue pie before this, but I'll be making more of them.

The pie starts with a crust (rolled as always between sheets of waxed paper to keep my counter clean):

The filling is a homemade lemon curd made with lots of fresh lemon, both the zest:

And plenty of juice:

This is cooked and whisked from this state:

Until is is properly thickened, and then poured into the pre-baked crust and refrigerated:

A quick meringue and toasting, and it's done!

Trio of Peach Pies

I had a lot of peaches in my kitchen this summer, thanks to my CSA:
And believe it or not, I had never made a peach pie before this summer, so I decided to try out a few recipes.

The first recipe I tried was for a peach custard pie. I mixed up a custard of egg yolk, sour cream and sugar:

Whisked it all together and poured it over sliced peaches:
That pie also had a very sweet crumb topping. I'll make that one again when I'm having a VERY strong sugar craving.

The next pie I made was a bit simpler - just sliced peaches mixed with a bit of sugar and spice, arranged over a crust of crushed gingersnaps mixed with butter:
I brushed a bit of warm apricot jam over that one for a bit of shine so it would look finished after I took it out of the tart pan.

Finally, I took on a plain peach pie. I sliced my peaches and mixed them with sugar, cornstarch and a bit of flour:

And once they were topped with crust, baked them into a classic!