Testing 1-2-3-Whole Wheat Pie Crust

If you are a purist about pie - seasonal fruit, organic ingredients, all natural - then it makes sense that you would eschew white flour in favor of a more healthful option for your pie crust....If it makes the pie better, that is.

Whole wheat pie crust: just the words seem to connote hardpan, hockey pucks, hippies, humorlessness, heaviness, and humdrum. On the flip side, though, there are the health benefits and perhaps the fun of experimentation with a new approach to pastry.

The challenge is to find a recipe that not only does what pie dough should - rolls, stretches, flakes, browns, and tastes good - but provides those attributes without requiring some other ingredients that subtract from the good reasons to use whole wheat flour. Whole wheat crusts that we've tried in the past were made with cooking oil instead of shortening, and they were, to be blunt, miserable to work with, unbeautiful to look at, and unpalatable to eat. Let's see if this one is an improvement.

In this inaugural attempt, we had to start somewhere...and Sac Pie can almost hear you moaning about this already...so we picked a recipe that included some familiars - butter as well as shortening, white flour as well as whole wheat. We know, we know. We hope you whole wheat zealots will not be too disappointed. We need a jumping-off point for continued experiments, and we figure we can gradually reduce butter and white flour and stop before we reach that "humdrum" end point. We are going to follow the recipe to the letter and see what happens. This trial is also a first for us using butter in pie dough ANNNNNDDD using our Cuisinart to make the dough.

This recipe comes from WikiHow. We chose it because it could be done in relatively few steps and without ingredients that we wouldn't otherwise use in a pie pastry.

For this recipe, we decided to make a pie with the remaining frozen peaches from last summer (which were luscious, were they not?). So that, if the crust was a bust, we would at least have that lovely fruit to spoon up.

As with most pie dough, the key thing again is that your liquid is ice-cold. If you do use a food processor to blend the fat into the flour, open it up and lift the bottom ingredients upward with a spatula or spoon, to make sure nothing is getting trapped in a clump on the bottom.

All right, here is the recipe, from WikiHow for pie dough with whole wheat flour:

Ingredients:

2 c all-purpose white flour

1/2 c whole wheat flour

1/2 c butter

1/2 c shortening

ice cold water (several tablespoons)

1 tsp(ish) salt

1 T(ish) sugar

Instructions:

Add the dry ingredients to the bowl of a food processor and pulse, roughly 5 times at 1 to 2 seconds each pulse.

Cut the butter into small chunks.

Add the chunks of butter to the bowl and pulse again, roughly 5 times at 1 to 2 seconds each time. With a spoon or spatula, lift the mixture from bottom to top all the way around the bowl.

Add the shortening, in small chunks to the bowl and pulse again. Lift again. At this point the mixture should look slightly crumbly.

Add the water in 1-2 T increments, followed by a pulse of the processor (and a lift). Repeat until the dough begins to clump and pull away from the sides of the bowl.

When you reach this point, feel the dough by squeezing it lightly. It should be moist, pliable, and slightly sticky. Remove it from the food processor and into another bowl, and shape into a ball.

The dough should be worked with rather quickly to keep the butter from melting. You may elect to cover it with a damp towel if the day is warm and dry.

You can see that the dough forms a ball quite easily, is moist and not crumbly, and that the butter and shortening are well distributed.

Follow this recipe and you will end up with almost enough dough for two pies. In addition to the pie shown above, we made a small 7-incher with the extra dough (also with double crust). You will find that the dough is very easy to roll out - possibly a little more elastic than our usual recipe. As with our usual recipe, it is, however, still slow to brown. We left this baby in the oven for nearly an hour (fearful of overcooking), the last 20 minutes on the top rack.

We encountered almost immediate shrinkage of the pastry as it began to warm up. You can see a little warping of the edge in the picture below. Interestingly, this did not happen to the small 7-inch pie made with the same pastry. Hmmm. Was it the result of two different pie pan materials? Was it anything to do with the differences in the two fillings? Sac Pie is mystified. We only know that it's not the dough itself that causes shrinking.

