But here, I stalk the market every Saturday in May hoping that this is the week when those photogenic strawberries will finally make their annual debut.

The trouble is, I have very little self-control when I secure, at last, these scarlet gems. The bulk discounts for buying more than one quart literally always get me, and I arrive at home suddenly doubting that I’ll be able to use up multiple quarts of berries before they wither and rot in my fridge.

This time, I was ready.

As you may have noticed, I tend to prefer using strawberries as whole as possible in my baked goods, which usually means they are freshly sliced and added to a cake with a smear of whipped cream. This cake still starts with berries that haven’t been pureed or cooked down, but after nearly an hour in the oven, they transform into dollops of jam and nestle into the cake beneath in the most delightful way.

I suspect, though I have not yet tested it, that this cake could be made with any number of berries. Perhaps even other baking fruits, like peaches or plums, would make delectable toppings. I’ll wager that as the summer wears on and the fruits appear in more abundance, I’ll be giving them a try. I won’t need much provocation to try this cake again.

I call this cake an anytime cake because it can just as easily be served for breakfast as it can for dessert. It would make a lovely brunch contribution but would also hold its own as the sweet finish of a decadent evening dinner party.

So as summer continues and the strawberries get even sweeter, please add this to your list of ways to use them up. It’s lovely just as it is out of the pan, but it really transcends to a higher level with a dollop of lightly sweetened whipped cream and a sprinkle of powdered sugar.

Welcome, summer!

Strawberry Anytime Cake
Adapted slightly from Smitten Kitchen

about 1 pound of strawberries, hulled and halved (you may have a few leftovers if you’re using a 9″ pan)
6 T unsalted butter at room temperature
7/8 c granulated sugar + 2 T granulated sugar (for sprinkling right before baking)
1/2 c whole milk
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp table salt

powdered sugar for sprinkling
1/2 c heavy cream, cold
2 tsp granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease a 9″ springform pan or deep dish pie plate. You can also use a 10″ pan for a thinner cake with more strawberries across the top. Wash, hull, and halve the strawberries and set aside.

In the bowl of a standing mixer or in another large mixing bowl, beat butter and 7/8 c sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in the whole milk, egg, vanilla just until combined. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture gradually just until smooth.

Spread the batter evenly in the pan and place the strawberries on the top, cut-side down, as close together as possible. There may be some overlapping. Sprinkle the remaining 2T of sugar evenly across the top of the berries.

Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 325°F. Bake for another 55-60 minutes or until a toothpick comes out without any wet batter. If the top of the cake is not yet brown, change to the broiler for just a minute or two to allow the cake to brown a bit.

Let the cake cool for 10-15 minutes in the pan, then remove the ring of the springform pan and place the cake on a cutting board or serving plate. Beat the heavy cream in a standing mixer or other mixing bowl until soft peaks form. Add the 2 teaspoons of sugar and beat until stiff peaks form.

Just before serving, sprinkle cake with powdered sugar. Cut into wedges and serve with whipped cream.

I’m so happy to say that. You may have thought that I had given up the goat, abandoned this little blog and buried it in the snow of this long, deep winter. But the truth is I just, quite simply, haven’t had the time or creative energy to handle it these last couple of months. Between the final events push of the fall semester at Duke, co-hosting a holiday party, moving out of my sublet, traveling for the holidays, camping on a friend’s couch for two weeks, saying goodbye to Durham, moving to Columbus, unpacking, organizing, starting a new job, visiting old friends, re-organizing, visiting more friends, and enjoying the company of Brad again, my camera has sat dormant for just over two months.

This move was a toughie. I started my new job almost immediately  upon my arrival in Columbus, and the cold weather provided me with little incentive to do much more than curl up in blankets when I got home each night. It’s taken several weeks to get used to my new kitchen. I’ve spent several evenings lamenting the fate of meals I nearly burned to death as I try to get used to cooking on a glass-top stove. I keep reaching for things where they used to be in my old kitchen. The pantry, still, is a total nightmare, as I have yet to find several hours to sit down and really consider where everything should go (doesn’t everyone do that?)

But finally, the time came this weekend for me to break out a recipe I’ve wanted to share with you since I started this blog. I must say, glass stove and messy pantry aside, I can’t deny that my current kitchen is far more equipped for blogging than my last, primarily due to one giant feature.

Light, glorious light! Flooding in to every corner of our apartment, these gaping sunny windows line the southern and western walls of our new home. They overlook a park and a river and trees and some sort of weird oyster-and-pearl sculpture. Admittedly, also a freeway, but I confess it is somewhat fascinating to watch the sludge of evening traffic heading north after Brad and I have already arrived home.

