Obviously, I am a pie lover.  I love pie for dessert, but I also think it’s pretty much the best breakfast food in the world.  With every season, I look forward to baking a different fruit pie with my farmer’s market bounty.  At the height of summer, when stone fruit is abundant and sweet as candy, I just can’t get enough, eating it with my yogurt in the morning, as a simple snack, on salads, in smoothies, and baked into cobblers. 

On those summer days when turning on the oven seems deranged (and making a pie crust equally masochistic), the less time spent in the kitchen the better.  Though I eschew store-bought pastry dough, Phyllo is something I un-apologetically get from the freezer section.  These turnovers still need to be baked, but with some care towards the handling of the phyllo they still yield a very satisfying “pie” without the demands of a traditional pastry crust. 

Light and crispy, they are delicious for dessert, breakfast, or both.  They do keep for a few days, but are best the first day when the phyllo is crispy.  To re-crisp on the second or third day, return to a 350 oven for 3-5 minutes.

Stone Fruit Phyllo Pies

6 medium nectarines (or peaches, apricots, etc), firm-ripe
3/4 to 1 c sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp cinnamon
1 c sliced almonds
packaged phyllo, thawed overnight in the fridge
1/4 c (4 tbsp/ half a stick) butter, melted and cooled to room temp

- pastry brush
- cling wrap
- one large or two standard cookie sheets lined with parchment

Preheat oven to 375

Cut nectarines in half and remove pits, then slice 1/4 inch thick.  In a large bowl, toss nectarine slices with sugar (less if fruit is very sweet, more if tart), lemon juice, and cinnamon until coated.  Add sliced almonds and stir to combine. 

Place two strips of cling wrap (side by side) on a work surface, then carefully unwrap phyllo, unrolling onto cling wrap.  Cut the stack of phyllo in half length-wise with a large, sharp knife.  Immediately and completely cover phyllo with more cling wrap, then with a dampened kitchen towel or paper towel. 

(Phyllo dries out very quickly, becoming brittle and impossible to work with; covering it with both cling wrap and a damp towel is the best method I’ve found for keeping it pliable for long enough to work with.) 

Remove two to four strips of phyllo and then re-cover the stack.  Place a dollop of nectarines at the close edge of the strip.  Brush the strip of phyllo lightly with the melted butter.  If using four sheets, brush two, then top with two more, then fruit.

Fold the bottom right corner across and over the fruit, then continue folding in a triangular shape, like a flag. 

At the top, brush the folded pastry with butter and fold edges over.  Sprinkle with sugar and transfer to baking sheet.  Repeat with remaining fruit and pastry.

Bake pastry for 20 - 30 minutes, or until phyllo is lightly golden and crispy.  Transfer to cooling rack and enjoy warm or room temperature.

One of my favorite aspects of cooking is making foods that are ordinarily store-bought.  Most people have probably baked cookies or simmered up some marinara, but how many people make their own bread, jams, or condiments?  Accustomed to buying certain prepared items, we tend to forget they can be made from scratch, although lately I’m seeing a resurgence in doing just that.  Controlling the quality of ingredients, avoiding unnecessary packaging, and a desire to eat “real” food the way it “used to be” made set me on the road to my first batches of pickles this summer.

I have always been a pickle lover, but I have recently swooned over pickle plates at Momofuku Ssäm Bar in New York and Umami Burger here in Los Angeles that offered some pretty outlandish pickles: watermelon rind, heart of palm, carrot, apple, cauliflower, shitake, okra…a bounty of exotic and heirloom veggies brined in a variety of salty, sweet, and spicy combinations.  A far cry from the sad chartreuse spears I nonetheless enjoyed as a child, these pickles were art.  

My head reeling with the limitless pickle possibilities, my first effort was the pickled watermelon rind from the Momofuku cookbook.

I’ll humbly admit this was a near-failure.  I decided to make a double batch since a single batch only called for half a watermelon rind and, well, I had a whole watermelon, so why waste?  I’m not sure what my downfall was, but there were a few issues.  First, maybe I left too much of the pink flesh on.  When the pickles were cooked, it was kind of mushy.  Also, where the recipe indicated to add the fruit to the boiling pickling liquid and then boil for a minute, I wondered, do I let the mixture return to a boil and then time the minute?  I did, but maybe that was a mistake as it took several minutes to return to a boil after adding the cold fruit.  Overall, I thought they came out a little too sweet, and something, maybe the star anise, lent them a funky flavor.  I pawned them off on as many unsuspecting friends as possible, but they were pretty and I love the idea so I might try another more traditional “American South” recipe.

