Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Sunday, November 11, 2007
An embarrassment of sweet potatoes
A blog named "Pie for Breakfast" probably should start out with pie, right?
Last week a co-worker of mine presented me with a grocery bag full of sweet potatoes, gleaned from a field near her house. And I mean about twenty-five pounds of little sweet potatoes, smelling of earth and sweet autumn. I wasn't sure what to do with them at first -- I mean, Thanksgiving is coming and all, but how much sweet potato casserole can one person make? Especially when neither of us likes marshmallow much to start with.
Then I found a recipe for Sweet Potato-Pecan Pie in a King Arthur Flour Baking Sheet from 2006. I like pecan pie, and Wiggy LOVES it, so I've made it plain, with Jack Daniels, and with chocolate for him. A combination of sweet potatoes and pecans would be just different enough to make it fun.
The recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups of mashed cooked sweet potatoes, which involves boiling them. I peeled eight small sweet potatoes with a potato peeler. Then I decided that perhaps my apple peeler/corer/slicer would do a better job. (Hint: it doesn't.) Five partially-peeled spuds later, I was losing my patience. I cut up all thirteen, put them on to boil and decided that the rest of the spuds could just wait their turn while I cleaned up the mess.
Now, I have this tendency to forget simple, well-known properties of things, so I wind up reinventing the wheel every so often. I'm sure it will come as no surprise to you that the partially peeled ones shed the rest of their skins in the boiling water, but I was quite pleased with my discovery. I scrubbed every last one of the remaining potatoes, and boiled them up.
So I made two pies. Sweet potato, egg, brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon and a little cream on the bottom, pecans, brown sugar, dark corn syrup and a little salt on the top. Oh, and a really interesting pie crust mixed *in* the pie baker, and made with vegetable oil. Almost crunchy, quite tasty and not a bit too sweet, the perfect bottom for smooth sweet potatoes and a pecan top.
Of course now I have twenty pounds of boiled mashed sweet potatoes in the fridge. I think sweet potato gnocchi will be on the Thanksgiving menu; that should take care of maybe two cups of them. I think I'll be looking for more recipes -- just hold the marshmallows.
Last week a co-worker of mine presented me with a grocery bag full of sweet potatoes, gleaned from a field near her house. And I mean about twenty-five pounds of little sweet potatoes, smelling of earth and sweet autumn. I wasn't sure what to do with them at first -- I mean, Thanksgiving is coming and all, but how much sweet potato casserole can one person make? Especially when neither of us likes marshmallow much to start with.
Then I found a recipe for Sweet Potato-Pecan Pie in a King Arthur Flour Baking Sheet from 2006. I like pecan pie, and Wiggy LOVES it, so I've made it plain, with Jack Daniels, and with chocolate for him. A combination of sweet potatoes and pecans would be just different enough to make it fun.
The recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups of mashed cooked sweet potatoes, which involves boiling them. I peeled eight small sweet potatoes with a potato peeler. Then I decided that perhaps my apple peeler/corer/slicer would do a better job. (Hint: it doesn't.) Five partially-peeled spuds later, I was losing my patience. I cut up all thirteen, put them on to boil and decided that the rest of the spuds could just wait their turn while I cleaned up the mess.
Now, I have this tendency to forget simple, well-known properties of things, so I wind up reinventing the wheel every so often. I'm sure it will come as no surprise to you that the partially peeled ones shed the rest of their skins in the boiling water, but I was quite pleased with my discovery. I scrubbed every last one of the remaining potatoes, and boiled them up.
So I made two pies. Sweet potato, egg, brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon and a little cream on the bottom, pecans, brown sugar, dark corn syrup and a little salt on the top. Oh, and a really interesting pie crust mixed *in* the pie baker, and made with vegetable oil. Almost crunchy, quite tasty and not a bit too sweet, the perfect bottom for smooth sweet potatoes and a pecan top.
