So I've been doing all these crazy things with fruit curds, right? And I made one that reminded me vaguely of blueberry, right? Well I decided to see how blueberry would work out in this recipe.
I tried puréeing blueberries to strain the mush for some juice. No dice. It turned out way too thick.
So I just used the purée. Pow.
Half a cup plus about a tablespoon to replace the lemon juice and zest in the Lemon Meringue Pie makes a Blueberry Meringue Pie.
If there should be a winner of the Fruit Curd and Meringue Experiments, this is the one. Shit it's tasty.
Showing posts with label Fruit Curd And Meringue Experiments. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fruit Curd And Meringue Experiments. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
The last (for now) experiment
This one is pomegranate.
They're a little trickier to juice, but here's what I did. Slice the top and bottom or the pomegranate, and score the sides top to bottom four to six times around. Submerging in a bowl of cold water, break it apart by planting your thumbs next to each other on one end, fingertips on the other, pulling apart with your fingers. Then gently remove each juicy little pod by rocking it out of the pithy stuff. The good stuff will sink while the waxy stuff that tastes like an empty coffee cup floats, so once you've removed all of the seeds just get rid of all the stuff that floats. Drain off the water and put the seed pods into a blender or food processor. 30 seconds should be plenty. Then strain it out to get rid of the seed bits, leaving just the juice. Take a half-cup of this juice (I used three pomegranates but had some left over, so two might have done the trick) to your fruit curd recipe, and voilà!
This one was also a little odd, but delicious. It tasted not entirely unlike pomegranates, but also tasted slightly like blueberries. The purple-ish color that the fruit curd turned out was also reminiscent of blueberries, so you could prolly fool your friends into thinking it was a Blueberry Meringue Pie. Makes me want to try that too, so maybe next week I'll get a whole load of blueberries at the farmer's market.
They're a little trickier to juice, but here's what I did. Slice the top and bottom or the pomegranate, and score the sides top to bottom four to six times around. Submerging in a bowl of cold water, break it apart by planting your thumbs next to each other on one end, fingertips on the other, pulling apart with your fingers. Then gently remove each juicy little pod by rocking it out of the pithy stuff. The good stuff will sink while the waxy stuff that tastes like an empty coffee cup floats, so once you've removed all of the seeds just get rid of all the stuff that floats. Drain off the water and put the seed pods into a blender or food processor. 30 seconds should be plenty. Then strain it out to get rid of the seed bits, leaving just the juice. Take a half-cup of this juice (I used three pomegranates but had some left over, so two might have done the trick) to your fruit curd recipe, and voilà!
This one was also a little odd, but delicious. It tasted not entirely unlike pomegranates, but also tasted slightly like blueberries. The purple-ish color that the fruit curd turned out was also reminiscent of blueberries, so you could prolly fool your friends into thinking it was a Blueberry Meringue Pie. Makes me want to try that too, so maybe next week I'll get a whole load of blueberries at the farmer's market.
Monday, July 25, 2011
Citrus again
More along the same lines: Grapefruit this time, for Wednesday, July 20th.
So if you've figured out the way this works, you'll know that it's basically just a half-cup of grapefruit juice and a tablespoon of grapefruit zest to change this recipe.
Unlike the strangeness of the watermelon, this one definitely tasted just like grapefruit. I think it worked really well. Folks at Ian's who tried it agreed on the whole.
I don't know what else to say. Try it!
So if you've figured out the way this works, you'll know that it's basically just a half-cup of grapefruit juice and a tablespoon of grapefruit zest to change this recipe.
Unlike the strangeness of the watermelon, this one definitely tasted just like grapefruit. I think it worked really well. Folks at Ian's who tried it agreed on the whole.
I don't know what else to say. Try it!
I took a break.
From Saturday the 9th to the following Saturday, no pies were baked. I had to deal with some insanity regarding my rent (which I think I mentioned earlier, as I was writing a post during this time), and there was already too much pie in the house, so I was just catching up on eating.
BUT THEN
Pies returned. Monday the 18th was another in the series of fruit curd and meringue experiments. This time: Watermelon.
Now, I know watermelon isn't a very traditional juice or pie or anything even close. But bear with me here. It's all exactly the same as the lemon and clementine varieties, except you use a half-cup of fresh-squeezed watermelon juice. Just cut out the watery flesh of a watermelon, and squish it. Strain out the seeds and pulp, and you're ready to go.