Undaunted, I forged ahead with a basic pickled beets recipe from epicurious.com using Chioggia beets, an heirloom Italian variety, instead of the dark purplish ones.  Bright red on the outside with concentric white circles inside, these lovelies yielded a pickled beet that was milder tasting and a very pretty bright pink.  These, too, were a bit on the sweet side, but definitely still tasty, unlike the watermelon rind (which I still have if anyone wants it).

After making the beets, I threw some raw purslane into the leftover pickle juice, inspired by some friends who’d bought pickled purslane (who knew you could pickle that?) at a roadside farm somewhere up the PCH.  It worked OK, but the spicier stuff my friends had gotten was much tastier, and I have to concede I don’t know the first thing about pickling purslane.  Really, I don’t know a lot about purslane at all, so let’s move on.

With one moderate success and one embarrassing failure, I thought I’d try some straight-up “Real Kosher Dills” according to Mark Bittman’s ever-useful tome How to Cook Everything.  What makes these the real deal is that they are cured with kosher salt rather than vinegar; the ingredient list is simple: water, salt, fresh dill, garlic, and Kirby cucumbers.  I also added some coriander seeds, mostly because I like the way they look floating in the jar among the spears.  Delicious and super easy, the only cooking involved was boiling water.  Packed in the Ball canning jars (which I finally tracked down at Target of all places), their classic aesthetic is charming, isn’t it?  And they really taste like a dill pickle— salty, crunchy, a nice garlic bite.  If anything they might be just a bit too salty, but that’s probably a matter of taste.  In any case, I saved the leftover pickle juice which I’m considering diluting a little and using to cure some more Kirbies, perhaps (thought this might be sacrilege) adding a handful of black peppercorns or a few dried chilies to spice things up.

Now that I can create my very own “pickle plate” at home, I feel like the possibilities are endless.  I don’t really care whether it’s an overlooked culinary treatment or a a retro-cooking fad, pickling made me want to plant a victory garden and make more of my own eclectic condiments.  Maybe ketchup is next?

I have been wanting to make Hand Pies since November when I competed in KCRW’s first Good Food Pie Contest.  Waiting in the entry line with my Caramel Pumpkin, I admired one woman’s lovely blueberry hand pies which later that day won Second Prize in the “fruit pie” category. 

A road trip up to Santa Cruz for Memorial Day weekend seemed like a perfect excuse to try out this idea, and some fragrant farmer’s market strawberries and slender pink-and-green rhubarb stalks sealed the deal. 

Excited by my plan for the most perfect picnic pies ever, I started on a crust from my go-to resource for baking, Betty Crocker’s Picture Cookbook (1950).  Now, I’m one of those people who believes a pie crust to be almost sacred.  I wrote recently about my dad making yeast dough, but my mom is the one who fancies herself a pastry chef.  And by that I mean she makes one pie a year, and it has to be perfect.  Eventually there came a time when my brother and I realized that, for our own safety, we ought to leave the house when that annual crust was being made. 

I don’t know how anyone can expect to do something once a year and have it be perfect.  The whole “easy as pie” concept, I’m convinced, only becomes a reality when you make a lot of pies.  Before the pie contest I tried to do some research online about pie crusts and was overwhelmed by a gazillion different theories, from people who make their pie crusts with vodka or vinegar instead of water, to the food-processor school, to those who swear by lard. Gross.  I decided to stick with the tried and true method.  For one thing, I’m one of those butter people (for baking anyway), and was before the whole trans-fats mania.  It just tastes better.  And I don’t even want to know how long that Crisco has been sitting on my mom’s shelf. 

One great technique I learned from the Betty Crocker cookbook: CUT THE BUTTER INTO THE FLOUR IN TWO STAGES. Betty says to cut half the butter in until you achieve a texture like coarse meal; this, she writes, makes for tenderness.  Then, cut in the rest to achieve that famous “small pea stage,” which makes the crust flaky (the butter melts leaving tiny air pockets).  Tenderness and flakiness— you gotta have both!

Once the soon-to-be flaky dough is all pressed into two beautifully swirled, striated discs, they need to chill.  Chilling the dough relaxes the gluten, making the dough easier to roll out.  (One other note: if the dough cracks while I am rolling it, I just gently mush it back together and re-roll.  No need to hurl it at the wall and start over, in tears, like my mom did.) 

