Salted Caramel Apple Pie

Another salty-sweet recipe from Four & Twenty Blackbirds! (See also the Salty Honey Pie from a couple weeks ago). This pie, a request from our friend Georgia, turned out close to perfect, though it could have been better if I'd done a couple things differently. But all in all, delicious.

Sugarless Apple-Blackberry Pie

Suzanne and I, hippies that we are, are working on drastically reducing our sugar intake; which, as you might imagine, creates some challenges in the pie-making department. However, there are options. This one, for instance, from Ken Haedrich's book Pie (in case you're wondering, it's a book about pie), uses apple juice as a sweetener, and is pretty delicious (though next time around I think I'll slip some honey in there just to make it deliciouser).

Dueling Caramel Apple Pies

While we were gallivanting around celebrating Thanksgiving, some excellent neighbors fed and entertained our gluttonous, attention-starved cats. As a reward, I promised each of them a pie. (The neighbors, not the cats). I originally intended to customize the pie-making to individual preference, but wound up getting lazy and making the same type of pie for each: caramel apple. It's a hard, cruel, world. They don't seem too upset though.

Peach and Apple Pie with Lattice Top

A splendidly unseasonal pie, using farmers' market peaches that we froze back in early September, and thawed for peach pie (by request for a treasured guest). Since the frozen peaches shrank in volume and looked like a dilapidated brown pool of limp dishrags when thawed, I added a sliced apple and some dried cranberries. The filling, amazingly, turned out terrific. This is also my first part-shortening crust, and the results were good enough (though I wound up underbaking the bottom crust) that there will be many more. Details, as always, below.

Guest Pie: Nina's Vegan Apple Galette

Awesome east coast pal Nina made a pie and sent me the pictures. Here's what she says:

I was pretty nervous about it since I've never attempted anything like this before, but it was fantastic. Baked and tender, and perfect with a little almond dream faux ice cream. Here's the recipe:
http://urbanvegan.net/search/?q=galette

 

I promise not to slack on my weekly piemaking, but I do hereby invite readers to send in their own pie success stories (please include at least one photo and a recipe!). The world needs more homemade pie!

Dutch Apple Pie

This was my first try at an apple pie. 

It was, as so often happens, nearly a complete disaster, and imperfect in many ways. (Rest assured that I'll tell you all about them). Yet: it was also a success, insofar as deliciousness goes. Yum. Pie is good even when it's bad. 

As a pie seeker, I quest for piefection. But in the meantime, this stuff still tastes tasty.

Apple-Plum!

As must by now be pretty obvious, we collected a lot of plums from the plum tree in our yard. Thus, when it came time to make a pie for friends Jonathan and Jenny, I followed the recipe for purple plum pie that I've been using, but mixed in about half apples and some extra spices.



The results were pretty good! I added lots of extra cinnamon, some extra nutmeg, and some ground cloves. And one large apple, sliced thin, went in with the frozen plums. The result was a bit like plum pie and a bit like apple pie.

My crust, though I followed Carolyn's magic pie crust technique, wasn't perfect: despite prebaking, the bottom was still a bit soft (though, the following day, cold from the fridge, it was just fine... so maybe the problem was serving it still-warm), and the streusel-ish top came out a bit mushy. Also, I completely forgot to decorate the edges, and overall this is a pretty ugly-looking beast of a pie. But the flavor was just fine, and the ugliness didn't seem to bother anyone too much. Any warm home-made pie tends to look pretty good with some vanilla ice cream on one side and a fork on the other...

All this plum pie is probably getting boring for the two of you who read this regularly, but fear not: apple-pie season approaches, as does pumpkin-pie season, sweet-potato-pie season, and, oh yeah, creative savory pie season. Yum.

One last note: if you're a Portland resident, be aware that I just purchased a special plastic pie carrier. Suzanne was a little doubtful as to whether I would actually need to carry pie places: I protested that I want to give people pie and this will make it easier.

This means that all you have to do is ask, and I will bring you a freaking fresh-baked pie (and, for that matter, if you want me to make something in particular, as long as it's in season I'll do it). So ask for some pie. Because you deserve it.