I have to say, the flavor was strange. Not strange as in non-delicious, just not what I expected from watermelon juice. I had a bunch of extra juice and drank it during my shift at work, and it shared the weirdness. I brought the pie in to work as well, and they enjoyed it. It certainly was tasty.
BUT THEN
Pies returned. Monday the 18th was another in the series of fruit curd and meringue experiments. This time: Watermelon.
Now, I know watermelon isn't a very traditional juice or pie or anything even close. But bear with me here. It's all exactly the same as the lemon and clementine varieties, except you use a half-cup of fresh-squeezed watermelon juice. Just cut out the watery flesh of a watermelon, and squish it. Strain out the seeds and pulp, and you're ready to go.
I have to say, the flavor was strange. Not strange as in non-delicious, just not what I expected from watermelon juice. I had a bunch of extra juice and drank it during my shift at work, and it shared the weirdness. I brought the pie in to work as well, and they enjoyed it. It certainly was tasty.
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Citrus is easy
So the next entry in The Fruit CAME: Clementine.
Since these are all basically the same recipe, the post for each will really only be what I changed, as well as some reactions to the pies.
To turn the Lemon Meringue into Clementine Meringue, I substituted some clementine juice for the lemon juice and orange zest for the lemon zest. Clementines are significantly more difficult to squeeze. After two or three I devised a way to squish each half of a clementine against the flat of my widest knife that worked pretty well. Clementine zest, on the other hand, is pretty much impossible to come by. Instead, I went with an orange. That worked out well.
In my opinion, this pie was a little too sweet. The tartness of the lemon curd is just about my favorite thing ever. But don't write it off based only on my opinion; Marty at Ian's says this is his favorite pie out of all those I've brought in. Everyone who tried it liked it. It was definitely worth the experiment.
Since these are all basically the same recipe, the post for each will really only be what I changed, as well as some reactions to the pies.
To turn the Lemon Meringue into Clementine Meringue, I substituted some clementine juice for the lemon juice and orange zest for the lemon zest. Clementines are significantly more difficult to squeeze. After two or three I devised a way to squish each half of a clementine against the flat of my widest knife that worked pretty well. Clementine zest, on the other hand, is pretty much impossible to come by. Instead, I went with an orange. That worked out well.
In my opinion, this pie was a little too sweet. The tartness of the lemon curd is just about my favorite thing ever. But don't write it off based only on my opinion; Marty at Ian's says this is his favorite pie out of all those I've brought in. Everyone who tried it liked it. It was definitely worth the experiment.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Lemon Meringue (and ensuing madness)
You'll notice there was not a Quiche Saturday in there. I'm sort of at a loss for quiche inspiration, so they'll be on hiatus until we get a new round of interesting veggies I can play with.
So I skipped forward to Monday, July 4th. (Technically, the fourth is when I baked the berries-that-are-not-all-berries pie, and the Lemon Meringue was the following day. Pies have all been off schedule for a while, but they've all been accounted for (except quiches)). I realized that even though I had baked this pie last year, it was after the blog side of things had fallen into disrepair. So I decided to revisit it.
Not only that, but I decided to play around with this one in the next series of pies. I wish I had a snappy name for it. How about 'the Fruit Curd and Meringue Experiments.' The Fruit CAME for short.
Anyway, Lemon Meringue is the first because it is the recipe that all those to follow are based on.
This starts out with the standard pie crust; in fact, this recipe is the rest of the Good Eats episode from which my pie crust method comes, I Pie.
Bake the pie crust blind at 425F for ten minutes with your pie weights and ten or so more without.
Beat your meringue up while it's baking. Beat 4 egg whites (the yolks are in the lemon curd part, so keep them around) with a pinch of cream of tartar. After they get to stiff peaks, slowly add 8 tablespoons (1/2 cup) of sugar. (I say eight tablespoons because it's easier for me to add that in bit by bit. If you had a stand mixer you could just slowly pour in a half cup as it's running, but I have to set down my hand mixer to add the sugar so I go by the tablespoon.) After it's all been added, beat for a few more minutes, until you can rub a small amount of meringue between your fingers and there's no grit from the sugar. Cover and stash in the fridge until everything else is ready.
