post65 // strawberry tart

it’s officially strawberry season !!! well maybe not “officially,” but the strawberries are out and about here in paris and i’ve received news that they are springing up stateside as well.

the dutiful strawberry happens to be one of my favorite fruits to use in desserts. watch out if you’re baking with me in the summertime, i sneak them into everything! (example a and example b.) last week, i decided to use them in a cake i baked for one of my first “clients” — yes, i got paid! i made a fraisier, a french cake with strawberry layers on the outside, genoise sponge cake as the base and pastry cream and more strawberries filling the middle. it’s called a fraisier because “fraise” means strawberry in french. the fraisier is usually topped with a thick layer of marzipan (almond paste) on top but i decided to forego this in order to let the strawberries truly shine.

in this week’s recipe, i adapted the fraisier to a tart base and added in a thick layer of strawberry jam to the bottom of the tart. one thing i’ve learned in pastry school is that a surprise layer inside a cake or tart is a really fun way to jazz up a dessert. also when someone cuts into the dessert, they’ll see these different layers and colors, which can be super appealing to a customer.

if you’re like me and keep leftover pie crust in the freezer, go ahead and defrost it straight away! if not, i’ve listed my classic pie crust in the bottom for you to start on. it’s easy peasy!

the actual assembly of this tart was super fun and i bounced around a lot of ideas for layering the strawberries before i landed on this one. it’s simple and makes a statement — that’s a twofer i’m always a fan of.

i opted for a “rustic” pie crust but if you’d like to shape or microplane your crust to make it perfect, go for it! i just liked the look of something not too fussy.

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and in this week’s other stuff! 

• love these beautiful iphone wallpapers from blogger paris with me
• even madewell is celebrating strawberry season!
• my absolute favorite look from this year’s met ball

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strawberry tart

fixings

pie crust (for a 9-inch tart ring, you will have leftover):

2½ cups ap (all-purpose) flour // 320 grams

1 teaspoon salt // 6 grams

1 tablespoon sugar // 12 grams

1 cup (2 sticks) well-chilled unsalted butter // 225 grams

extra butter or oil to prep pan

pastry cream

1½ cups milk // 360 grams

4 medium-sized or 3 large-sized egg yolks

3/4 cup sugar // 120 grams

2 tablespoons cornstarch // 24 grams

2 tablespoons flour // 24 grams

1/3 cup butter // 80 grams

1 cup beans for blind bake

assembly

1/4 cup good-quality strawberry jam // 80 grams

basket of strawberries (at least 20 small to medium-sized)

directions

crust (adapted from Kate Lebo’s, Pie School):

1. preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. fill a spouted liquid measuring cup with about 3/4 cups of water, plop in some ice cubes, and place it in the freezer while you prep the following steps.
3. in a large bowl, mix the flour, sugar, and salt. drop 1-tablespoon pieces of butter into the flour and toss the fat with the flour to evenly distribute it.
4. place your palms up and curl your fingers back to scoop up the flour and fat. rub, rub, rub it between your thumb and fingers, letting it fall back into the bowl after rubbing. make sure you reach into the bottom and around the sides of the bowl to incorporate all the flour into the fat, until the mixture is slightly yellow, slightly damp. it should be chunky—mostly cherry-size pieces, the smaller bits resembling coarse cornmeal.
5. take the water out of the freezer. pour it (slowly!) in a steady thin stream around the bowl for about 5 seconds. toss to distribute the moisture. as you add a bit more water and toss, the dough will become a bit shaggy and slightly tacky to the touch. press a small bit of the mixture together and toss it gently in the air. if it breaks apart when you catch it, add more water, toss to distribute the moisture, and test again. if the dough ball keeps its shape, it’s done.
6. split the dough into 2 and form each ball into a thick disk using your palms and thumbs. wrap both disks in plastic wrap. refrigerate for 30 minutes to 3 days before rolling.
7. butter or oil the tart pan. once rested, take the crust out of the fridge and roll to fit your tart or pie pan. use the rolling pin to run along the top of the tart pan in order to remove excess dough from the sides.
8. layer a sheet of tin foil on the crust. pour the beans or rice onto the tin foil to prep the crust for par-baking.
9. bake the crust for 5 minutes at 425 degrees, then lower the heat to 375 degrees and bake for 15 more minutes. warning: these cooking times may vary from oven to oven so just keep watch on your tart!

pastry cream (while your crust is baking!):

1. whisk together egg yolks and sugar while putting milk onto boil. combine egg yolks with dry components: cornstarch, flour, sugar.
2. once milk reaches a boil, pour gently over the other ingredients while whisking. transfer all ingredients back to pot and heat together until thickened and bloopy. take off heat and add the butter. mix well and transfer to the fridge to cool down. (this can be done up to 3 days ahead of time.)

