How to make a pumpkin pie

 My first (successful) pumpkin pie

I felt ambitious enough to try my hand at making another pumpkin pie this year.  My last attempt, which had a disastrous outcome, took place when I made a somewhat less-than-stellar Thanksgiving dinner for my German hosts when I was traveling in Europe a number of years back. Gladly, I was very happy with the results this time around.  In celebration of the coming Thanksgiving weekend, and to atone for my sins of Thanksgivings past, here's the recipe. Guten Appetit!

What you'll need:

4 large eggs
3 cups fresh pumpkin puree
3/4 cup evaporated milk
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons pumpkin spice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 unbaked, 9 inch pie shell

To prepare the pumpkin, remove the seeds, cut into chunks and remove the skin.  Boil, roast or steam the pumpkin until tender then puree.  Cool to room temperature and drain off any standing liquid that forms.

Mix the pumpkin puree with the remaining ingredients until well blended and pour into an unbaked pie shell.  When it comes to pie shells, I usually use whatever pastry recipe comes on the box of the shortening I've bought. Read my blog post, Things I’ve learned about making pies, for more on how to make pie pastry.

Bake the pie at 350 degrees for 55-65 minutes.  The top of the pie will be slightly browned and the middle of the pie will still look slightly wet when it's done.

More tips:

- Use a small pumpkin.  I chose one that was a little bit smaller than a basketball and ended up with enough pumpkin puree to make two pies.

- If you don't have pumpkin pie spice, you can also use a mix of spices (1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon, 1 teaspoon cloves, and 1/2 teaspoon ginger).

- This is the kind of pie that needs to bake a while for the filling to cook.  If your pie crust starts to darken too quickly around the edges, cover the rim of your pie with a strip of tin foil (shiny side out).

- Save the seeds and roast them in a pan with a little oil and a sprinkling of salt.  Yum!

While your pumpkin is stewing you can roast the seeds in a pan with a little oil and salt.

Things I’ve learned about making pies

My first strawberry rhubarb pie.

A while back my friend Andrea came up with the awesome idea to get a group of our friends together  on a regular basis so we could teach each other things.  It’s of course also an excuse for us to meet up to enjoy a few beverages and some conversation, but that’s not the main point (at least that’s our story and we’re sticking to it).

Anyway, Andrea started us off with a flower arranging party (if this perks your interest and you live in the Victoria, BC area, check out the workshops at the floral shop Andrea co-owns with her mom, Poppies Floral Art). Next, our friend Carole introduced us to the art of making wontons. Yum!!  We’ve also gotten together to decorate mirrors and dye Easter eggs.  For my contribution, I promised everyone I would organize an evening of group pie baking.

That was over a year ago.

An explanation in my defense

I most recently proposed holding my pie baking soirée in June, but I don’t think anyone, least of all me, is overly serious about the idea that this will actually happen. 2 months ago, I proposed a spring date that has since come and gone.  Yes, this is a recurring pattern. Now before you go passing judgment and blaming me for being a serial friend-disappointer, I want to point out, in my defense, that it has proved extremely difficult to coordinate a night that works for everyone during a week when I have time to make enough pastry dough for 10-15 pies. 10-15 pies!!

Anyway, I fear the time has come for me to rethink my skill-swap strategy.  That said, in the interest of not completely dropping the friendship ball where passing on pie making skills are concerned, I thought I’d offer this post:

How to make pies

Notice I’ve titled this section, ‘how to make pies’, not ‘how to make A pie’.  If you’ve resigned yourself to being a one-off pie baker, I can tell you right now, your pie will probably suck.  How can I be so certain? Well, one of the innate qualities of pie pastry is it’s ability to recognize undedicated novices. Seriously.

Choosing a pastry recipe

I don't believe it really matters which pastry recipe you choose. I’ve tried a few different ones with fairly consistent levels of satisfaction – in the beginning, every recipe I tried produced somewhat miserable results and, with those false starts behind me, every recipe I’ve since come across has been pretty all right. As of late, I most often use the recipe printed on the label of whichever brand of shortening I’ve purchased. The only additional recipe-related comment I would offer is that, despite any claims you might come across, ‘no-fail’ pastry is a pipedream.

Tips for making pies:

• Keep your shortening in the freezer and when you’re ready to use it, cut it into sugar-cube sized cubes before adding it to the flour.
  