I usually let the dough chill overnight, then allow it to come to room temperature a bit while the oven is heating and I prepare my filling.  In this case, I sliced the rhubarb and strawberries a little smaller than I would for a regular size pie.

filling

2 cups rhubarb chunks
2 cups halved or sliced strawberries (this ratio is variable, with the goal being 4 cups of fruit)
1 cup sugar (also variable depending on ratio of fruit as well as sweetness of berries )
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
small sprinkling of freshly grated nutmeg

After I rolled the dough out, I decided to use a 3” biscuit cutter to make little round pies (like the woman at the pie contest did, though hers were bigger).  One batch of crust would thus yield a dozen pies, I reasoned, enough that we could each have 3, not including the ones I would make from the scraps and eat hot out of the oven, a.k.a. “poison testers.” 

After arranging half of the little dough circles on a baking sheet, I topped each with a dollop of fruit, then covered them with the other twelve dough circles. 

Rolling out the top circles a tiny bit more after cutting made them large enough to blanket the little mounds of fruit.  I then pressed around the edges with my fingers to seal, followed by a go ‘round with the tines of a fork.  I cut tiny holes to let the steam escape, then brushed each with milk and sprinkled with sugar, like my grandmother always used to do, to give them a nice golden glaze. 

I baked them at 425 degrees, and of course I forgot to make note of how long for, but I think I started at 30 min and just kept checking until they were golden and the juices inside were bubbling.

In retrospect, perhaps the biscuit cutter idea was a mistake.  For one, they were so small as to have me cursing over the filling and sealing process.  For another, I had at least half my filling left over.  Well, live and learn.  They were not a bad size for eating (about cookie size), and now I have instant pie filling in my freezer.  Additionally, it seems my sealing methods were inadequate, because they leaked juice all over the place during baking. 

No matter, they were a tasty snack/dessert/breakfast for our adventure, and next time I will make two batches of dough, cut the circles bigger, and seal them more tightly.  Here’s my husband holding “the pretty one” for a photo in Santa Cruz:

Today I am finishing my second 2010 batch of kumquat marmalade.  I am lucky to have a friend with a tree, but last year when I tried to make the jam for the first time I couldn’t find a recipe I really liked, so I’ve synthesized a few, done some testing, and here’s my own.  I guess it’s technically more of a jam since I use the whole fruit instead of just juice and peel, but whatever.  I think it’s damn tasty.

kumquat marmalade

5 cups sliced (or processed) fruit
4 cups water (filtered or spring)
3 cups honey (TJs 24 oz squeeze bottle works great)

Slice fruit as thinly as possible without cutting your finger off (I’m not kidding—these things can get pretty slippery and I lost a chunk once), reserving the seeds.  Any big pieces you can put in a food processor and pulse.  I know this is not as elegant, but it’s better than a missing digit.

Gather the seeds up in a piece of cheesecloth, tie with kitchen string, and put with the fruit and water in a big, non-reactive pot.  Cover and let sit for 24 hours (approximately).

Bring the fruit, water, and seeds to a boil (uncovered) over moderate heat, then reduce to simmer and cook 45 minutes.  Measure to see how much it’s reduced— you are aiming for 4 cups.  If it’s over, cook it a bit longer (I had to cook it about an hour last time).

Add the honey, then turn heat up to medium and bring to a boil.  Put a few small plates in the freezer for testing.  Boil, stirring, and begin testing at around 10 minutes by dropping a small teaspoonful onto a chilled plate.  Return plate to fridge for a minute, then turn plate— if it runs/ drips, it’s not ready.  If it mostly stays put and wrinkles a little when pushed with a finger or spoon, it’s ready.  This stage could take anywhere from 10 - 30 minutes or more, so stir and check frequently and use your best textural judgment— it won’t set too much more than this when it’s processed and/or cooled, so think about the consistency of it on your toast.

When done, remove from heat, remove seed bag, and ladle jam into sterilized jars.  You can either process the jars or freeze them.  I am not an expert, so I won’t give processing instructions here but there are plenty of resources for that.  If you are unsure, just freeze them anyway— that’s the safest bet and what I always do.

enjoy!

(cutting board: target/ pot: le creuset/ prep dish and lemon towel: crate & barrel/ whale towel: enormous champion, brooklyn/ canning jar: weck)