The point, here, is that not only did I shoot one recipe this weekend, I shot three! Complete with the natural, angular light that I love to shoot in. No more toting cutting boards topped with carefully balanced ingredients to the office!

Let’s get started, shall we Three years ago, about two weeks BEFORE I decided to start a food blog, I made these compact cheesecake bars to celebrate Valentine’s Day. Thinner than normal cheesecake, they can easily be eaten without a fork and can be made in any shape you so desire.

Like most decent cheesecakes, this one starts off with a pile of graham crackers. Now yes, I know you can buy graham cracker crumbs, but I always feel like they taste stale and are far to fine-grain for my liking, so I prefer to buy graham crackers whole and then grind them up to my liking in a food processor. You can also put them in a zippered bag and snack them repeatedly with a meat tenderizer or rolling pin, which may not give you as even a consistency, but is certainly more fun.

Combined with butter and a bit of sugar, the crumbs are pressed into the bottom of a spring form pan. Don’t have one You could also use a pie plate, so the side will be sloped and you won’t have quite the same effect. I picked up a set of three spring form pans for less than $15 I think, so if cheesecake is your thing, I recommend the investment.

Next! While the crust hardens up a bit in the oven, the luscious cheesecake itself can commence. The ingredients themselves are fairly simple: cream cheese (obviously), eggs, sugar and four, lemon juice and vanilla. And sour cream, which in my opinion is the most important element of making this cheesecake tangy and tart.

Though this is delicious enough to eat immediately (raw eggs or not) it needs almost an hour in the oven. After which you’ll be glad you cooked it!

While the cheesecake cools to room temperature, you can cook the berry topping. Now honestly, I tend to prefer cheesecake plain in most instances, but I really love the way these bars taste and look with a ruby red layer of fruit atop the creamy filling. Three layers are so pretty!

Our mission with these berries is to create a quick jam. And that is exactly what it sounds like. Berries + a bit of sugar + heat + time = jam. With such a small quantity, it doesn’t take more than about 10 minutes to get a berry topping that will hold its shape on the cheesecakes.

Once the cheesecake and the jam have cooled to room temperature, it’s time to make bars! For this particular set, I used a heart-shaped cookie cutter, but you could also just as easily slice them into narrow wedges, squares, rectangles, whatever shape you like. Using a cookie cutter requires a bit more time as you have to carefully ease the cheesecake out of said cookie cutter. I also rinsed mine after every cut to make the cuts smoother.

Once the cheesecakes are cut, it’s topping time! Again, this takes a little finesse so that your topping doesn’t become siding, but it’s nothing a small cake knife can’t handle.

I love raspberries above all other fruit toppings, but you could easily swap them out for strawberries, blueberries, or blackberries. Or further still! You could top these with chocolate, caramel, whipped cream… if you can imagine it tasting good on a cheesecake, you can use it.

And the best part Once your showy little hearts are ready to go, you still have allllll theeeeese leftovers.

I’ll give you one guess as to what happened with those.

So Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! Let’s eat cheesecake together to celebrate!

Raspberry Cheesecake Bars
Adapted generously from The Pampered Chef

Makes one 10″ cheesecake, which can be sliced or cookie-cuttered into about twelve bars

For the Crust
1 c graham cracker crumbs (one package from a box of graham crackers)
4 T unsalted butter
1 T white sugar

Preheat oven to 300°F. Crush or grind the graham crackers into fine crumbs. In a medium bowl, melt the butter until liquid. Add the graham cracker crumbs and the sugar and mix with a fork. Press the crumb mixture evenly into the bottom of a 10″ spring form pan with a fork, keeping the mixture on the bottom and not spreading it up the sides. Bake for 10 minutes and remove to a cooling rack while you prepare the filling.

For the Filling
16 oz cream cheese (2 packages) at room temperature
2/3 c white sugar
1/8 c all-purpose flour
2 eggs at room temperature
scant 1/2 c sour cream
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp vanilla

Beat cream cheese, sugar, and flour for several minutes until fluffy, scraping down the bowl with a spatula once or twice. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well between each one. Add sour cream, lemon juice, and vanilla and beat on medium for about five more minutes, scraping down the bowl a couple of times throughout.

Pour filling into the crust and spread evenly with a spatula. or knife, all the way to the edges. Bake for 45-50 minutes until the center of the cheesecake is not jiggling. Remove to a cooling rack and run a knife around the edges of the pan. The cheesecake will deflate as it cools. Cool to room temperature, then refrigerate.

