Egg and Bacon Pie and memories of a Milk Bar

When I was a Uni student in Melbourne I lived an an apartment that had a Milk Bar nearby - less than a 100 metres away. This Milk Bar was our stop whenever milk ran out(obviously) or bread, for a quick chocolate fix or snack. Even for a can of corned beef or when we had run out of something like tomato sauce. The milk bar was also a 'saviour' whenever we wanted a quick meal and that was usually a four and twenty meat pie with loads of tomato sauce squeezed into the pie. Joe and Claudette, the proprietors of this milk bar, served up another fancy pie that I absolutely loved - Egg and Bacon Pie. Joe and Claudette orginated from Lebanon and since I lived in that apartment for more than 3 years, we became good friends. They would know what I wanted based on what time of the day it was. If I sauntered in at around dinner time, Joe would welcome me before asking "Meat Pie or Egg and Bacon mate?"

Graham Cracker Crust Chocolate Flourless Cake

What do you do when your children want something delicous to eat, you want to finish off some unused biscuits and you want to try something new? Bake a new dessert of course!

I've seen a lot of recipes that call for Graham Crackers. Never seen them before nor have I tried them. I usually use Marie Biscuits or Digestives in place of Graham Crackers whenever a recipe calls for it. Anyway, our friend Lynn brought over some Graham Crackers to eat with cheese - not knowing that Graham Crackers are sweet. I don't blame her since the word cracker would imply savoury rather than sweet. Anyway, I was thrilled to finally get my hands on some Graham Crackers. They tasted very much like Digestives, although maybe a little sweeter.





The Graham Crackers sat in the cupboard for a little while till the kids asked for a nice dessert one fine day. I decided to whip up something and to use the Graham Crackers as the base. This is what I did.

Ingredients
125g Graham Crackers
90g Butter

200g Chocolate
3 eggs
150g sugar
100g almond meal

300ml cream
Method
Melt butter and allow to cool. Crush the Graham Crackers in a bag till fine (or use a food processor - although the bag method produces a nicer crust). Place crumbs in a bowl and mix with the butter. Pack into a 8" or 9" springform and then bake crust for 15mins at 180C. Remove from oven and let cool

Meanwhile, melt the chocolate over a double boiler. Allow to cool. Whisk the eggs and sugar together till thick and creamy. Beat in the chocolate and then mix in the almond meal till smooth. Whip the cream and fold into the chocolate mixture. Spread into the springform pan and bake at 180C for 20 mins. Remove from oven, cool and then refrigerate for at least 4 hours before serving.

The crust turned out really nicely and the cake was mousselike with a nice texture from the almonds. The children really enjoyed it as did The Lovely Wife. I love anything chocolate and this one goes in as another one of my favourites - a mix between a pie and a crusted cake.

Simply Delicious!!

Chicken Pie

One of the Lovely Wife's favourite dishes is Chicken Pie. In fact, it was a challenge from her that spurred me to make my own Chicken Pie. Most of the restaurants we have eaten at serve Chicken Pot Pies where the pie is served in a bowl and covered with puff pastry on top. My wife prefers a complete pie with pastry at the bottom as well. Not one to resist a challenge, I came up with this recipe and she now rates this as one of her favourites.


A couple of weeks ago, we invited her cousin and his wife over for dinner. She suggested that I make Chicken Pie as she was sure that it would be something that would be well liked. Whenever I make pie, I usually make enough for two 9" pies, as Chicken Pie is lovely eaten as leftovers.

All went well when suddenly we realised that one of my pie plates was in my Mother-in-Laws house. I quickly decided that I would try and make mini Chicken Pies using ramekins. That actually turned out quite nicely as now each person had his own personal pie. The kids loved that they had their own individual pies too!



Usually, I use shortcrust pastry for the base and Puff Pastry for the top. However, this time, as a cost saving measure, I just used Puff pastry for the base and top. It turned out well!



This is my recipe for Chicken Pie


Pastry
1 sheet frozen Puff Pastry
1 sheet frozen Shortcrust Pastry
1 Egg

Filling
400 gm Boneless Chicken Breast
250 gm Fresh Button Mushrooms
2 Cloves Garlic
2 Large Carrots
3 Potatoes
250 gm fresh Spinach (or use frozen if you like)
200 ml Cream
½ Tsp Black Pepper
½ tbsp Corn Flour
2 Tbsp Olive Oil
1 tsp Oregano
2 Bay Leaves
½ tsp Rosemary
8 Rashers Bacon (optional)

Method
Line bottom of 9” pie dish with shortcrust pastry. Trim edges and use to cover open areas of dish and line edges of dish. Bake Blind in pre-heated 190oC Oven for about 15 minutes. (Baking Blind means covering the pastry with baking parchment / greaseproff paper and filling the shell with rice or beans to prevent the pastry from rising. Baking blind ensures that the bottom layer stays firm and doesn’t get soggy once the filling is put in.) Remove and let cool.