Of course now I have twenty pounds of boiled mashed sweet potatoes in the fridge. I think sweet potato gnocchi will be on the Thanksgiving menu; that should take care of maybe two cups of them. I think I'll be looking for more recipes -- just hold the marshmallows.
Friday, November 9, 2007
In which we say hello
Apparently Pie wants its own blog. Pie and I may need others to talk to, so we will invite Cake, Cookie, Tart, Cupcake and Dessert along to keep us company. Pie and I (and Pie's friends) are starting out on a journey, and I'm not sure how it's going to progress.
I have worked in various offices for nearly 30 years -- publishing, law, advertising, banking -- and have finally come to the realization that I can't do this anymore and keep my sanity. (Especially not banking.) My husband, the incomparable Wigwam Jones, and I are planning a move from North Carolina to Michigan sometime in the next six months or so, and I intend to take the opportunity to choose a very different career path -- pastry and baking. I could wind up a pastry chef at a restaurant or a country club, work at a neighborhood bakery or open my own, start an online empire or cater special pastry and desserts for parties and local events from home. Open a tea room! Open a dessert-and-coffee-only cafe! I don't know yet! I just know that I need to do something creative, to make something, to produce something that makes people smile, and that leaves me cheerfully tired at the end of a day, not exhausted and depressed.
To that end, I'm investigating cooking schools, cuisine classes at community colleges, and anything else I can find to learn about the profession of baking. (Michigan promises to be much more fertile ground for this -- all I can find near me in Eastern North Carolina are cake-decorating classes. Which I will take -- it never hurt to know how to decorate a fancy cake.) While that's going on, I'm practicing pie crust, cakes, cookies, cupcakes and anything else that revolves around dessert and celebratory edibles. (Well, I've always baked; now it's become more than just playing around.) And I'm also sailing around the internet, discovering how very many of my sisters and brothers are out there, baking up a storm and sharing stories and pictures with anyone who happens to come by their blogs.
And so we begin. This weekend I have plans to work on a sweet potato-pecan pie from King Arthur Flour's Baking Sheet, and a peanut butter mousse tart with chocolate ganache from Rose Levy Beranbaum's Pie & Pastry Bible. Photos will be posted, no matter what the results look like. (Be very afraid.)
I have worked in various offices for nearly 30 years -- publishing, law, advertising, banking -- and have finally come to the realization that I can't do this anymore and keep my sanity. (Especially not banking.) My husband, the incomparable Wigwam Jones, and I are planning a move from North Carolina to Michigan sometime in the next six months or so, and I intend to take the opportunity to choose a very different career path -- pastry and baking. I could wind up a pastry chef at a restaurant or a country club, work at a neighborhood bakery or open my own, start an online empire or cater special pastry and desserts for parties and local events from home. Open a tea room! Open a dessert-and-coffee-only cafe! I don't know yet! I just know that I need to do something creative, to make something, to produce something that makes people smile, and that leaves me cheerfully tired at the end of a day, not exhausted and depressed.
To that end, I'm investigating cooking schools, cuisine classes at community colleges, and anything else I can find to learn about the profession of baking. (Michigan promises to be much more fertile ground for this -- all I can find near me in Eastern North Carolina are cake-decorating classes. Which I will take -- it never hurt to know how to decorate a fancy cake.) While that's going on, I'm practicing pie crust, cakes, cookies, cupcakes and anything else that revolves around dessert and celebratory edibles. (Well, I've always baked; now it's become more than just playing around.) And I'm also sailing around the internet, discovering how very many of my sisters and brothers are out there, baking up a storm and sharing stories and pictures with anyone who happens to come by their blogs.
And so we begin. This weekend I have plans to work on a sweet potato-pecan pie from King Arthur Flour's Baking Sheet, and a peanut butter mousse tart with chocolate ganache from Rose Levy Beranbaum's Pie & Pastry Bible. Photos will be posted, no matter what the results look like. (Be very afraid.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
