Testing for the holidays

Pie #3. Getting crazy, now I'm messing with the pastry. Where will it end.

Pastry:
1 1/4 cup pastry flour
½ teaspoon salt
⅓ cup + 2T shortening
1 ½ T dried orange zest
₁⁄₈ teaspoon orange-seasoned black pepper
3-4 T orange juice or liqueur

Whisk dry ingredients; cut in shortening with a pastry blender or knife until shortening is the size of peas. Add OJ a tablespoon at a time, blending with a fork until liquid is absorbed. Roll out into a disc about 1/8" thick, and lay in a pie plate. Fold and crimp crusts. Put in fridge to chill.




Filling:

1 ½ to 2 cups pumpkin or pumpkin+squash puree
3 large eggs +2 yolks
1 cup heavy cream
2 T liqueur or brandy (I used honey liqueur)
spices:
½ cup packed brown sugar
1 T finely chopped fresh sage
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
₁⁄₈ teaspoon ground cloves
₁⁄₈ nutmeg, grated
salt

Mix the spices together. Whisk together the wet ingredients then fold in the spices. Pour into the chilled pie shell and bake at 325 for at least 20 minutes or until it starts to set. Remove from oven and cool slightly. Do not turn the oven off. While it is baking, make:

Caramelized pears
2 medium Anjou (or other firm) pears
2 T butter
splash of liqueur
2 T sugar

Melt the butter in a medium skillet, then lay the pears in a single layer. Splash with liqueur and bring to a simmer; sprinkle with sugar. Reduce heat and simmer until sugar starts to carmelize. Gently turn pears so both sides have some caramelization. Allow to cool.

Take the cooled pie and very gently lay the pears in a nice pattern (or randomly, I don't care) on the surface. Return to the hot oven and finish baking, about 10 minutes.

How have I never made pumpkin scones!

Adapted recipe, from I don't even remember which scone I've made before. Made a double batch even though it was a test recipe. Fortunately they're delicious: texture just shy of crumbly, nice dense mouth feel. Glazed the second batch with maple syrup, for a little extra sweetness.

In the spirit of October Unprocessed, I grated and/or ground my own pumpkin pie spice-- nutmegs, cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, dried ginger, all processed in a simple coffee grinder. To clean between each grinding, run a couple tablespoons of white rice through it, then wipe with a dry rag. You needed to use that white rice for something anyway!)

I left all ingredients except the yogurt and butter out so they were room temp.

Definite winner.

Pumpkin maple scones

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour (for October unprocessed, use all unbleached wheat flour)
1 cup unbleached wheat or whole wheat flour
½ cup oats
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2 T maple sugar*
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (mix your own, lots of recipes on the web)
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits (or grate frozen butter. Make sure the grater is also frozen)
¾ cup raisins, plumped

1/4 cup maple syrup
1 large egg
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1/3 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

* Yes, I know that maple sugar is $16 a pound and hard to find. If you don't have any, or want to spend the money, substitute 1 T dark corn syrup, and cut back the maple syrup by that amount. You can get maple sugar from The Spice House.

Preheat oven to 400F (375 if you have a baking stone in your oven) and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position. Beat together the liquid ingredients and set aside.
Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the plumped raisins into the flour mixture. (If you don't plump them, they'll dry out when baking. To plump raisins, just cover them with water in a small glass mixing bowl and microwave on high for 3 minutes. Drain.) Add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Dough will be sticky and slightly elastic.
Roll dough out until it's about 1/2 thick, then cut into wedges. Dough rolled out to about 10" disc. Place onto a parchment-covered baking sheet about 1 inch apart on and bake for 17 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

Happy Fourth of July

Sconeday lands on the holiday this week, with special red-white-and-blue scones. I'm having a great holiday weekend-- the Peterson Garden Re-dedication yesterday was a fantastic party with kids and dogs (and chickens) in costume (you heard me). We had garden tours, singalongs, family, friends and great food.

I'm sitting here waiting for my good friend and her rabbit-scaring dog. They drop by periodically to convince my resident evil furface that my perennial bed is NOT a good place to set up housekeeping (or for forays into the bean patch, where said furface has decimated the crop).

Later today I'm marching in the Evanston Fourth of July Parade with our skating camp, and tomorrow Peterson Garden powwow with these fantastic scones:


Red-White-and-Blue scones
Recipe: Cooks Illustrated scones recipe (gonna make you sign up for the site)

After rolling out the scones in about a 12" square, lay blueberries on one-third, then raspberries or cut-up strawberries and the next third, finally, break up a frozen white chocolate bar or use white chocolate chips (mine was a Divine Chocolates white chocolate with strawberries from Ten Thousand Villages) and lay that on the final third.

Continue recipe as directed.