I made this for christmas dinner this year instead of traditional pumpkin pie! We had a smaller dinner on christmas, and the larger italian seafood feast on christmas eve. I made tiramisu on christmas eve, and then it was all adults for christmas so I thought a more grown up version of the dessert would be good. It’s a really simple recipe and you can make it the day before, so it requires no day-of prep! (more…)

This weekend in Canada is Thanksgiving! Which means food, food and more food. And of course, Pie. It wouldn’t be thanksgiving without a pie for dessert. Even though you’re usually too full from all that food to even think about eating any more, but somehow everyone always manages to make room for dessert.

Traditionally Thanksgiving means pumpkin pie. But, nowadays pumpkin cheesecakes and other desserts are making their way into the spotlight as the holiday dessert. This year however, I wasn’t going to let pumpkin pie take the backseat to this new trend. My mom had gotten a pumpkin cheesecake for thanksgiving, but she knew I would be baking something else as well. I couldn’t not!I decided to bake two types of pies. Now usually we have a massive thanksgiving dinner, up to 30 people so three desserts would be acceptable, but this year there’s 12. And, it’s not three desserts, its four. I had planned on making a large pumpkin pie, and a pecan pie. But I noticed I only had two smaller pie dishes and one larger one and enough pie dough to make three crusts. So, why not make three pies?? Yup. Three. Two smaller pecan pies and a pumpkin pie, and then the non-homemade pumpkin cheesecake. It was necessary. So to all the Canadians Happy Thanksgiving! And make room for pie!

Good Old Fashioned Pumpkin Pie

Buttermilk Pie Crust (recipe from joy the baker)

• 2 sticks (8 ounces) cold unsalted butter
• 2 1/2 (12 ounces) cups all purpose flour
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (5 to 6 ounces) buttermilk

1.  Cut the butter into 1-inch pieces and place in the freezer to chill for 15 minutes.  Measure out the buttermilk and store in the refrigerator to keep it cold.

2.  Sift together the flour, sugar and salt in a large bowl.  Take the cold butter from the freezer and toss it with the flour mixture.

3.  Dump the cold butter cubes and flour mixture onto a large work area for rolling.  With a rolling pin, roll the mixture, flattening the butter cubes with the flour into long, thin, floured butter sheets.  Work quickly to ensure that the butter stays cold.  Below is what the rolled butter and flour look like after I’ve gathered them together on the work surface a bit.

4.  Place the flour and flattened butter back in the large bowl and chill for 10 minutes.    When the butter is cold, remove the bowl from the refrigerator, make a small well in the center of the flour and butter mixture.  Add the cold buttermilk to the bowl all at once.  Begin to bring the dough together with one hand ( keep the other hand free to answer the phone).  Moisten all of the flour with the milk, using your hand to break up large clumps of milk and flour.  The dough will be rather shaggy, but you can add another tablespoon of buttermilk, if you see that all your flour isn’t moistened.  Form the dough into two disks.  The disks will be rough, and hard to shape together, but once they rest in the fridge for an hour, they’ll be easier to roll out.

5.  Chill the dough for at least an hour in the refrigerator.  At this point, the dough will keep in the fridge for up to three days, or in the freezer for up to three weeks.  For freezing, roll the dough out into sheets and wrap them in plastic film.

Traditional Pumpkin Pie

- makes 6 to 8 servings -
Adapted from Baking: From My Home to Yours

Ingredients:

1 9-inch single pie crust, partially baked and cooled
2 cups (canned) unsweetened pumpkin puree
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup (packed) light brown sugar
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1/3 cup sour cream
Pumpkin Pie Spice – As much as you like depending on how spicy you like your pie!
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 450°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a silicone baking mat and put the pie plate on it.
2. Put all of the filling ingredients in mixer, stopping to scrape down the sides of the bowl once or twice. Alternatively, you can whisk the ingredients together vigorously in a mixing bowl. Rap either the work bowl or mixing bowl against the counter to burst any surface bubbles, and pour the filling into the crust.
3. Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce the oven temperature to 300°F and continue to bake for 35 to 45 minutes longer, or until a knife inserted close to the center comes out clean. (If you don’t want to create a slash in your masterpiece, tap the pan gently—if the custard doesn’t jiggle, or only jiggles a teensy bit in the very center, it’s done.) Transfer the pie to a rack and cool to room temperature.

Storing: Like most pies, this one is best served the day it is made. However, you can make the pie early in the day and keep it refrigerated until needed.

Happy Thanksgiving =)

With Halloween just around the corner I thought I’d make some Halloween sugar cookies! Last weekend I made the trip to my favorite baking supply store – Scoop&Save. I only go there once in a while because its pretty far away, about 40 mins to drive there. So i stocked on some decorations and cookie cutters, royal icing mix & piping tips etc. I wish I lived closer so I could go all the time.. although it’s probably best that I don’t! I found this recipe in Baking: From My House to Yours by Dorie Greenspan. I made my pumpkin tarts from it as well. I really like the recipes in there, and my favorite thing is all the pictures! I really hate cookbooks that don’t have pictures.. as many people know. haha. I always make sure when I get a cookbook that it has a good amount of pictures accompanying the recipes. I’m glad I got this book for my birthday! I thought about joining Tuesdays With Dorie but being a student/working it’s a little hard to commit to baking every other Tuesday. So I’ll just got through the book on my own and experiment! Ps. I went to see Celine Dion Tuesday night..soo good! Now all I have stuck in my head are her songs..Which means Im definitely listening to her while I bake. . .ohh Celine!

So here’s the recipe:

*Just to let you know, these take at least 2 hours to chill prior to baking..which I only found out once I had my oven pre-heating and got to the end of my mixing & finished reading the bottom of the page..Oh well! I just had to wait a little longer before eating baking and decorating!

