Penelope always loved to bake pies. Even as a Penelopette she shunned the Easy Bake oven and went right for the big kids' kitchen…
Friday, May 9th, 2008
This may seem like restating the obvious, but if you’re using the same lemon (or orange or lime) for zest as for juice, and why wouldn’t you since money doesn’t grow on trees, make sure to get the zest first, and then juice the fruit. A flat fruit is no longer interested in being zesty.
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
If your recipe calls for pureed peaches, you can’t just throw them into a food processor and hope for the best. You have to remove their skins by blanching them.
First, fill a large saucepan ¾ full and bring it to a boil. Also, have a bowl of ice water ready. (Is this starting to sound like something the CIA might be interested in?)
Cut a shallow X in the blossom end of each peach (the part with the stem and leaf), then immerse the peaches, two at a time, into the boiling water until their skins start to pull away from the Xs. Maybe 5-10 seconds. Using tongs or a slotted spoon, lift them out of the water, put them into the ice water, and just slip off the skins. Peaches actually don’t mind this too much. They’re like babies or pregnant celebrities on magazine covers, and think being naked is fun.
Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008
Having good and serviceable, not necessarily expensive, equipment is half the battle in pie success. The other half is knowing how how each piece of equipment works. Knowledge is Pie Power!
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008
They linger at bakery windows. They perk up when a cute cobbler goes by. They get misty at a tray full of cute tartlets. Is it the quest for the ever-illusive perfect pie crust or the infinite variations of fillings that are at the root of pie addiction? Who can say? The good news is, there’s no known cure.
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008
If you were a young pie starting out in your first kitchen, wouldn’t it be fun to have an Oven Warming? Well, Penelope thought so, too. And it just so happened that her friends at King Arthur Flour had already thought of pretty much everything a proper pie could ever want. You may be a little short on gas money these days, but your pie can have it all:
Thursday, March 6th, 2008
Almost all double crust pie recipes say to divide the dough into three balls. Except it’s almost impossible to get the same amount of dough in each one. Either one ball has too much and it has to be cut and added to the third ball, it or there’s not enough dough and it has to be stretched over a blank spot in the pie. So let’s rethink this. Unless you’re going to bake again soon, and then only a single crust pie, the third ball will only remind you of all the things you thought had to have but never used. So no matter what the recipe says, only make two balls of dough, but make one larger and use that one for the bottom crust. The one on the bottom always needs more dough.
Wednesday, February 27th, 2008
Sometimes Penelope likes to blind bake a few pie crusts at a time. But what to use for pie weights? She was never really crazy about the dried kidney bean solution. Or rice. Some of the grains always get baked into the dough. Sure, there are lots of fancy pie weights around, but they can get expensive. Then one day she heard about pie chains. Instead of pouring rice, beans or weights onto the dough, you coil a pie chain on the bottom of your crust. A pie chain is super-efficient at holding the crust flat as it bakes, and also easier to grab and lift out when it’s done. Just remember to use an oven mitt. Look for extra-long chains that give you more coverage. They’re reasonably priced and, in a pinch, can be doubled (or tripled) and used as a necklace over a drop-waist dress to make a flapper concept completely baked.
