Salted Caramel Apple Pie

You might be asking, another pie??  But it's pie season, and this one is so good!  This is not just any apple pie, but one with homemade salted caramel stirred into the filling, and additional caramel poured on top when served.  The big apple slices hold their shape and juiciness, and the caramel makes the filling wonderfully saucy.

This pie is also different because I finally decided to test-drive a recipe for a yogurt-butter crust, and I can report that it is super flaky and easy to roll out.  It wasn't so easy to assemble.  For the first time I used a handheld pastry blender like the recipe called for, rather than my food processor.  I've concluded that I'm lazy and prefer the machine, plus I feel like the machine works the dough less.  And we all know that working the dough less ensures tender pastry.  Also, while the yogurt works as a tenderizer, there simply wasn't enough moisture to bring the dough together.  I added about a quarter-cup extra water along with another teaspoon of yogurt.  I could chalk this up to the awfully dry conditions at home during fall and winter.  But continuing to work in the extra liquid made me afraid I was overworking the dough.  The pastry still came out tender, but next time I'll go the lazy route and use the machine.

Part of my autumn pie madness: puff pastry apple tartlets thrown together at a moment's notice

Finally, the caramel is simple to make, and I didn't even break out my candy thermometer.  But if you're short on time, I think storebought salted caramel would work just as well.  One last tip: I'm always afraid of crystallization when making caramels and syrups, so I put the lid on the pot for 2 minutes during the vigorous stage of boiling -- the steam builds up and washes down the sides, along with any crystals that have formed.  Both the pie dough and the caramel can be made a day or so in advance, and refrigerated until needed. Microwave the caramel to make it warm and pourable before using.  Have a good Thanksgiving, folks, and may it be filled with pie.

Looking for other Thanksgiving dessert ideas?  Here's a few:

Black Bottom Tart

Chocolate Cream Pie

Maple-Glazed Apple Crostata

Pear Custard Tart

Pecan Bars

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting

Sour Cream Pumpkin Tart

Vanilla-Bean Pear & Apple Tart

Pear Custard Tart

I've been on a pie-baking frenzy this fall, and I don't think I've run out of steam yet!  The latest is this Pear Custard Tart.  Bartlett pears are poached with vanilla bean and orange peel, then layered in a buttery crust and soaked in a vanilla custard before being baked and topped with toasted almonds.  It sounds amazing, and yet the result is understated.  The first day I found it plain and was a bit disappointed, but on the second day the flavors had developed -- the pears had more of a presence and the custard and almonds complemented them well.

I'm chalking the difference up to using pears that could have been more ripe, and not including the brandy the recipe called for.  We rarely have hard stuff in the house, but this simple tart could use something to punch it up.  I would definitely make it again, using riper pears and the brandy.  The tart doesn't have loud flavors: no chocolate, cinnamon, clove, or cayenne.  Still, it's gorgeous, elegant, and tasty (at least on the second day), and would make a light but showy finish to a Thanksgiving feast.

Boston Globe Review: Thanksgiving-Ready Pies

Some of the premade pies ready to go in my oven. I labeled the parchment to keep track of which pie was which.

I neglected to post about my latest review that ran in Sunday's Globe South in The Boston Globe.  Ever So Humble Pie Company in Walpole sells made-from-scratch frozen pies, and all you do is put them in the oven.  It's a convenient option for Thanksgiving if you want a from-scratch pie but don't have the time to make one.  The fruits and dairy are from local farms, and many of the pies are vegan-friendly.  The photographer's photos in the paper are far better than mine here, of a bunch of personal-sized pies ready to go into my oven (and my belly).

There was lots of pie-eating involved on my part.  It's a tough job, but somebody had to do it!  Check out the review: http://b.globe.com/193xDC1

Three-Bean & Corn Chili

It's getting downright cold here.  Sadly, I know this is nothing compared to the next few months.  Feeling my face hurt in 8-degree cold and shoveling in knee-deep snow are among my least-favorite things.  To warm up, I've been baking up a storm and making lots of soups and stews.  This Three-Bean & Corn Chili from Flour bakery's second cookbook will be making lots of appearances over the next few months.  It's full of cannellini beans, black beans, chickpeas, corn, sweet potato, and carrots.  Pimenton, or smoked Spanish paprika, gives it an unexpected smokiness and depth.  And to mix it up, I used ancho chile powder when the recipe called for chili powder.

I didn't think Joe would like this, expecting his reaction to be along the lines of: "Where's the beef?"  But we loved it.  I'll be making beef chili at some point also, because we love our red meat.  But this bean chili is hearty without weighing you down, and has got loads of flavor.  It's also super-healthy and low in the calorie department, both good things as Thanksgiving and Christmas approach.  If you're vegetarian or vegan, this will be a welcome addition to your repertoire (minus the cheese if you're the latter, of course).  Stay warm, friends!