assembly:

1. while tart is cooling (in fridge, freezer, or just at room-temp), hull strawberries and cut to ~1/2cm thick slices. for reference, i got about 4 slices out of each medium-sized strawberry.
2. once tart is cool, fill bottom with a thin layer of strawberry jam. follow with a thick layer of pastry cream, spiraling from the inside out. make sure to fill any gaps with extra pastry cream.
3. layering the strawbs: organize your strawberries from large to small before putting them on the tart. start by placing strawberries along edge of the tart. once the first row is complete around the tart, add a second layer that staggers the first. repeat until you fill the entire tart, leaving just a small hole in the middle to plop three strawberries in for garnish. voilà!
4. store tart in a sealed container in fridge. it should keep for up to 3 days depending on when you made your pastry cream.

post41 // blueberry crumb pie

hi there! how are you? i hope you’re having a lovely day, made even better by looking at photos of ice cream melting in this blueberry crumb pie. i promise it really does taste as good as it looks. so keep reading!

my past couple of days were filled with so much good food and fun. my two ex-roomies from new york came down for a visit and we somehow wound up at a peruvian independence day party. it was a blast! and for the first time in three years, i ate authentic aji de gallina — a peruvian dish made out of shredded and creamed chicken with aji pepper, potatoes, and eggs. it tasted just like what i had eaten when living in peru: comforting and delicious. speaking of which, maybe i’ll have to work on an aji de gallina recipe of my own soon. more coming there!

in the meantime, i think this blueberry crumb pie will keep you warm and comforted in a different way. a sweeter way. to start, i’ll let you know that this recipe is the result of no real direction. all i knew going into baking yesterday was that i wanted to make some sort of pie/galette/crisp/crumble/buckle/streusel type dessert (or breakfast!) with fresh blueberries since they’re in season. i ended up with a cross between a crumble, galette, and pie — but that seemed like too many words to fit in the title. so blueberry crumb pie it is!

i began with my favorite trusty pie crust, an all-butter variety adapted from Kate Lebo’s butter crust, as seen in Pie School. i used a 13×6″ pyrex pan and rolled the entire double-pie crust out into a rectangular shape, then transferred it to the pan. at first, i thought that i would keep the pie crust crimped but after loading in the blueberry and sugar filling, i realized i had some room for the crust to fold over. i layered on the crumb topping and then folded the extra crust over, completing the galette portion of this dessert (see what normal galettes look like here).

before baking, i swiped on a light egg wash and then dropped some sugar onto the pie crust. i used granulated sugar but i’d recommend sanding sugar if you can get it — it adds an extra crunch to your crust.

of course, any baked good like this isn’t complete without a bit of vanilla ice cream dressed on top. as you can see, a bit in my family = three very large spoonfuls.

so go on, give this recipe a whirl! it’s perfectly doable after-work, but even more enjoyable on a day off. it’s something you can pick at throughout the day or serve to a dinner party at night. pro tip: the ice cream spoonfuls are a nice way to “present” the pie if you’re hosting!

and in other news, here’s this week’s other stuff!!

my ex-roomie melissa got a job at glossier !!! 👏👏👏 i celebrated her win by buying their newly released wowder. will report on how it looks next week!

a really sound article on wellness and diet trends in this month’s elle: “every day, people” by lucy danziger

ikea’s 2018 catalog is everything.

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blueberry crumb pie

serves 10-12, in a 13×6″ pyrex

fixings

pie crust:

2½ cups flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup (2 sticks) well-chilled unsalted butter

filling:

3 pints blueberries, washed and de-stemmed

2/3 cup sugar (+more for egg wash)

2 tablespoons corn starch

zest from 1 lemon

1 tablespoon lemon juice

crumb:

1/4 keebler graham cracker crust, broken up

1/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

1 1/2 tablespoons light brown sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 egg

instructions

pie crust (adapted from Kate Lebo’s, Pie School):

1. fill a spouted liquid measuring cup with about 3/4 cups of water, plop in some ice cubes, and place it in the freezer while you prep the following steps.
2. in a large bowl, mix the flour, sugar, and salt. drop 1-tablespoon pieces of butter into the flour and toss the fat with the flour to evenly distribute it.
3. place your palms up and curl your fingers back to scoop up the flour and fat. rub, rub, rub it between your thumb and fingers, letting it fall back into the bowl after rubbing. make sure you reach into the bottom and around the sides of the bowl to incorporate all the flour into the fat, until the mixture is slightly yellow, slightly damp. it should be chunky—mostly cherry-size pieces, the smaller bits resembling coarse cornmeal.
4. take the water out of the freezer. pour it (slowly!) in a steady thin stream around the bowl for about 5 seconds. toss to distribute the moisture. as you add a bit more water and toss, the dough will become a bit shaggy and slightly tacky to the touch. press a small bit of the mixture together and toss it gently in the air. if it breaks apart when you catch it, add more water, toss to distribute the moisture, and test again. if the dough ball keeps its shape, it’s done.
5. gather the dough in 1 balls and form the dough into a thick disk using your palms and thumbs. wrap the disk in plastic wrap. refrigerate for 30 minutes to 3 days before rolling.