While shell is baking, Cut chicken into small squares. Mix 1/2 tbsp corn flour with pepper and salt. Add in Chicken and mix well so that chicken pieces are coated. Let rest.
Meanwhile, slice mushrooms thinly, cut carrots and potatoes into squares. Heat oil in pan. Add in chopped garlic, Oregano, Bay leaves and Rosemary and fry lightly till fragrant. Add in Chicken and cook well. Add in bacon if using and cook well.
Add in Mushroom and cook till mushrooms are tender. Add in Potatoes and Carrots and simmer. Add in Cream. Mix well and simmer uncovered. Add in chopped spinach and mix well. Continue to simmer until mixture is thick and potatoes, carrots and spinach are all cooked. Mix a little corn flour with water and add to the mixture (if required) to make it thicker. Allow to cool.
Fill shell with Chicken filling, taking care to fill evenly to corners and sides. Ensure that filling is COOL before filling pie. Cover with sheet of Puff Pastry. Moisten edges of pastry with water and press down firmly. Using a butter knife, trim the sides, cutting upwards. This helps the pastry from separating while baking.
Using left over pastry, decorate top of pie with pastry shapes. Beat the egg lightly and brush top and edges of pie. Bake in a Pre-Heated 220C Oven on the middle tray for at least 20 minutes or until pastry has risen and is golden brown.
Serve Hot and Enjoy!

Lemon Meringue Pie

The whole blogosphere is going to be crowded with Lemon Meringue Pies! Yeap! That was the challenge for this months edition of The Daring Bakers.
When I first saw the challenge, I must admit that I wasn't too excited. You see, I'm not a big fan of Lemon Meringue Pie. I've had a LMP once and only once before and it's definitely NOT something that is on my radar screen to make. But I guess that is the whole point of the Daring Bakers. As Captain Kirk says - "To boldly go where no man has gone before..." There I go showing my age again. Anyway, I much prefer Jean Luc Picard!

Captains Log, Stardate 43223.5, my orders are to attempt the Daring Bakers challenge of a Lemon Meringue Pie. As usual, I woke up early to tackle this challenge. There are three parts to this pie,
The Crust
The Filling
The Meringue

and I'll share my experience with each part.


The Crust
I used the Food Processor option for my crust and it came together rather well. First mistake though was I don't think I used enough flour. (Either that or this Romulan class flour just doesn't bind together at warp speed). I didn't pack the flour in but just filled the cup loosely. I know there wasn't enough flour because the pastry was very soft even after chilling. Or perhaps there's too much cold water in the recipe. Whatever it is, I added in a few more sprinkles of flour. Then I lined my pastry dish and let some of the dough hang over the edge before chilling it again.

Problem was that when I baked it, the 'overhang' all dripped off. Fortunately though, there was enough pastry that stayed in the dish to form a nice crust. The crust was delicious and my darling daughter loved the parts that had dripped off to form 'drop biscuits'! She even had these with milk for her breakfast and declared the biscuits were yummy!

The Filling
While waiting for the crust to cool, I started on the filling. When I had read the recipe earlier, I noticed that there was a large amount of corn flour needed for the filling, but it didn't seem to bother me. However, once I boiled the water and added in the sugar and corn flour, I couldn't help but think how much it reminded me of glue... Sorry. Fortunately when I added in the eggs, the mixture looked much better and resembled a custard. No real problems here.

The Meringue
This was the least of my worries but don't we all know that when you least expect it, something will go wrong. Before I go into details of my Meringue, this was the opportunity to use my latest toy! Yes! My parents gave me a Kenwood Chef as a combined Birthday/Christmas gift. Here's a picture of it sans bowl and balloon whisk (which were being washed!)


So, with my Kenwood whipping up the egg whites into a frenzy, I started measuring out my sugar. Aaaaarrrggghhh! Not enough Caster Sugar!! The egg whites were already at the soft peak stage so I briefly considered rushing out to the store to get some caster sugar - but that would probably deflate the egg whites. Screw it. Just use some coarse granulated sugar instead.
In retrospect, if I have stayed calm and cool like the man I normally am, I'd have whizzed the coarse sugar in the food processor to make it finer. But I was too darn panicky wasn't I. S T U P I D! Definitely NOT what they taught me at Starfleet Academy.

Anyway, i only had about a quarter cup of Caster sugar so that meant half a cup of coarse sugar. I turned the Kenwood on high in the hopes that it would dissolve the sugar. Man! I've never, EVER seen egg whites whipped to such stiff peaks before. It was awesome!

Unfortunately, all the sugar didn't dissolve and there were still a few grainy bits in the meringue. I piled the meringue on and even piped some around the edges. However, when I tried to shape the meringue into lovely billows, it just ended up getting mussed up - I think it was a tad too stiff. So anyway, I just swirled it on and then popped it into the over to bake.

Too much thinking is not good for the soul and neither is it when it comes to baking. You see, I figured with some sugar still undissolved and also to try and prevent beading and also to get a nice golden top, I should place the pie dish on the top rack. Bad Idea.

The meringue browned a little too much and a little too quickly. I realised the folly of my ways and removed the pie to the lower tray. It came out looking pretty nice although not as nice as I had imagined in my minds eye. No billowy sails or peaks. Just a mound of smooth meringue. Oh Well.