It doesn't look like it's going to taste bad, does it?

Well, it was perfectly fine. We wanted it to be a little more flaky on top, so there is room for improvement. We could not discern the benefits of the butter in either taste, appearance, or texture of the crust. We detected a slightly dry feel to the crust, but this might have been the result of the pie's bake-a-thon in the oven rather than the ingredients. With all of those things in mind, we still enjoyed snarfing up this pie and the first one gives us confidence to try again: less butter, maybe a small increment of whole wheat flour to replace the white flour.

Don't be intimidated by the novelty of this recipe. It behaves well, tastes good, and is pleasing to the eye. It makes a fine package for your frozen peaches, and is a homey, comforting product.

Pie of the Week - Lemon Tart

It's time.

I have been putting this off all winter. I look at those Meyer lemons bobbing on the tree out back and think, "I gotta do something with those." I've made lemonade, limoncello, and lemon-juice ice cubes. And there are still so many lemons out there. Look at them all! Next I must consider preserved lemons.

After I get finished with lemon tart, that is. Tart is just another word for pie with no lid.

My web research on lemon tart led me through the looking-glass and into a vast lemon tart alternate universe. I never knew that this was a tart people became passionate about. And, as with everything else one searches for on the web, there are gazillions of recipes - and all of them called THE BEST LEMON TART RECIPE -EVER!!!! Sac Pie could make an entire career out of comparing all the lemon tart recipes side by side in an enormous early spring bake-off - amount of butter/eggs, ease of preparation, presentation, taste, yadda yadda - but Sac Pie already has a full-time job, such as it is, and other leisure pursuits besides eating. Please don't act all surprised about that.

So far, I'm able to make three decisions: I will use the backyard lemons, and look for the recipe that maximizes lemons (counting the juice and the zest this took four); I will use the standard pie crust for the tart shell (just to see what happens); and I will not strive for a low-fat, cooking-light recipe but start out with the full schmear - eggs, butter, sugar. Based on the outcome, I will modify the recipe if needed, because I will still have a thousand lemons.

So all I need is a recipe for the tart filling. This is not going to be lemon meringue pie, no no no. Sac Pie does not do lemon meringue. This filling is going to be something between a lemon curd and lemon sauce - soft but firm, viscous and low-rise, not stiff and airy like lemon pudding. It seems wise to pre-bake the shell because 1) the filling is delicate and, loaded with sugar, prone to scorching, and 2) the liquidy filling will be less likely to make the bottom of the shell turn mushy if it's baked first.

Here we go.

I followed this recipe, which I found at David Lebovitz's site, www.davidlebovitz.com/archives/2009/05/tart_au_citron_french_lemon_tart.html.

This one looked the simplest and the least sugary and finicky to me. Because I'd never made a lemon tart before, I figured I ought to start with the simple approach and build some confidence before going for something more elaborate. And if David Lebovitz can make a delicious tart with egg yolks that have been in suspended animation in his freezer for a few months, odds are good that a novice's will come out okay. Right?

If you are using a standard 9.5-inch tart pan, I would advise doubling the recipe below, otherwise you end up with barely enough filling to make the dessert not just low-rise but, er, thin. To the point of stingy. Not especially enticing.

Are you ready?

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (125 ml) freshly-squeezed lemon juice 


grated zest of one lemon, preferably unsprayed


1/2 cup (100 g) sugar 


6 tablespoons (85 g) butter, salted or unsalted, cut into bits


2 large eggs


2 large egg yolks

One 9-inch (23 cm) tart shell.

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350F (180C.)

NOTE: If you pop the tart shell into the oven at 350 degrees F to bake until golden, you can have the custard filling ready to go into it at the exact time that it is finished baking - about 20 minutes.

1. In a medium-sized non-reactive saucepan, heat the lemon juice, zest, sugar, and butter. Have a mesh strainer nearby.

2. In a small bowl, beat together the eggs and the yolks.

3. When the butter is melted, whisk some of the warm lemon mixture into the eggs, stirring constantly, to warm them. Scrape the warmed eggs back into the saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens and almost begins to bubble around the edges.