filling, crumb, and assembly:

1. preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. combine sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice, cornstarch, and blueberries in a large bowl. mix and let sit for 10-30 minutes.
3. in the meantime, prepare your crumb. mix graham cracker crumbs with the rest of the crumb ingredients and toss to combine.
4. roll out your pie crust as described above, in a rectangle slightly larger than the pyrex pan. (if it’s not perfect, don’t worry!) butter/spray your baking pan and then transfer the pie crust to the pan.
5. pour the filling in the pan and then follow with the crumb.
6. beat together the egg and a bit of water in a mug, brush your pie crust with the egg wash and sprinkle some sugar to finish.
7. bake pie at 425 degrees for 20 minutes, and then at an additionally 25 minutes at 350 degrees.
8. eat!!!

 

post33 // melting berry pie

there was a lot to celebrate this past month, most notably my big brother rob’s move up to the big apple. i’ve been hoping he’d make the move since, well since i moved up here, and on saturday april first it came true! i was glad it wasn’t an april fool’s joke. he showed up with my brother jake and i showed up with the best thing i could think of: pie.

pie, pie, pie. we really love pie in my family. probably because i really love making it. on summer weekends together, pie is my baking project of choice. i run out of hands when i start counting the number of friends and family i’ve made pies with.¹ so it seemed only right that upon rob’s arrival, a pie would be a nice treat. not to mention, a really good mid-move snack.

i had planned to make the pie saturday morning and bring it over to my brother’s new place that afternoon when they arrived. butttt my plans got a bit meddled after a night out on friday, spent very wisely at my favorite place in nyc: sid gold’s request room, which led to sleeping in on saturday.  who can blame me? needless to say, pie making was pushed a bit later in the day. and my brothers’ plans? they were actually arriving *earlier* than expected. not exactly what i wanted to hear. i got to baking right away.

two hours later and the brothers had arrived in brooklyn as i was just pulling out a hot berry pie from the oven. wow it looked good. but how the hell was i going to get this thing over there? i live seven stops away in manhattan requiring two trains to get to my brother’s new place. would i bring the pie on the subway? i thought about this. for like a second. hell no i was not taking a warm pie in the subway. how would i swipe my subway card and hold it? this pie was still hot so i would have to carry it on a cookie sheet. nope.

the pie didn’t make it on the subway. instead, i went with uber. i was already late anyways so hopefully a car would get me there faster.

my uber driver was not happy with my entrance. i had to ask a random man on the street to open the car for me and i didn’t really think through driving on nyc streets in a car with a liquidy, bubbling pie. as i sat clutching the pie plate so hard, the dessert spilled and leaked onto the cookie sheet. one big pothole and that pie would’ve leaked all over my uber driver’s car. and boy was he noticing. “is that going to spill??” he kept asking me. “everything okay?” came out of his mouth at each stoplight. i felt terrible, but what could i do! i needed to get the pie there! and i did. a few sticky fingerprints were left on my uber man’s car (sorry sir), but i made it and greeted my brother with a “welcome to new york city” shout and a pie shoved right into his face. a warm welcome right there.

¹s/o to some special folks i’ve made memorable pies with: this thanksgiving apple w/ my mom, this lattice beauty with stella, this strawberry cream version w/ my dad, this low-res pie w/ yarbs (from my ig’s days of infancy), and this berry number showing off pie process with avh.

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berry melt pie

makes 1 double-crust pie

fixings

pie crust:

2½ cups flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup (2 sticks) well-chilled unsalted butter

filling:

1 1/2 cups sugar

5 tablespoons cornstarch

1/4 teaspoon salt

7 cups fresh berry medley (i used strawberries blueberries, and blackberries but cherries, peaches, plums, and any other fruit will be delicious.)

