No More Mr. Nice Pie
  • About
  • Blog
  • Pies About Town
  • Pie-Ku
  • Recipes
    • Recipe Index

WEAR THOSE WHITE SHOES NOW

7/22/2022

1 Comment

 
Picture
​It takes a certain type of person to contemplate baking when the “real feel” temps outside are hovering in the triple digits. I’m that person, turning the oven to 400 degrees with one hand and replenishing my iced coffee with the other. No stranger to heat and humidity playing on repeat, I remind myself of the alternative; we could be in the midst of a polar vortex.
 
As eternal as the oven-burn scars embellishing my arms, summer kitchen memories never fade completely. Heat advisories in a commercial kitchen are redundant. When your job entails open flames, double-stack convection ovens, or the dreaded over-sized Sunday brunch griddle, you’re already playing with fire. And as individuals working in food service know, any number of unforeseen crises will enhance the quality of your workday (or night shift). With little notice, you might find yourself frantically emptying the contents of the walk-in to an already full single-door fridge, because the compressor finally surrenders. It could be something as stressful as a 3-tiered buttercream cake, listing precariously to the side, needing transport to a quaint barn venue without A/C. Expensive perishables will spoil, tempers will flare and someone will call out sick or simply melt into a puddle while working the line.  These are all reasons to be kind and patient the next time you slip into a pleasantly cooled eatery and order an icy glass of heat distraction.
 
Early morning or late at night is obviously the best time for summer baking. As fond as I am of ice-box desserts, fresh fruit offerings are ridiculously tempting right now. Fruit wrapped in pie dough requires an oven, but doesn’t need much in the way of peeling or slicing. Peaches and nectarines need a quick surgical pit removal but little more. Fill the crevice with a hint of brown sugar or honey, a touch of spice (or not), and factor in some time for the assembled dumpling to chill before baking. One recipe for a 9” double crust pie yields enough dough to wrap six peaches, each about 3” in diameter. (While the oven is on, you can sneak in a pan of vegetables that will happily roast on the top shelf at the same high heat required of the dumplings.) Summer is notoriously hot, much in the same inconvenient way that winter is bitterly cold. Enjoy wearing those white shoes now because in a flash we’ll be scraping ice from windshields, our nostrils will burn from the onslaught of pumpkin spice and we’ll be pining for peaches. 

Picture
1 Comment

SUMMER FRUIT TART LOVE

7/8/2022

0 Comments

 
Picture
July affords bakers an embarrassment of fresh fruit riches. Consider capturing the over abundance of jewel-like berries available from the weekly farmers’ market in a classic tart.  

I plead guilty to amassing more tart pans than my kitchen drawer can comfortably accommodate. Plenty of options await the cookie-like French tart dough, pâte sucrée. Rounds, rectangles, squares, 4-inch and 2¼-inch options, some with removable bottoms, others without. Having personally experienced the fruit tart mania of the 1980s and ‘90s from the vantage point of a restaurant kitchen, memories of turning out massive quantities of the classic pastry never really fades. High stress/high volume tart creation is far less pleasurable than crafting them on a smaller scale, simply for the joy it brings. However, for anyone keen on playing with their food, there is no better summer kitchen craft project. And thankfully, we are no longer tethered to kiwi fruit as an integral part of the mix. 

Summer berries are fragile and require minimal fuss; little more than stem/insect removal and a light misting with cool water. Allow the fruit a chance to (paper) towel dry before placing them atop your favorite tart filling. There are many choices in the offing, but my leaning is towards a classic pastry cream, "crème patisserie" found in any number of cookbooks. Turn to Julia or Jacques or Pierre for guidance and use the very best vanilla. And though a slick of apricot glaze is traditional, when the berries are positively gorgeous, they need little more than careful placement atop the tart before you simply step away and grab a cake fork. 
0 Comments

    Archives

    March 2025
    July 2024
    March 2024
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013

    Ellen Gray

    Professional Pie-isms & Seasonal Sarcasm

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Artwork by Retsu Takahashi
© Ellen Gray All Rights Reserved 2014
  • About
  • Blog
  • Pies About Town
  • Pie-Ku
  • Recipes
    • Recipe Index