Black Berry Pie

I couldn't afford to pay for something so I offered to make this friend of mine a pie. This person is a great cook and I took a great risk making this pie. I was excited and thrilled. I later found out that the pie was not only soupy but it was in their humble opinion not cooked all the way. After a week they said they were still working on the pie and to date I have not seen my tin back. Frankly speaking I loved the honesty. I know some people think it is better to be polite and say "I loved your pie." but honestly I would rather give up politeness for honesty. Yes the truth may hurt at times but isn't that what life is, a learning process? Think about how my friend must have felt. I'm sure it was hard for them to be up front and say it basically wasn't that great. Or perhaps they didn't even care. Either way, I did appreciate it and saved that tip or learning experience for future pies. As it goes with anything else, you have to do something enough times before you get it right. I'm still learning but I really do love making pies.

I had this discussion with a coworker of mine. She found it hard to believe that making pies for me was rather therapeutic. There would be times at work where all I could think about were pies. I would see what people were eating for lunch and thought, wow I could make a pie out of that. I was recently asked to make a chocolate bacon pie, to which I laughed but still thought of it to be a great idea. I'd have to use "Fake-on" of course, as my brother-in-law calls it. Mmmm that actually sounds good. But seriously, some days especially after a bad day at work, there is nothing more I would rather do than to run my fingers through butter, flour, sugar and milk and to roll out what my idea of a perfectly looking pie crust would be.

To date I have not attempted to go back and perfect my black berry pie. Frankly, the only reason I attempted it was because I was told that this person loved black berry pie. Soon enough I will have to revisit this area and get it right. Really not so much venturing out and being creative but actually sticking to a recipe, THEN letting the creative pie thoughts take over. lol. Scary.

Madly in Love

This pie is made with granny smith apples, cranberries and black berries. It's definitely in my top five of favorite pies because it's let's just say.... delicious! In all modesty when you mix those ingredients together baked in a buttery flakey crust, the result is, well it's YUM, and with a name like Madly in Love, you can't go wrong.

My inspiration for this pie is actually the result of two close friends who I love dearly who are madly in love with each other. The pie was made and named in honor of them. Primarily because I have always loved the combination of apples and cranberries period. I guess you can say I am also Madly in Love with this pie.
Traditionally I made this pie with hearts to garnish the outside of the crust and to add more presentation to the name. This is a picture of the very first time I made this pie. I actually wasn't satisfied that the top opening of the pie revealed some of the sugar I used. I wanted the presentation to be a little bit better. The second time I made this pie I actually put all the cranberries on the top center which made it look cuter but the end result as far as taste was not the result I had hoped for. Primarily because the apples and black berries were separated instead of mixed together.

Enjoy, and here's to everyone out there who is madly in love, just as I am with this pie.

More Queen Desirae's w/o lattice

This pie is from the Queen Desirae weekend. I had company over three nights in a row and of course, interestingly enough, each couple asked for a pie. Well lets face it, even if they didn't ask, I still made it. I'm forcing every one to eat pie now a days. Ha! Anyways... the Queen Desirae pie is originally made with a lattice going diagonally across and rolled out on the thin side. I don't know if you have already noticed but I have a tendency to dress my pies with some kind of sun or flower when I don't have time or energy to make the lattice. These pies were pretty good. I'm still trying to get the top edges of my crust right. For some reason they come out too thin. I think it might have something to do with the tin I am using. But sometimes they will come out good.
Before I finished this pie I had cut up my apples and strawberries and just laid them out. I thought they looked cute together with my marble rolling pin so I took this picture. The story behind my marble rolling pin is my mom got it for me at "El Ruedas" which is where she finds us alot of cool stuff. She came over on Wed night and used it to make tortillas de harina and had forgotten she bought it for me. Ah I can't tell you enough how much I love it!

For this pie, fresh granny smith apples and fresh strawberries work best. You can actually taste each separately in every bite. *Mouth Watering* Especially as I had mentioned before the texture is way better and the slices of pie look more appealing when you are looking at the fruit part. I also made this pie back in mid March.