4. Pour the lemon curd though a strainer directly into the pre-baked tart shell, scraping with a rubber spatula to press it through.


5. Smooth the top of the tart and pop it in the oven for five minutes, just to set the curd.

6. Remove from the oven and let cool before slicing and serving.

That was easy! A dusting of confectioner's sugar and a few twists of fresh lemon on top, a sprig of mint, perhaps, and you are off to the races with this simple, elegant confection. Or skip the decorating and just slice into it. Your pastry shell should be firm enough to hold up the dense, silky curd. The filling made with this recipe was balanced between sweet and tart; if you like it more tart, you can reduce the sugar. In the picture directly below, you can see the little flecks of lemon zest in the curd and get a sense of the smooth consistency of its surface.

This was one of Sac Pie's homelier-looking works, mainly because it was an experiment that we were prepared to throw out if it didn't work. But it works just fine. We will double the filling and dress it up when we make it for Susan's ranch picnic this weekend.

If you have some lemons to use up, this is an easy and delicious way to enjoy their freshness. Let me know how you do with your version of this tart.

Pie Spy - Sugar Plum Vegan

We had cruised Sugar Plum Vegan's web site (http://www.sugarplumvegan.com/) a few weeks ago to see what was up with their new shop opening at 2315 K Street. The web site told us that they were open, but a drive-by shortly thereafter gave us contradictory data. So on a recent sunny Friday, we decided to check in again.

The shop occupies the space that had been True Love Coffee House, Sanaa, and Jasmine in recent years - it's a white Victorian next door to Hina's in Midtown. The interior has been modified slightly to brighten it up and make the small rooms seem less busy. Baked goods are prominently displayed at the counter, where you can order breakfasts, salads, soups, sandwiches, and other eats. Every item on the menu is vegan. Sugar Plum also offers some gluten-free items.

I looked into the display case for the pie, but saw only cookies, muffins, and scones. The pies and cakes are in a cylindrical display case all their own, up near the front window. This is the kind of pie cabinet that diners and old-time bakeries have, with shelves that rotate. However, all the pies and cakes were stationary on our visit. The case held a tantalizing array of stuff on that day: apple pie, with either crumb or pastry topping; apple-granola crisp with raspberry; peanut butter mousse pie, and beautifully decorated deep chocolate cake. I have to say, the cakes were very pretty compared to the pies. What, exactly, is in a vegan frosting that makes it look and behave like butter cream frosting?

I am beginning to think of apple pie as the litmus-test pie for Pie Spy's eating-out adventures. It was certainly the most attractive pie in the case -- so I ordered a slice. There was only one of each variety of pie and cake in the case, which made me wonder whether you could purchase a whole pie there without ordering ahead.

While vegan frosting and cupcakes may be a bit of a challenge, vegan fruit pie is not much of a stretch. Still, I wanted to see for myself what Sugar Plum's vegan version was like.

Sugar Plum's apple pie slice was generously sized (at $3.95 a slice). Full of thinly sliced, almost crisp pieces of apple, and very gently seasoned with cinnamon and nutmeg. The filling was exactly moist enough. The pastry of this slice was very white, although not underbaked. It felt a little bit granular rather than flaky, and a little bit sticky. I think both of these attributes have to do with the type of shortening (fat, for lack of a better word) used. I find that certain shortenings do take quite awhile to brown. A cup of coffee would be the perfect accompaniment to this rendition of apple pie to help with that feel of stickiness.

While this slice held no surprises or revelations, it had a welcome home-made quality and it celebrated the apples, rather than drowning out their freshness by overloading the spice.

We sat in sunshine on the patio and enjoyed our dessert, one big fat delicious forkful at a time. Next time, we will have the Pie Spy Camera handy, we promise. By all means make a visit to Sugar Plum if you are in the mood for dessert but want to feel virtuous about it afterwards. [And if you don't want to virtuous about it, go across the street to Rick's Dessert Diner.]