  
• When cutting the shortening into the flour, don’t worry about making sure the ingredients are well and uniformly mixed. The less you fiddle with the mixture the better. As outlined in most recipes, stop when the mixture begins to resemble crumbs and small peas. I’ve learned that stopping a little sooner- when the mixture begins to resemble flour with crumbs and peas of various sizes - works too.
  
  
• Wrap your pastry dough in plastic wrap and allow it to rest in the fridge before rolling it out. I usually let dough rest a 1/2 day or overnight.
  
  
• Wrap your rolled out pastry dough around your rolling pin and unroll it into the pie pan.
  
  
• Unless the fruit you’re using is super tart, use 1/2 to 3/4 the amount of sugar the recipe calls for.
  
  
• For fruit pies, assemble the ingredients for your pie filing and let the mixture sit for a bit (at least 15 minutes), then drain off the juice before placing it in the crust.
  
  
• Add a little additional flour, corn starch or tapioca to your pie filling. I usually put in an extra teaspoon or two if the fruit seems very juicy.
  
  
• In my experience, the easiest kind of pie to make is apple.  If you’re trying to decide what type of filling to put in your first pie, go for apple.  Strawberry rhubarb is pretty easy too, but don’t forget to drain the juice before placing the fruit in the crust.

Links to pie filling recipes I've tried and liked:

• Apple pie 
• Apple berry pie
• Strawberry rhubarb
• Strawberry
• Peach
• Lemon meringue pie
• Chicken pot pie

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With thanks always to pie baking superstar, Corrie Huys and her son Baasje who gets the first slice of every pie I make.

Food friends cook for friends when they’re feeling under the weather

Since moving from the east to the west coast a few years back, I’ve observed a few notable cultural differences. Attitudes toward eating, for one. As you might expect on the ‘left’ coast, food choices are generally lighter and healthier than those you’d find out east, though I’ve recently learned there are exceptions to this rule. When I fell ill a short while back, my amazing friends dropped by with dishes that it appears are tried and true standbys no matter what part of the country you live in. Soups and casseroles that make for great stick-to-your-ribs dinners and also reheat well for lunch the next day. As a little thank you, I promised to post links to a few of the recipes for others to try out and share. Call me sentimental (or perhaps, a sentimental little piglet) but in my books, nothing makes a person feel as loved as a gift of food.

Maclaren's Imperial Cheese and Macaroni (thanks, Carole)
This is like mac and cheese turned up to 11 especially if you’re a fan of Maclaren’s Imperial Cheese, the crumbly cheese spread in the red container with the black lid. If that’s not enough to perk your interest, perhaps the addition of mushrooms and bacon will up the drool factor. Where has this recipe been all my life (minus the years I was vegetarian, of course)? Maclaren's Imperial Cheese and Macaroni recipe.

Mom’s Shepherd’s Pie (thanks, Steve)
This dish made frequent appearances on the supper table of my childhood, so I was extra pleased to savour it’s yummy goodness while I was convalescing. A pretty standard recipe with all the usual suspects – potatoes, ground meat and a few additional ingredients for flavour. To me, shepherd’s pie is all about the condiments, so you really want to keep it simple. In addition to gravy, I like to apply a sprinkling of mint sauce AND Heinz 57. Mmmmm! Mom's Shepherd's Pie recipe.

Cocoa Chili (thanks, Cara)
I had no idea you could put cocoa in chili, but apparently a lot of people do and you know what? It makes for pretty fantastic tasting chili. Cocoa Chili recipe.

Chicken Noodle Soup (thanks, Baasje)
Of course. Chicken soup recipe.

Hot Cocoa
One of my favourite rainy day treats. You might be as surprised as I was to hear that hot cocoa is exceptionally good for you. Add a little chili and cinnamon to make it exceptionally delicious. Hot Cocoa recipe.

Great treats and boredom tools (thanks Andrea, Bob and Terra!)

Pacific Coast Highway Road Trip, Day 2 - Portland, OR

Voodoo Doughnut
Originally uploaded by theotherlondon

I have been remiss!  Remiss to the Nth degree!  What kind of person am I that I would begin to recount a west coast road trip adventure only to leave you hanging after one measly day of travel, through rainy Washington and in the dark nonetheless!  I know it's no excuse, but, you must forgive my lollygagging, I've been recovering from our time spent in Los Angeles.  You know how it is.