So. All in all, a pretty successful challenge. But how did it taste? I was the first to cut and taste it and I am happy to report that there was NO weeping! YAY! The pie was quite tasty and definitely the best Lemon Meringue Pie I have ever tasted but seeing as I've only tasted one before, that's really nothing to shout about. It was nice enough, I have to admit but its really not my cup of tea. And I really doubt I wuold make it again or even try it anywhere else - unless I had too or jus to be polite. As I said, the LMP is just not my kind of pie. Also, I still had visions of the corn flour glue..... but even without that vision, not really my kind of dessert.

But the crust was superb!

Anyway, to be fair, I thought I'd let my official tasters guide me on it.

My son kind of liked the pie. He seemed to like the lemon taste as well as the meringue. Kind of expected as he likes sourish things - especially lemons and limes! But it wasn't a super dessert in his eyes because he didn't rave about it nor did he want seconds. But all in all, I think he quite enjoyed it.

My daughter loved the meringue but wasn't too impressed with the filling. But I expected that as she is a Chocolate girl - like her Daddy!

The lovely wife was not a great fan. She felt the pie was a bit sweet and just didn't quite like it. She also mentioned a bit ruefully that this was the first DB challenge that she didn't like....

Oh Well, it was still a great experience making this pie and if not for this challenge, I would never, ever, not in a million years have thought of making a Lemon Meringue Pie. And isn't that just what the Daring Bakers are about! So my thanks go to Jen the Canadian Baker for choosing this as the challenge.


You can find the rest of the Daring Bakers at the Official Daring Bakers Blogroll to see how they fared with this challenge.

In the meantime, for any of you interested, the recipe is duplicated below. I now need to return to The Bridge as The Enterprise is about to orbit the two major planets of the Beta Renner system. Engage!



Lemon Meringue Pie
from "Wanda's Pie in the Sky" by Wanda Beaver

Makes one 10-inch (25 cm) pie

For the Crust:
¾ cup (180 mL) cold butter; cut into ½-inch (1.2 cm) pieces
2 cups (475 mL) all-purpose flour
¼ cup (60 mL) granulated sugar
¼ tsp (1.2 mL) salt
⅓ cup (80 mL) ice water

For the Filling:
2 cups (475 mL) water
1 cup (240 mL) granulated sugar
½ cup (120 mL) cornstarch
5 egg yolks, beaten

¼ cup (60 mL) butter
¾ cup (180 mL) fresh lemon juice
1 tbsp (15 mL) lemon zest
1 tsp (5 mL) vanilla extract


For the Meringue:

5 egg whites, room temperature
½ tsp (2.5 mL) cream of tartar
¼ tsp (1.2 mL) salt
½ tsp (2.5 mL) vanilla extract
¾ cup (180 mL) granulated sugar

For the Crust: Make sure all ingredients are as cold as possible. Using a food processor or pastry cutter and a large bowl, combine the butter, flour, sugar and salt. Process or cut in until the mixture resembles coarse meal and begins to clump together. Sprinkle with water, let rest 30 seconds and then either process very briefly or cut in with about 15 strokes of the pastry cutter, just until the dough begins to stick together and come away from the sides of the bowl. Turn onto a lightly floured work surface and press together to form a disk. Wrap in plastic and chill for at least 20 minutes.

Allow the dough to warm slightly to room temperature if it is too hard to roll. On a lightly floured board (or countertop) roll the disk to a thickness of ⅛ inch (.3 cm). Cut a circle about 2 inches (5 cm) larger than the pie plate and transfer the pastry into the plate by folding it in half or by rolling it onto the rolling pin. Turn the pastry under, leaving an edge that hangs over the plate about ½ inch (1.2 cm). Flute decoratively. Chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350ºF (180ºC). Line the crust with foil and fill with metal pie weights or dried beans. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. Carefully remove the foil and continue baking for 10 to 15 minutes, until golden. Cool completely before filling.


For the Filling: Bring the water to a boil in a large, heavy saucepan. Remove from the heat and let rest 5 minutes. Whisk the sugar and cornstarch together. Add the mixture gradually to the hot water, whisking until completely incorporated.

Return to the heat and cook over medium heat, whisking constantly until the mixture comes to a boil. The mixture will be very thick. Add about 1 cup (240 mL) of the hot mixture to the beaten egg yolks, whisking until smooth. Whisking vigorously, add the warmed yolks to the pot and continue cooking, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil. Remove from the heat and stir in butter until incorporated. Add the lemon juice, zest and vanilla, stirring until combined. Pour into the prepared crust. Cover with plastic wrap to prevent a skin from forming on the surface, and cool to room temperature.


For the Meringue: Preheat the oven to 375ºF (190ºC). Using an electric mixer beat the egg whites with the cream of tartar, salt and vanilla extract until soft peaks form. Add the sugar gradually, beating until it forms stiff, glossy peaks. Pile onto the cooled pie, bringing the meringue all the way over to the edge of the crust to seal it completely. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until golden. Cool on a rack. Serve within 6 hours to avoid a soggy crust.