Banoffee Pie

Banana + Toffee = Banoffee! This is hands down my favorite dessert. And, apparently the invention of this amazing pie took place in the county in England where my mum grew up and where I studied in college.  In fact, the creation of this pie was at The Hungry Monk pub in Jevington, East Sussex, England, where I would often go to study in the evening.

Some American-ized versions of this dessert use ginger snaps or graham crackers for the crust, but it really needs to be made with McVitie's Digestive biscuits to get the nice salty crust to balance out the sweetness of the bananas, toffee cream, whipping cream and chocolate. And, for the chocolate, I insist on using Cadbury's Flakes to sprinkle on top.

I recently made it and just used the Carnation recipe as you need to use sweetened condensed milk to make the caramel/toffee mixture.

Key Lime Tart

One of my favorite desserts (although there are a few), is key lime pie. I had made little key lime pie tartlets a long time ago and I was due to try making something with key limes again. We had a big family dinner this weekend and I wanted to make a nice summer dessert. I used an Epicurious recipe that called for both key lime juice and a touch of lemon juice. 

I started by making the graham cracker crust from scratch. You can buy graham cracker crumbs by the box, but I find it quite easy to crush graham crackers in a gallon Ziploc using a rolling pin. I pressed the crust into my tart pan and baked it as directed.

Then to make the key lime filling...and this is when I remembered why I had not made key lime anything for a while. The key limes are tiny - about the size of my thumb and I needed to squeeze more than one container of these little guys. 

I prepared the filling, poured it into the tart shell, baked it and let it cool. I wanted to use some whipped cream to put in top and looked into making stabilized whipped cream for the first time so it would hold its shape when I piped it.

I was fairly pleased with how it turned out and only hoped the crust would stay in tact when I removed the outside of the tart pan. 

Phew - it did...and yes, life is short, so eat dessert. I don't indulge too much or every day, but all in moderation.

I grated some key lime zest on the tart and cut a piece for each family member to enjoy. 

Triple Berry Pie

My colleague at the office loves pie so I set out to bake a perfect summer pie to take in for her birthday celebration. I had some blueberries, blackberries and raspberries on hand and they made the sweet summer triple berry pie. 

I first made a traditional pate brisee crust using the food processor.

Then I made the berry mixture and savoured the amazing jammy mixture that would fill the pie. 

Top crust went on and I used a spoon to make a simple patter around the edge of the pie. 

Triple Berry Pie

Ingredients:

Pate Brisee crust (split in two for a double crust pie)

7 C. fresh or frozen berries

1 C. granulated sugar

1T. lemon juice

4 T. cornstarch

2 T. butter

1 egg white beaten with a fork

Directions:

Add the berries, sugar and lemon juice to a large saucepan over medium heat. Simmer until they are warm and juicy, about 5-10 minutes. Spoon out about 1/2 C. of the juice from the pan into a bowl and mix in the cornstarch. Continue simmering the pot of berries and add in the cornstarch mixture slowly. Gently stir the mixture until thickened, about 2-5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the butter. 

Remove from heat and pour the mixture into an unbaked pie shell. Top with the second crust, finish the edge and prick the top for steam to escape.

Brush a thin layer of the beaten egg white on top of the crust and sprinkle with sugar.

Bake at 400 degrees for about 40 minutes. (check 1/2 way through and add foil to keep the crust from burning.

Cool slightly and serve with vanilla ice cream!

Thanksgiving Baking

While my amazing chef of a husband is preparing the turkey and sides, I was busy doing all the baking for our Thanksgiving meal. For a family of five we had enough pie to last us for a few weeks. We enjoyed a homemade apple pie, pumpkin pie and I also made brioche rolls to have with our feast. I was thoroughly enjoying fall baking in our brand new kitchen even though it was more than we needed.

For the apple pie, I much prefer a crumble topping.  Can't decide between apple pie and apple crumble - make an apple crumble pie!

Recipe for Apple Crumble Pie Topping:

3/4 C. all-purpose flour

3/4 cup old fashioned oats

1 1/2 t. ground cinnamon

1/3 C. brown sugar

1/2 cup cold unsalted butter

Mix together the ingredients until combined and crumbly and cover the top of the apples.

I used the Ina Garten mini brioche roll recipe and it was fairly foolproof to make. I could not find my brioche tins anywhere, so I made three small balls of dough to place in each muffin tin. to make the three clover rolls and they turned out quite nice. I had enough brioche to make a few mini loaves and used the extra to make brioche french toast the next morning.

Stars, Stripes and Cherries

Happy 4th of July! I have always loved the 4th of July. What's not to love? BBQ, fun in the sun, fireworks and time with family. I also have always looked forward to my birthday being only a week away. This year, my husband is traveling far, far away (to the far east, in fact) and wouldn't be here to enjoy all those lovely things. While I knew he would have an amazing first class airline meal to choose from, we had our 4th of July celebration on the 3rd this year including a picnic, some time at the beach and a lobster dinner that ended with this yummy cherry pie with homemade vanilla bean ice cream.

This stars and stripes pastry idea was on the most recent cover of Martha Stewart Living. They used different pie fillings, but I decided to use cherries that are in season in Michigan right now and these cherries were picked just up the road from where we live.

I made my pastry a day in advance to allow it to chill. I actually made enough for four single crust pies, so I have some pie pastry in the freezer to save me some time later.

I made a small pie with some of these vintage pie tins my mum gave me. I was able to get the pie crust for the bottom and have plenty left over to cut out my stars and stripes to use for the top from just a single crust portion of dough. I used a rotary ravioli cutter for the stripes and a Christmas cookie cutter in the shape of a star.

I pulled this together quick while we were video conferencing with my husband's family and preparing our lobster dinner. Oh....and chasing our 1 1/2 year old around! The four stars and three stripes have no significant meaning aside from that is what I fit on this little pie.

After I arranged the stars and stripes, I brushed on an egg wash and sprinkled it with turbinado sugar.



Here it is all baked and ready to serve with homemade ice cream. The pastry got nice and golden brown from the egg wash and the fresh cherry filling was so juicy and sweet. The stars and stripes just weren't as pretty when it was cut into pieces, so I didn't bother taking photos after it was cut.

Homemade Pumpkin Pie

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This was the first year that I tried making pumpkin pie from scratch. I've always made my own pastry and mixed together the filling, but I've typically used canned pumpkin. I roasted a sugar or pie pumpkin a few weeks ago, pureed the cooked pumpkin and kept it in the freezer until a few days before Thanksgiving. I used Martha Stewart's "Classic Pumpkin Pie" recipe for the filling and used homemade pastry and made an oak leaf pattern around the edge with the extra pastry. It was well worth it as the flavor was fantastic, especially served along with pumpkin whip cream.