4 egg yolks
1 1/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup water
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup lemon juice (fresh squeezed is where it's at)
1 tablespoon lemon zest
3 tablespoons butter
A helpful instrument for this recipe would be an egg timer or stopwatch. Three times while cooking the curd, you'll be letting it boil for a full minute, so any implement that you can use to time out sixty seconds will make this quite a bit easier.
Beat the egg yolks in a mixing bowl until they lighten slightly in color. Combine the sugar, water, salt, and cornstarch in a saucepan over medium heat and whisk to combine. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently, then continue to cook for sixty seconds while stirring.
Remove from heat and temper the egg yolks by adding a whisk-full at a time of the hot mixture to the eggs, beating together and working quickly. After quite a few whisk-sized transfers (shoot for about a third of the hot stuff) return the saucepan to the heat and add the tempered eggs to it. Bring to a boil again, then cook for sixty seconds for a second time.
Turn the heat down to low and add the lemon juice, zest, and butter. Stir slowly until fully combined then return to a boil. Cook for a third sixty seconds after it's boiling. Then pour the curd into the pie crust.
Beat up the meringue one more time, for about thirty seconds. Top the curd with the meringue and let cool for at least two hours. Overnight is prolly best.
I LOVE this pie. Like whoa. Strong contrasts in both flavor and texture make the pie experience great. Crispy crust, creamy filling, fluffy meringue paired with the sweet-tart flavor combo: YUM.
So I skipped forward to Monday, July 4th. (Technically, the fourth is when I baked the berries-that-are-not-all-berries pie, and the Lemon Meringue was the following day. Pies have all been off schedule for a while, but they've all been accounted for (except quiches)). I realized that even though I had baked this pie last year, it was after the blog side of things had fallen into disrepair. So I decided to revisit it.
Not only that, but I decided to play around with this one in the next series of pies. I wish I had a snappy name for it. How about 'the Fruit Curd and Meringue Experiments.' The Fruit CAME for short.
Anyway, Lemon Meringue is the first because it is the recipe that all those to follow are based on.
This starts out with the standard pie crust; in fact, this recipe is the rest of the Good Eats episode from which my pie crust method comes, I Pie.
Bake the pie crust blind at 425F for ten minutes with your pie weights and ten or so more without.
Beat your meringue up while it's baking. Beat 4 egg whites (the yolks are in the lemon curd part, so keep them around) with a pinch of cream of tartar. After they get to stiff peaks, slowly add 8 tablespoons (1/2 cup) of sugar. (I say eight tablespoons because it's easier for me to add that in bit by bit. If you had a stand mixer you could just slowly pour in a half cup as it's running, but I have to set down my hand mixer to add the sugar so I go by the tablespoon.) After it's all been added, beat for a few more minutes, until you can rub a small amount of meringue between your fingers and there's no grit from the sugar. Cover and stash in the fridge until everything else is ready.
4 egg yolks
1 1/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup water
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup lemon juice (fresh squeezed is where it's at)
1 tablespoon lemon zest
3 tablespoons butter
A helpful instrument for this recipe would be an egg timer or stopwatch. Three times while cooking the curd, you'll be letting it boil for a full minute, so any implement that you can use to time out sixty seconds will make this quite a bit easier.
Beat the egg yolks in a mixing bowl until they lighten slightly in color. Combine the sugar, water, salt, and cornstarch in a saucepan over medium heat and whisk to combine. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently, then continue to cook for sixty seconds while stirring.
Remove from heat and temper the egg yolks by adding a whisk-full at a time of the hot mixture to the eggs, beating together and working quickly. After quite a few whisk-sized transfers (shoot for about a third of the hot stuff) return the saucepan to the heat and add the tempered eggs to it. Bring to a boil again, then cook for sixty seconds for a second time.
Turn the heat down to low and add the lemon juice, zest, and butter. Stir slowly until fully combined then return to a boil. Cook for a third sixty seconds after it's boiling. Then pour the curd into the pie crust.
Beat up the meringue one more time, for about thirty seconds. Top the curd with the meringue and let cool for at least two hours. Overnight is prolly best.
I LOVE this pie. Like whoa. Strong contrasts in both flavor and texture make the pie experience great. Crispy crust, creamy filling, fluffy meringue paired with the sweet-tart flavor combo: YUM.
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