Hands.  Recently I was in the occupational therapy area of the Healthplex getting therapy on a smashed (but recovering) right index finger.  The other person getting treatment was a guy who seemed – from appearances, I didn’t ask – to be recovering from badly burned hands, arms and scalp.  He struggled to do basic therapeutic movements with his stiff hands, transplanted skin stretched tight across them, fingers cracked and bleeding.  He worked very hard at simple things, like moving pegs on a board.  Whew. 

How much of what we do every day is dependent on having the use of our hands?  You could make a list that would be almost endless, I’m sure.  Please take a moment to at least think about your list.  Hopefully one of the things on it would be the ability to touch those you love – family, friends, pets, other animals, even plants or books.  And I would include food on the list of things we might touch with love.  The ability to choose and prepare nutritious, good food with love and care is a blessing.  Now I’m not saying pie is nutritious, but you know I think it’s an important part of the food pyramid and deserves to be an occasional treat!

The next time you make a pie, think about how cool it is to have your precious hands to bake with.  Love your hands, love pie.  It’s all good.  Very good!

Take a look at this dough!  Oh, my gosh.  This was the gluten-free dough after chilling, before rolling.  It was a mess:  look at how it had crumbled into a bazillion pieces already.  Nothing seemed to be holding it together in any way…how was I ever going to roll it out and get it into the pie dish?

Dutifully, I worked on a cold surface, dusting the rolling pin with more gluten-free flour.  But it just cracked and split and went this way and that, with no pretense of “rolling out.”  This was one radically uncooperative crust. 

Finally, I had to get rough with it. I did something I would never do with wheat crust:  rolled back and forth, back and forth across the dough, pressing hard. It cracked and split at will, and I could almost hear it laughing at my efforts.  I rolled harder.  What in the world was going on here and what would hold this dough together?  The xanthum gum?  The eggs?

With a great deal of persuasion – rough play, really – I got it big enough and loosened it from below.  Okay, whew.  Then, going into the plate, it ripped into 9 pieces.

Onto Plan B:  there would be no lattice on this cherry pie.  The top crust would be made into small pieces intentionally and laid on top.  Meanwhile, the bottom one was pieced together, pinched and patted and molded with fingers to fit and to form something of a lip on the crust.  There would be no folding together of the two crusts, either.  Instead, I built up the lip enough to then use a fork and make a little pattern going around the edge.  That would have to do.  My perfectionist self was getting a lesson in gluten-free realism!

As you can see, the top crust was pieced together by making cut-outs using a cookie cutter.  I highly recommend this solution, as it allows you to create an attractive top without the drama of trying to transfer a large, rolled piece of dough intact onto the pie.

The recipe came from a well-known flour company’s Web site and featured their own gluten-free all-purpose flour.  I’ll post the recipe and comments on the results in the next “Deep Dish” blog. 

Til then, to your health and to happy gluten-free baking,

Rebecca

More Good Pie!

That’s a motto to live by, isn’t it?  And we had GOOD PIE on PI DAY last week!

Several of us spent a whole evening at John and Bianca’s home, with laughter and pie coaching in abundance.  John honed his pie skills while Bianca made her very first pie ever!  Yay! 

John made a blueberry peach pie, after making homemade crust for the first time.  He's already known for making pumpkin pie from fresh pumpkins, and now he can claim success with making the flaky crust, as well!

Beth, an experienced baker, made her favorite:  custard pie.  She added a piece de resistance, freshly grated nutmeg, to the top of the pie just before baking.

Havens, also an experienced baker, made a sour cherry pie and brought it to share.   We had three to sample:  the cherry, blueberry peach and custard!  Check these out in the attached photo.

Bianca and John were coached by yours truly, someone who finds great joy in sharing the how-to of pie.  They were very good sports!  They learned the chemistry of crust: the “keep it cold” rule, how to cut in the shortening in two batches using a pastry blender, and how to judge the consistency of the dough and to add just enough water (which varies from one day to the next, depending on humidity and such). They managed to roll the dough and get it into the pie plate without excessive cursing, and created a crust edge to seal in the juices and look pretty. Now they can make great pie crust any time! 

Bianca made a beautiful first-ever pie, a traditional apple pie in an all-butter crust.  It came out late at night, so we didn’t get to try it, but I’m quite sure it was fabulous. 

Special thanks to Janet for being our taster extraordinaire! 

If you, too, want to have the confidence to make perfect crust every time, you can learn everything you need to know with “Pie Crust 101,” a DVD with all of the tips and tricks and a recipe, created by me with the help of my film friends, “Film Feed.”  You can find it in the Pie Pals Pie Shop, where you'll also find aprons either made by a microentrepreneur or printed in a union shop.  Made in the USA, of course!

Happy baking to all, and here’s to more good pie bakers! 

Rebecca

Pie Advocate

And that would be…?  Your rolling pin is your pie dough’s best friend (followed by the cold surface on which you roll the dough out).  If you want that wooden rolling pin to stay your “best friend forever,” then there is one thing you should never do.

Never put it in soapy water and wash it.  As tempting as that might be, please resist!  The oils that build up on the pin over years of use help keep it slick – just the way you want it.*   Washing your rolling pin with soapy water would remove those oils.  And beyond that, even water without soap can soak into your rolling pin, causing the grain to expand slightly, making the wood less smooth.

Keep it simple and wipe the rolling pin clean with a paper towel as soon as you’re through with it.  That keeps the oils intact while wiping away any bits of dough that have stuck to it. 

And if your pin isn’t nice and slick from years of rolling?  Feel free to use a paper towel or soft cloth to work in some canola (or other flavorless oil, not olive oil).  Actually, I keep my rolling pin for pies separate from the other one, which might be used for cookies or pasta.  I’m willing to rinse the second one under water (no soap) once in a while as needed.

And there is one more rolling pin lesson I learned the hard way.  I loaned out my pie pastry rolling pin to a friend who was enthusiastically learning to make pie. She followed my request and didn’t wash the pin.  Ahem.  She didn’t even wipe it off.  It came back encrusted with bits of dough that had turned to rock.  I had to wrap that pin in a towel soaked with cooking oil in order to soften those chunks enough to get them off!  And now it’s fine again. 

Roll on!

Your Pie Pal, Rebecca

*You want it that way so that you can use a minimum of additional flour to accomplish rolling out the dough, thus keeping the flour/water/fat proportions of the recipe.