And - of course! - tell them Pie Spy sent you. We will be waiting for your report.

P.S. On our last trip to the Davis Food Co-Op, we spied a placard that read "DFC is pleased to supply pies to Sugar Plum Vegan, Sacramento's new vegan restaurant." This calls for further investigation!

Pie Spy In Los Angeles

When you’re in LA, treading those boulevards of dreams, and you want to sit down and have something sweet, where ya gonna go?

Your Pie Spy visited several iconic establishments throughout the city, some of them better known for other selections than for pie. This turned into a mini urban pie safari. The featured stops along the way included these:

Musso and Frank (www.mussoandfrankgrill.com)

The Original Pantry (www.pantrycafe.com)

Clifton’s Brookdale (www.cliftoncafeteria.com)

And Pea Soup Andersen’s, on the way home, in Buellton (www.peasoupandersens.net).

There was no pie at the Pacific Dining Car, none at the Nickel Diner, or Rincon Criollo, or Tender Greens, or – understandably – at the Formosa Café.

Obviously there are many, many more pie venues in the big city than these, but there were other missions on the urban safari besides eating all the pie we could. It can get overwhelming if you don’t bite off small pieces.

Among these pies, Musso and Frank's apple pie (pictured above) was notable for being the thickest and being served on the prettiest china. Not a fancy restaurant, but it was a standout for the ambience. The fare at M &F is traditional, and maybe even plain. But eating pie where stars have dined – maybe even at our table! - has its own sparkly charm.

The Original Pantry’s apple pie (shown above) came warm and dressed with cinnamon sauce, which wasn’t mentioned on the menu, but turned out to be an interesting embellishment. It was $3.95 a slice, or $1.25 extra if you wanted ice cream with it. (But pretty good without!) That place is always hopping, and you might decide well before you’re hungry to go there – there is often a line out the door.

Clifton’s Brookdale had cherry pie as well as apple, but Pie Spy was tired of apple pie by the time we got there. The cherry (below) was the winner in the price category, at a bargain-licious $2.39 per slice. Tart fruit and buttery pastry. Home/cafeteria cooking that is hard to find in our own part of California. You gotta go to Clifton’s to experience the crazy décor as well as the pie. Notice the moose head and the fancy forest wall decoration, with tree trunk in the right foreground.

And let us not forget Pea Soup Andersen’s. It has been there by the highway so long that maybe you don’t even notice it anymore. Choices of food stops along the road are generally not very good for you. Pea Soup Andersen’s, however, is a welcome alternative to the burgers, pizzas, and chicken buckets. The eponymous soup is vegetarian and very, very delicious, full of protein, and just eating it makes us feel calmer. The copper-topped tables and the non-truck-stop lighting also make you feel more civilized. If you’re not into green soup, try the salad, and if you’ve had enough pie for one week, order a chocolate milk shake. Then you will have the courage to keep on driving. The pie was warm, but as you can see from the picture below, it was a little bit oozy. We neglected to inquire about the makeup of the pastry, but I believe it is vegetable shortening–based. In my opinion it is not quite as good as homemade pie, but even so one should be grateful that pie is anywhere to be had out there on the freeway. And we were very grateful!

The inaugural SoCal Pie Spy mission was a big success. When I can get back into the skinny jeans, I'll be ready for the second phase.

Pi Alert - Do Not Panic!

Today's Sacramento Bee claims that this Sunday (March 14) is Pi Day - not to be confused with January 23, which you all know now to be bona fide Pie Day. Here we at Sac Pie are just getting rolling, so to speak, with Pie Day, and the media are already trying to dilute our sacred holiday. Of course, if you feel you need another day with the "pi" syllable in it in order to have an excuse to bake, maybe that's all for the good.

