Let them eat PIE

so one of my favorite things about November and December is the ABUNDANCE of cranberries. Fresh, red, beautiful tart CRANBERRIES!

Naturally, when I see them at my grocer's, I can't help myself and pick up a bag or two. then I make a beeline for the apples... and get home to start baking.

My girlfriend made a french Cranberry-Apple pie a few years ago, and I have been smitten ever since. between the streusel-crunch topping and the intermitten tart cranberries, I firmly believe I can not make a plain apple pie ever again.

The recipe she passed on to me was a photocopy from a Williams-Sonoma cookbook, but I have found this recipe online to be identical. If I was in the business of sharing my secrets, I'd tell you I ALWAYS double the amount of streusel topping and omit the nuts.... but the best way to bake (at least as far as I have found) is to taste and see and tweak as you like.


Anyway... if you're looking for a sure-fire hit to bring to a Thanksgiving dinner... this is a winner. enjoy... and let's all give thanks for the cranberry!

Lessons Learned: I have been LOVING the little pie tins. Not only do I increase the number of pies I can get out of one batch of filling, but the SIZE!! so nice! Perfect for hitting the spot when you have a sweet tooth, but don't want to be eating the same dessert all week.

These tins can be found in the grocer's under the label of 'pot pie' tins. They're deep dish, so 1/4 of this pie is a generous portion. try them out... they even serve well to bring to a friend's house for coffee or little thank you gifts.

Bake Sale

For the February bake sale, I kept it easy. made four personal pies... 2 cherry and 2 apple... both with the lattice work on top.

as you can see-- the edges got a bit brown, so I either need to employ the foil around the edges or buy one of those fancy bake rings. my cheap ass will probably stick with the foil.

A personal favorite of mine is chocolate covered pretzels, so I rolled up the sleeves and got to dippin'.

I made 13 one-dozen bags of pretzels to donate; in each dozen, there were 4 pretzels that had a decorative pink (dyed white chocolate) squiggles on them. My original attempt was to have that white chocolate be CHERRY flavored, but when I added the cherry extract, the white chocolate melt got stiff. TOTALLY not able to put it in the piping bags. I think because I used imitation extract, so maybe it was a water base, and caused the chocolate to coagulate?

anyways... I scrapped that batch and just went with the plain pink (white) chocolate.

I also took the opportunity to practice piping some chocolate designs on parchment paper.

piping with chocolate is much different than the royal icing. Next time I either need to go with a smaller tip or just have more practice, period. perhaps I might try letting the chocolate cool a little more, too.