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

Hell Hath No Fury

2/6/2015

0 Comments

 
Picture
Disappoint me once, Phil, shame on you. Break my heart, Phil, shame on me. The week commenced with shadowy news from Punxsutawney Phil and his Inner Circle on Gobbler’s Knob forecasting six more weeks of winter. I was counting on you Phil, to turn things around and you’ve dashed my hopes once again. The combination of ice pelting from the sky and baker’s racks filled with heart shaped cookies may be just enough to send me over the edge. The sugar cookies cool their heels waiting to be inscribed with clever conversational sentiments. ‘Stupid Cupid’ sums it up for me.

It would be easy to drown my sorrows in Peanut M&Ms or mint lentils, but I’m way beyond that. The perfect antidote for my February-melancholy awaits on the dining room table.  After many weeks of scouring the tri-state area plus a touch of international smuggling, the search is over. I am the proud owner of not one, but three rather large boxes of After Eight Mints. One of the boxes had been earmarked as a belated birthday treat for my favorite sister-in-law, but as I craft this post, they are dangerously within my reach.

If you could tuck the best part of winter inside dark chocolate, it would be an After Eight mint. The taste is bracing, clean with just the right amount of peppermint and a bit of a chill. I love that the mints are packaged in their own little sleeves that barely crinkle. Ideal when you decide you must have one just as intermission is ending and Act II beginning. The ushers may instruct you to turn off your cellphones but seldom your After Eights.

On Monday, after trudging through snow and ice up the big hill, I retreat to my kitchen still wearing my parka. Freezing rain beats angrily against the windows. The second chocolate peppermint has begun to take effect and I am feeling markedly better. Go ahead, blow winds blow. I am eyeing some fresh mint purchased last weekend. Master/Master would have muddled it into a fabulous cocktail of sorts, but he is snowed in in Boston. Blondilocks was here only briefly, breezing through town with her Shakespeare cronies. So now it’s me and the mint and a big block of dark chocolate plus a container of heavy cream. The triple threat guaranteed to catapult me out of my six-more-weeks-of-winter slump. It may be only six weeks, but I might as well be stuck in an elevator listening to the theme song from ‘Frozen’ on an endless loop. I’m taking matters into my own oven mitts.  I am baking this pie and I’m baking it now.

This is not an ordinary chocolate pie. The filling blurs the line from decadent to dangerous. Heavy cream is infused with fresh mint leaves then combined with dark chocolate. My mood is melancholy, but not homicidal, so I will temper the richness with some berries. After I pile the blackberries on top of the pie, I realize they might have been for someone else’s breakfast. Oh well. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned by a groundhog. 


Picture
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    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