The Bee, having missed the boat in January, tried to recover today with a full-page spread (page D4) touting 'easy' pie recipes with 'shortcut' and 'cheater' ingredients for the weekend Pi festivities. Hmmmmm. Beware of no-bakes with cream cheese and peanut butter! There must be a pie analogue to "either fish or cut bait," I just haven't figured it out yet. I mean, if you're going to make pie, i.e., expend effort to create something fresh and good, don't make pi. Pie is worth your effort.

To be fair, on the Mailbox page (D7), the Bee has published a clip and save recipe for "high top apple pie." No shortcuts or cheating with this recipe. It has a very different pastry that includes eggs, butter, and superfine sugar, and calls for kneading and chilling the pastry before rolling it out. Sounds like it might be fun to try - who will be first to report back to us on results? But does it really have 102 milligrams of cholesterol per serving as published, and 36 percent of its 496 calories from fat? Wow! Might want to take tiny forkfuls and go slowly with this one.

Wouldn't it have been great if someone could have concocted a recipe for Pi Day that has 3.14159265 fat grams or weighs 3.14 pounds (give or take) when it's done?

Or is that just the nerd in me talking?

You can email Teri Watson at twatson@sacbee.com, and visit www. sacbee.com for the full "high top" apple pie recipe, and others if you feel a craving for Covert Cookie Pi. Me, I've got the real thing going in the oven today. Stay tuned.

Pie of the Week - Cranberry Pie Deux

Winter's almost over and I still have two bags of cranberries in the freezer. I know, I said I would attempt cranberry pie again after that shaky and barely palatable first attempt. Lessons learned, as they say in corporate life. I'll do it better this time!

If you were not tuned in during the post-Thanksgiving cranberry pie experiment, let me just give you the bottom line again:

Cranberries are SOUR. Their sourness will dominate any other flavor note in the filling unless you curb it with even more sugar than you think. If you don't get the sugar right, no one will taste the citrus, apple, pear, or cinnamon, or clove, or whatever other delightful accessory flavors you were so excited about. And your guests will not be able to force a full serving of this pie down, because their faces will be turning inside out with pucker. Sac Pie has already run this experiment so you don't have to. Trust me!

Cranberries impart terrific health benefits to us along with that puckerful punch that makes your jaws lock up. Loaded with vitamin C and antioxidants, very hardy and relatively non-perishable, they can make a great addition to your dessert repertoire if you handle them right. They need to be cooked and sweetened in order to be palatable. Just writing this is making my eyes water...

Sac Pie began with friend Kim's cranberry relish recipe again, and this time was in possession of several estate-grown oranges with which to add flavorful sophistication to the pie filling.

The cranberries, frozen, as I said, were thawed and then rinsed gently. I hewed closely to the original recipe, namely combining

1 c. orange juice

1 c (organic cane juice) sugar

2 tsp ground cinnamon

1.5 tsp clove

1 T minced fresh ginger plus a strip of dried sliced ginger (removed after cooking)

1/2 c golden raisins

in a saucepan on the stove. I boiled the juice until the sugar was dissolved. Then I added the cranberries and other ingredients and cooked it just until everything was combined. I cooled the mixture for about 2 hours.

The spicing and additional fruit is completely up to you. All will be well if you just remember that the critical thing is the sweetener (we can run the experiment next season with brown rice syrup or honey). In this incarnation, in addition to the cranberries, I used 1 chopped apple and about a T of orange zest in the filling (after it had cooled).

After adding the sugar-spice combination to the cranberries and mixing, I sprinkled in a scant teaspoon of tapioca for a thickener.

Voila! A carnival in a pie shell. Maybe for Mardi Gras or Valentine's Day next year?

A few pats of butter, a full pie lid, and into the oven at 400 degrees for 50 minutes.

This time, the pie filling was much more temperate and sparkly in flavor, rather than aggressively tart and borderline obnoxious. I liked having the apple chunks and the raisins for textural variety. The seasoning really does remind me of the mince pie combination. I completely forgot my note-to-self from last fall about adding a little booze. I think that amaretto or kirsch would be an interesting note. But even foregoing that, I think the combination really comes together as a result of the sugar to buffer the acidity of the cranberries.