Sour Cream Pumpkin Tart

Dorie Greenspan's Pumpkin Pie/Tart has been my favorite for years, and I have to have it every fall.  Sometimes it graces our table on Thanksgiving.  I love it cold straight from the fridge, but my mom likes to warm her slice in the oven for a few minutes.  I think it's perfect -- creamy and mellow, the spices fragrant but not too sharp.  I brought one of these tarts in to work last weekend, and one co-worker called it "sublime."  Another said it was "really fockin' tasty."

If I have one complaint, it's that there's always too much filling unless you bake it in a deep-dish pie pan.  But because I like the fancy-schmancy look, I divided the filling between a round tart and a rectangular tart.  If you do this, you'll need to double the recipe for the dough, and you'll have dough left over.  Shape it into decorative leaves like I did here.  Or roll out the leftover dough, cut it into strips, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, and bake.  Whichever way you make the tart/pie, I think there should always be a dollop of freshly whipped cream.

If this doesn't satisfy your pumpkin fix, here's more:

Pumpkin Waffles with Maple Butter

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting

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Pumpkin Fritters with Rosemary and Cheese

Pumpkin Meringue Pie

Vanilla-Bean Pear & Apple Tart

I have a zillion apples to get through after apple picking.  There's something about fall that makes you bypass even the farmers markets and head for the orchards to pick your own.  Is it the gorgeous foliage views, the hay rides, the cider doughnuts?  When we first arrived, the aroma of cider doughnuts was intoxicating, and they tasted just as good as they smelled.  With doughnuts in our bellies, we picked more apples than we needed.  And I knew the purpose most of them were meant for: pies.  With that in mind, the bulk of our apples were Golden Delicious and Mutsu, which hold their shape well when baked.

The orchard; my niece, Audrey; and a cider doughnut.

I was looking for a new way to do apple pie -- I've done traditional double crust, tarts, turnovers, hand pies, and crostatas.  The recipe I chose involved simmering the apples with some Red Devoe pears in a bath of melted butter and vanilla bean, and they were baked into the pie topped with a walnut lattice crust.  Apple, pear, butter, and vanilla bean combined are truly heavenly, and the chunky pieces of fruit were juicy.  Except... the bottom crust was soggy and the recipe called for an unusual lattice that came with no instructions: the strips were wide with no spaces between them.  I've made several lattice pies before so I wrangled one, but it was fussy.  So I set about re-creating the recipe.

Enter this tart.  It's shallower than a pie and has a lot less fruit, so no soggy bottom crust.  No tricky lattice dough to contend with, and no walnuts to blend into it.  I kept the blend of pears and apples, sprinkling them with vanilla sugar and dotting the whole thing with cold butter.  Much easier and faster than the pie, which was a production.  I might cut the fruit thicker next time because I did miss the big, juicy chunks from the pie.  It also didn't have as much vanilla-butter sauciness as the pie, but tarts are generally drier like that.  Don't substitute that vanilla bean with extract!  Go ahead and splurge on a bean, because it makes a world of difference.  Now I've just got to work my way through about a bushel more of apples!

Chocolate-Filled Walnut Cookies

Wow.  I thought I'd like these cookies, but I didn't think they would be quite that good.  I've had these walnut cookie molds for four years now, and they sat wrapped in their plastic packaging until this week.  I don't know why it took me so long to try them out.  Of course it's not the molds that make the cookie great, but the recipe.  When filled with chocolate ganache, the flavor is reminiscent of a chocolate chip cookie with walnuts.  As good as that is, I prefer them unfilled because they actually taste close to pecan pie, with that deep brown sugar and nutty flavor.

Top-left: Shnooky with our current cat, Gandalf the Grey. Bottom-left: Shnooky (left) with his big brother, Baby.

Before I go further, I wanted to dedicate this post to my beloved cat Shnooky, whom we lost three weeks ago.  I've been feeling down and a little lost without him, and we'd been together for one-third of my life.  He was as kooky as his name, and he made me laugh a lot.  He was "little buddy" and "sweet pea" to me, and he loved sunbeams and charging squirrels and birds outside the window with his "battle cry."  I even miss him walking all over me, demanding to be fed, as I slept in the mornings.  We feel sad to have lost two cats in two years, but we try to remember them with smiles instead of tears.

Back to the less-sad subject of cookies.  Don't have walnut molds and don't want to buy them?  You don't need to.  After I filled all 50 molds, I used a cookie scoop to make 3 more mounds, and they baked up on the cookie sheet just fine.  I can't tell you about the experience of filling those with ganache, because we ate them first.  Take note, though, that you can't use those cookie scoops (even the "teaspoon-sized" ones) to fill the walnut molds; those will give you too much dough.  Use the teaspoon in your measuring spoon set.  I would have preferred the ease of a spring-loaded scoop.  I also thought I would include these in our Christmas cookie baskets this year, but they appear too fragile to hold up in the mail.  Still, they would make a lovely gift hand-delivered for the holidays.  Or just good for eating on any old afternoon.