Grandma’s All-Occasion Sugar Cookies

From Baking: From My House to Yours by Dorie Greenspan

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 stick plus 2 tablespoons (10 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Whisk the flour, salt and baking powder together.

Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter at medium speed for a minute or so, until smooth.

Beat in the sugar and continue to beat for about 2 minutes, until the mixture is light and pale. Add the egg and yolk and beat for another minute or two; beat in the vanilla.

Reduce the mixer speed to low and steadily add the flour mixture, mixing only until it has been incorporated — because this dough is best when worked least, you might want to stop the mixer before all the flour is
thoroughly blended into the dough and finish the job with a rubber spatula. When mixed, the dough will be soft, creamy and malleable.

Turn the dough out onto a counter and divide it in half. If you want to make roll-out cookies, shape each half into a disk and wrap in plastic. If you want to make slice-and-bake cookies, shape each half into a chubby sausage (the diameter is up to you — I usually like cookies that are about 2 inches in diameter) and wrap in plastic. Whether you’re going to roll or slice the dough, it must be chilled for at least 2 hours. (Well wrapped, the dough can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months.)

Getting Ready To Bake:

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.

If you are making roll-out cookies, working with one packet of dough at a time, roll out the dough between sheets of plastic wrap or wax paper to a thickness of 1/4 inch, lifting the plastic or paper and turning the dough over often so that it rolls evenly.

In case your wondering..that’s Jordan’s hairy arm..not mine! haha

Lift off the top sheet of plastic or paper and cut out the cookies — I like a 2-inch round cookie cutter for these. Pull away the excess dough, saving the scraps for rerolling, and carefully lift the rounds onto the baking sheets with a spatula, leaving about 1 1/2 inches between the cookies. (This is a soft dough and you might have trouble peeling away the excess or lifting the cutouts; if so, cover the dough, chill it for about 15 minutes and try again.) After you’ve rolled and cut the second packet of dough, you can form the scraps intoa disk, then chill, roll, cut and bake.

The First Few!

If you are making slice-and-bake cookies, use a sharp thin knife to slice the dough into 1/4-inch-thick rounds, and place the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving about 1 1/2 inches of space between the cookies. 6. Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 9 to 11 minutes, rotating the sheet at the midpoint. The cookies should feel firm, but they should not color much, if at all. Remove the pan from the oven and dust the cookies with sugar or cinnamon sugar, if you’d like. Let them rest for 1 minute before carefully lifting them onto a rack to cool to room temperature.

Repeat with the remaining dough, cooling the baking sheets between batches.

One of these things is not like the other…

Storing: The cookies will keep at room temperature in a tin for up to 1 week. Wrapped well, they can be frozen for up to 2 months.

Enjoy!

So here in Canada it was thanksgiving this weekend! Of course I was in charge of two things, decorating the table and baking. Last year I made this pecan pie, which I saw on Martha Stewart one day. I have actually never made a pumpkin pie and decided I wanted to this year! Well, I guess technically I still haven’t. I made a large pumpkin tart, and little pumpkin tartlets.

My aunt gave me a large tart pan for Christmas and I still haven’t christened it! So I decided it was time to tart it up!..or at least bake one. For my birthday my boss bought me a new cookbook, this book, Baking: From my Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan. So I decided to look through it for a potential thanksgiving recipe! I came across the recipe for a pumpkin pie/tart and gave it a try. It was sooo good. I made it a week or two ago for a dinner with my cousins, so I could test it out! It was de-lish. So I decided it would be a great thanksgiving dessert. You can make this as a pie, but if you use it for a large tart, you have enough filling left over for little tarts! which is what I did.

If you love pumpkin pie {like me!}, I would definitely try it as a tart!

Here’s the recipe from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan

Sour Cream Pumpkin Pie (or Tart)
(If you make this as a tart, you’ll have filling left over, which you can use to make mini-tartlets; bake the minis at 400 degrees F for 10 to 15 minutes.)

- makes 6 to 8 servings -
Adapted from Baking: From My Home to Yours

Ingredients:

1 9-inch single crust Pie Dough , partially baked and cooled, or one 9-inch tart shell , partially baked and cooled
2 cups (canned) unsweetened pumpkin puree
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup (packed) light brown sugar
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1/3 cup sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
Pinch of ground cloves
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
Pinch of salt
3 tablespoons dark rum <— I left this one out!**
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
Lightly sweetened lightly whipped cream, for topping

Directions:

Getting ready: Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 450°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a silicone baking mat and put the pie plate (or tart pan) on it.

Put all of the filling ingredients in a food processor and process for 2 minutes, stopping to scrape down the sides of the bowl once or twice. Alternatively, you can whisk the ingredients together vigorously in a mixing bowl. Rap either the work bowl or mixing bowl against the counter to burst any surface bubbles, and pour the filling into the crust.

Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce the oven temperature to 300°F and continue to bake for 35 to 45 minutes longer (20 to 25 minutes for a tart), or until a knife inserted close to the center comes out clean. (If you don’t want to create a slash in your masterpiece, tap the pan gently—if the custard doesn’t jiggle, or only jiggles a teensy bit in the very center, it’s done.) Transfer the pie (or tart) to a rack and cool to room temperature.

Serving: Pumpkin pie and whipped cream are naturals and, if you’ve tested the pie’s doneness with a knife, you might want to serve the whipped cream as a cover-up. I like this pie chilled, but others are fans of it at room temperature – decide for yourself.

Storing: Like most pies, this one is best served the day it is made. However, you can make the pie early in the day and keep it refrigerated until needed.