1 tablespoon milk

2 teaspoons sugar

special tools

rolling pin (or wine bottle!)

pie plate

instructions

pie crust (adapted from Kate Lebo’s, Pie School):

1. fill a spouted liquid measuring cup with about 3/4 cups of water, plop in some ice cubes, and place it in the freezer while you prep the following steps.
2. in a large bowl, mix the flour, sugar, and salt. drop 1-tablespoon pieces of butter into the flour and toss the fat with the flour to evenly distribute it.
3. place your palms up and curl your fingers back to scoop up the flour and fat. rub, rub, rub it between your thumb and fingers, letting it fall back into the bowl after rubbing. make sure you reach into the bottom and around the sides of the bowl to incorporate all the flour into the fat, until the mixture is slightly yellow, slightly damp. it should be chunky—mostly cherry-size pieces, the smaller bits resembling coarse cornmeal.
4. take the water out of the freezer. pour it (slowly!) in a steady thin stream around the bowl for about 5 seconds. toss to distribute the moisture. as you add a bit more water and toss, the dough will become a bit shaggy and slightly tacky to the touch. press a small bit of the mixture together and toss it gently in the air. if it breaks apart when you catch it, add more water, toss to distribute the moisture, and test again. if the dough ball keeps its shape, it’s done.
5. gather the dough in 2 balls, one slightly larger for the bottom crust. quickly form the dough into thick disks using your palms and thumbs. wrap the disks individually in plastic wrap. refrigerate for an 30 minutes to 3 days before rolling.

filling: 

1. heat oven to 450 degrees.
2. in large bowl, stir together 1 1/2 cups sugar, the cornstarch and salt. gently toss with all the berries and let stand for 15 minutes. dump into the bottom crust-lined pie pan. fold the top crust over the pie plate and arrange strips in a lattice if desired! crimp edges and brush crust with milk, followed by a sprinkle of sugar.
3. place pie in the middle oven rack and put a cookie sheet below it in case of leakage. bake 20 minutes and reduce oven temperature to 375 degrees. cover edge of crust with foil strips to prevent burning. bake 40-45 minutes longer or until middle part of crust is golden brown and filling is bubbling. recommended: let stand 2 hours before serving (we know I didn’t do that…).

photography by catherine o’donnell/foodstuffs

post32 // butternut squash pie

a new and “improved” food lifestyle seems to pop up every morning. at this rate, vegetarianism will no longer be considered an alternative diet as clean eating, raw diets, veganism, gluten-free diets, paleo, juice fasting, lacto vegetarianism, case-in free diet, locavorism reign high. a whole pool of evidence, both pros and cons, sit behind each of these lifestyles, luring or deterring joiners. as a cook, these fads function as a limiting tool for much of what I like to make: sweets. a cake with no flour? a brownie mix with no egg? a pie with no crust? yes, those are the confines of some of the above-mentioned lifestyles, and while i lean towards a food regimen that consumes anything, i’m willing to dabble in someone else’s food restrictions.

i stepped again into the world of gluten-free baking with this recipe, a place where i have failed so many times before. the lack of flour or substitute flours tend to mix up the balance of a typical dessert, creating end products that are too eggy or sugary in many cases.

this recipe steers away from flour all together, a canny movie by author Emiko Davies. lacking the traditional crust, this butternut squash pie allows the pie filling to take center stage. if you’re a fan of pumpkin pie, this butternut squash variety will make you question your allegiances.

as cousins in the gourd family, when mixed with butter and cinnamon, pumpkin and butternut squash pie filling become indistinguishable, giving way to torpedo spoons that rake and consume this dessert in minutes. topped with powdered sugar for flavor and crunchy sliced almonds, this pie is a true trophy of gluten-free baking. 

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Butternut Squash Pie

adapted from Emiko Davies, Food52

special tools:

 

hand mixer

food processer (optional)

pie dish

fixings:

1 pound butternut squash

1 pint milk

2 eggs, beaten

3 ½ ounces soft light brown sugar

2 tablespoons melted butter, plus extra for greasing

3 ½ oz almond meal

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

pinch of salt

handful of sliced almonds

powdered sugar, for decoration

whipped cream (optional)

instructions:

1. heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. remove the seeds and skin of the squash and chop into inch-sized cubes. This link offers a great tutorial for how to do that: How to Peel and Cut Butternut Squash.
3. place squash in saucepan with the milk. simmer about 25 to 30 minutes or until soft. drain and leave squash in a colander or sieve to drain and evaporate as much as possible until cool. then transfer to a bowl and mash or purée the squash. i suggest using a food processer if you have one.
4. in a separate bowl, beat eggs together with sugar, butter, almond meal, cinnamon and pinch of salt. Stir through the cooled squash/pumpkin to combine well.
5. pour the mixture into a greased pie dish. sprinkle top with the sliced almonds.
6. bake for 45 minutes or until golden on top and set. when cool, give a healthy dust of powdered sugar and serve. whipped cream is another smart topping.