Don't forget to try the recipe above as a cranberry relish, which is its origin, after all. And thank you again, Kim, for getting me started on this. I can cater you a slice, if you like!

Pie Spy - Freeport Bakery and the Knish Delish

One of Pie Spy’s favorite places in the whole Sacramento Valley is Freeport Bakery at 2966 Freeport Boulevard (www.freeportbakery.com). We here at SacPie are not so into “cute” as a lifestyle choice, so that’s not why we love Freeport Bakery (although you could not ask for a more charming bakery storefront). We love it because their commitment to excellence is evident everywhere you look, and in every bite. We love it because it is a place where you can not only buy delicious things to eat but you can sit down and eat them, with real plates, knives, and forks, and enjoy a good cup of coffee too. We love it because it has clearly and deservedly become a mainstay of its neighborhood. We love it because it is a short walk from our house. Of course, we love it for the beautifully made, proudly displayed, and extravagant pies on offer. We will get to the pies soon.

But they really hooked us with the knishes.

Freeport Bakery’s take on vegetable knishes is a total departure from anything you may have previously consumed that called itself knish. The conventional deli knish we have experienced only comes in one variety – potato. PieSpy has scoped them in local deli cases - brownish bricks that look like square corn dogs – the kind you’re supposed to dip in mustard. They've been frozen too long, and maybe thawed out too soon. They aren’t appetizing to look at, and feel pretty much like bricks once they are ingested.

Scan the web for knish data and you will find recipes for fish, pastrami, cheese, chicken, and other hearty fillings, surrounded by dough made with chicken fat, or with puff pastry, Kosher, not Kosher, and on and on. Many of these seem beyond substantial and into ‘dense.’ Never having had the experience of knishes in a genuine New York Jewish deli, I cannot say what makes a store-bought knish authentic (although a tiny voice inside tells me the brown bricks are NOT). And never having had a Jewish grandmother, I have no experience of home-made knishes either.

Anyone out there making their own knishes at home?

At Freeport Bakery, if you ask for the knish, what you will receive is a glorious, ethereal, miniature self-contained vegetable pie on a small china plate. You will not see them in the bakery cases, but usually one is displayed on the counter to the left of the entry door. They cost about $3.95 each. Just ask. Your odds of success will be higher if you get there earlier in the day.

I have not inquired as to whether these knishes are kosher, but I'm sure someone at the counter can let you know, if you are interested.

You can re-heat them for a minute or so in the Bakery’s microwave, and then enjoy them hot right there. I have tried many times to get the temperature just right with their 1980's-era nuker, but the filling becomes either scalding hot or remains too cold, and you don't want to ruin that beautiful pastry crust. Maybe you will have better luck if you can take a few home with you cold, and heat them up later in a 300-degree oven. Be advised, though, even your best mustard would be an insult on this gorgeous little pie. It needs no extras.

The crust is both decorative and appetizing; firm enough to hold the insides in, but light and buttery. A little cutout leaf or nut made of dough adorns the egg-glazed top. The knish has the look and aroma of a fancy French savory pie. About 3 inches in diameter, it is best enjoyed, and deserves to be enjoyed, on a plate and eaten with a fork. This knish is flaky and too civilized to be eaten while you are driving or – you know who you are – standing over the kitchen sink.

Inside, the knish is filled with an aromatic combination of mashed and finely minced vegetables – potatoes as well as carrots, mushrooms, broccoli, onion (or perhaps leek), and a delicate array of herbs. The filling is velvety yet all the ingredients are identifiable. On the plate, the knish may look small, but it eats big. One knish can be a satisfying breakfast or lunch for one person – decadent, but with vegetables.

Freeport Bakery’s knish will make you want to throw rocks at other knishes commonly on offer in stores. They are so satisfying that you may say, “to hell with baking knishes myself!” If so, make sure you get to Freeport Bakery before I do. Or call ahead and request a special order.