The first Banana Cream

When I decided I was going to seriously make pies and try to perfect them, I remember Tobi saying "Do you think you can make me a cream pie?" I was a little nervous at first, but said, "Sure. I'll accept your pie challenge." Thus I looked up a recipe for a banana cream pie and realized I had all the ingredients for it. I was shocked! I did make it for him that day and I was actually impressed. It came out good. Banana Cream has always been one of my favorite kind of pies so I was more than happy to make this one. This was one of the first pies that I am comfortable making. Once I felt comfortable with it, I stopped making it. In fact it's been a while since I have made a banana cream. I made this one in particular on March 19, 2011. I have gone from making your plain traditional banana cream pie to switching up the crusts and toppings. I was asked by a friend to make a chocolate banana cream pie. I'm actually very excited at what he has proposed. I love new pie challenges and new pie ideas. So if there is something you want, let me know.

The usual & Keylime Pie

My coworker who has been really stressed out lately asked me to bake her a pie... she told me she likes strawberries so I told her I would make her a Queen Desirae pie. Unfortunately I somehow didn't measure the flour right so I ended up with this pie that was way too buttery. I stayed up really late (really late) trying to finish the corresponding lattice to this pie but alas I gave up as it kept falling apart because of the texture that was not right. Argh! It was a bit frustrating. Anyhow, it tasted ok, slightly overcooked but somewhat juicy. Another thing about making pies I've come to realize is that everybody has different expectations and tastes. While somebody told me they did not like my pie because it was too "soupy" basically juicy, my current supervisor told me she loves it when they are juicy! Wow what a contrast. The pie tasted great. One complaint I do have is that I didn't make this pie until Friday and I had bought fresh strawberries for it on Monday. By the time Wednesday night came around I noticed my strawberries were looking sad. So I put them in the freezer so they would make it till Friday. Thursday night I made this pie and I was not happy with the texture of the strawberries. The pie tasted great but the strawberries had completely fallen apart. Hm... more learning experiences.
The story behind the Keylime pie is that it was my first one! Yeay! ...and I used the recepie from the Patty Piner book Sweety Pies. Although I did not use the crust it suggested or I did not make the merengue, the keylime filling was made from scratch and using that recipe. It actually came out really good and I feel very strange saying that because I'm usually modest with my pies but I really, really liked it. My other coworker who I had made this for, had suggested a graham cracker crust (guess she wanted something different). Although the pie filling was good, the crust needed more butter to make it stick together. Although I used a recipe online from allrecipes.com it still did not hold together as much as it should have. Oh well. We'll just keep trying. The funny part too (haha, another funny part) is that I told Tobi on saturday that I wanted to make this pie again saturday night when we were expecting company, Tobi said not to make it because it wasn't really a prefered flavor. When I spoke to my brother in law Chris, I come to find out that is his favorite pie! Which is funny because by then I had already decided not to make it. Haha! Oh well... at least now I know what his favorite pie is. I send him home with a lowfat/semifat healthy version of Karson's mud pie instead. He said he would text me to tell me how it was as soon as he got home but I guess he didn't like it because he never sent that text. Guess I'll never know. Anyway, I have more pies and more pictures to post of course. Till next time.

Just not the same

It was the second time making the Oreo pie and the second night in a row I had made a Queen Desirae Pie. As I mentioned before in my previous post, the Oreo pie was only good the first time around. I can't seem to get the pudding part of it right. Nevertheless the Oreo crust was ok. The hardest part about making an Oreo crust is grinding the Oreo cookies down till they are sand. The funny part is that they sell pre made Oreo crusts.

Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of the Queen Desirae pie I made right before this one so one less pie for my pics collection. Unfortunately I have a tendency to get a late start on my pies when I have company and so they leave before they get to try it. these were made on a sat night, Mar 13, 2011. I know Dez and Karson were visiting that night and I remember really wanting Megan to try them but I didn't have it ready in time. I started timing my pies and I have got them all to an hour max for prep time. If I can somehow manage to steal sometime with no interruptions, an hour time will be the max result.

Oreo Pie

I made this pie for a couple who we had over for dinner. I have failed multiple times again while making my chocolate pudding, but for some reason this pie was the only one where I seemed to have gotten it right. The Oreo crust was the hardest to make as I had to purchase whole Oreo cookies and ground them up myself for a pie crust. It was pretty tasty. I made this pie the first weekend in March, 2011.