But I get ahead of myself...

When last I wrote we were spending our first night (of two) in Portland at the Convention Center La Quinta. Unlike my perception of the bright and friendly Austin Airport La Quinta, where I happily sojourned during the SXSW conference in March, I'm afraid I don't have many good things to say about the Portland Convention Center La Quinta.  It is cheap - with the $50 cash back 'Portland Perks' deal offered on the Travel Portland website, it was actually cheaper than some hostels I've stayed in...which to be fair were a great deal more dingy and stinky.  Meh.  I still wouldn't stay there again.

But let's not doddle on the less than stellar details!  You and I prefer the amusing haberdashery of pleasant, loosely organized travel memories - e.g. 'Was that Bolivia or Switzerland?' - and the describing of aesthetically intriguing or culturally interesting finds that simply become more fabulous with the passing of time -  e.g. ' The colours in the marketplace were so vibrant I was gobsmacked' on second telling to become 'I was completely gobsmacked' later to be followed by an emphatic, 'Gobsmacked, I tell you!'

And I will tell you, there are many fine things to appreciate about Portland - unless you compare Portland to San Francisco, but we'll get to that post in a few days.  Anyway, taken on it's own, there are many fine things to appreciate about Portland and of all the fine things to appreciate - lovely architecture, interesting neighbourhoods, abundant evidence of the local population's regard of fine art, culture and all things environmentally friendly - what I appreciated most was the food.  In my admittedly limited experience, Portland is an exceptional city when it comes to culinary offerings. 

Our first real meal in Portland was at a comfy little diner in the city's trendy Pearl District called the Byways Cafe. At this point, I must make a confession that I fear may cast an unflattering light on our journey.  That is, that I planned the restaurants we would visit based on one of my favourite Food Network TV shows, 'Diners, Drive Ins and Dives'. In case you're not familiar with this show, which I would guess to be the case, it features a boisterous, bleached-blond, red convertible driving Californian, named Guy Fieri, who tours around the US visiting famed local greasy spoons recommended by viewers where he samples America's 'best' over-sized and deep-fried diner specialties.  You must forgive my shortcomings for referencing the 'p' word (plan) and the banality of scheduled television broadcasting, but time was short and a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do when she's traveling with a guy who's unfailing response to, 'What would you like to eat?' is, 'How 'bout A&W?'  As recommended by Guy, we ordered the blue corn pancakes, which were every bit as good as he said they would be, and the 'Lumberjack' hash which was okay.

After our meal at Byways, we took part in an informative and entertaining walking tour called 'Underground Portland' offered by a tour guide company aptly named Portland Walking Tours.  When the tour wrapped up, we decided to revisit one of the spots we passed during the tour, a little hole in the wall (literally) doughnut shop called Voodoo Doughnut.  This was, in fact, not the first time we had returned to Voodoo Doughnut during the day as we had passed the shop numerous times while exploring the core area, each time hoping the forty-five minute lineup would diminish on our next pass,  which never happened.  We finally acknowledged we would either have to wait or forgo the experience.  Well, the decision was obvious, of course.  When we were finally admitted to the closet sized interior space, packed with bodies, punk music blaring, anticipation was high. Gladly, we were not disappointed by the array of choices on the chalkboard menu, awash with tantalizing, exotic combinations including maple glaze with bacon - well, hello?! why hadn't anyone thought of that one before -  and our choice the 'Memphis Mafia', a banana fritter the size of a human head topped with peanut butter, chocolate sauce, chocolate chips, chopped peanuts and, for good measure, sugar glaze.  It took us three whole days to eat most of that doughnut and we ended up throwing some of it away.  My, it was good.

We had dinner at another 'Diners, Drive Ins and Dives' gem, Pok Pok, which unexpectedly features a menu of Thai street-food.  Unfortunately, I'm tired and ready to go to bed so at this point, I'm afraid we're going to have to make due with my insistence that a meal at Pokpok alone is worth the drive from Victoria to Portland.  Being the good, old friends that we are, I know you will know what I mean. Remember the fish and chips place at Tobermory I deemed good enough to warrant the drive from London?  Well this is twice the distance.  It's that good.

I know you're vegetarian, but I'm still going to recommend you try the chicken wings. Gobsmacked, I tell you!

View my West Coast Road Trip Flickr set.