For the Topping
6 oz fresh or frozen raspberries, thoroughly rinsed
1/4 c granulated sugar

Combine berries and sugar in a small sauce pan over medium-high heat. Stir often, breaking down the berries as they heat up. Once the mixture begins to boil lightly, stir more frequently and cook for 8-10 minutes. The mixture should thicken slightly until it slowly runs off the spoon. Remove from the heat and pour into a small bowl and set aside to cool.

Assembly
Carefully remove the ring from the spring form pan and set aside. Gently slide the cheesecake off the bottom of the pan onto a cutting board, using a flat spatula or knife if needed. For shaped bars, use a cookie cutter (as deep as you can find!) to press all the way through the cheesecake. You may need to use a knife or flat spatula to get the cheesecake out of the cookie cutter. If you don’t want to hassle with a cookie cutter, slice the cheesecake into rectangles, triangles, or wedges.

Carefully spread a layer of the raspberry topping over each bar, about a quarter of an inch thick.

Refrigerate for at least four hours or until ready to serve.

Oooooooooooooh blackberry season is here! It’s been summer here for a long time, but blackberries have always signified summer for me more than any other bounty the garden has to offer. Usually, between Brad and I, fresh blackberries don’t last long enough for me to put them into baked goods. They’re just too damn delicious raw and fresh! But this year, with a half batch of leftover buttercream lurking in the freezer from a round of wedding cake recipe-testing, I decided I’d test out a flavor combination I’ve been curious about for some time now: blackberry and lemon.

Perhaps it’s my love of sweet and tart flavors. Perhaps it’s the purely aesthetic bliss of bright purple icing against a mellow yellow cookie canvas I don’t know. But this was the year! I would not let blackberry season pass me by without trying out the union of blackberry and lemon. I thought about making a layer cake, or maybe cupcakes, but since there’s been a lot of cake around here lately, cookies seemed like the way to go this time around.

This is, I must admit, a particularly lovely cookie even (!!) without the icing that I’m making such a fuss about. With the juice and zest of an entire lemon, this is a quick and easy cookie full of lemon flavor. For a little extra, the dough is rolled between palms and then coated in powdered sugar. I wanted fairly small cookies, so I rolled them out with a one-inch diameter, but you could easily make them larger, as well.

With the cookies well on their way to completion, I busted out my leftover buttercream. Don’t worry, if you don’t happen to have a quart of buttercream sitting around, I included the recipe below. Or, you could probably mix the blackberries into ANY icing and still end up with beautiful purple clouds atop your cookies.

A quick note about blackberries: I don’t really notice them when eating them raw, but blackberries do have a pit, of sorts, that just doesn’t play nicely when blended into icing. They are much larger than raspberry seeds, so they are easy to pluck out of the mixture. No need for a food processor or blender, fresh blackberries are tender enough to be squashed with a fork, at which point you can easily spot and remove the pits. Then it’s time to dye the icing purple with one of nature’s best food dyes!

And then to decorate! I originally planned these cookies as little sandwich cookies, like super-summery Oreos, but after some, er, testing (for science!) I determined I really liked the cookie-to-icing ration better with a swirl of icing atop each cookie. This icing can be piped or spread with a knife, whichever makes you happy.

You guys, these cookies are good. I mean really good. They are soft and chewy, and the tart, creamy icing really sends them over the edge into awesome-town. Plus, they are quick and easy if you already have icing on hand, which as you may suspect, I usually do.

As with most icings, this one is best eaten at room temperature. However, you can totally store them in the fridge for serving later, just remember to take them out a few minutes before you want to eat them.

That is, if you can wait that long…

Lemon Cookies with Blackberry Buttercream
Adapted from Lauren’s Latest

Makes 5-6 dozen cookies

For the Cookies
1 c unsalted butter, cold
1 c granulated sugar
zest of one lemon (about 4 loose teaspoons)
juice of one lemon (about 2 tablespoons)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 whole eggs
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3 c all-purpose flour
1 1/4 c powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two large cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

Cream together butter and sugar in a standing mixer until light and fluffy. Add lemon zest, lemon juice, vanilla extract, and eggs. Beat well. Add salt, baking powder, baking soda, and flour. Mix just until combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl to ensure you mix in all the dry ingredients.

Measure the powdered sugar onto a plate. Scoop a heaping teaspoon of dough and roll between your palms to create a ball about one inch in diameter. Gently roll the ball in the powdered sugar and place on the lined cookie sheet. Continue with the remaining dough, placing dough balls about three inches apart, until cookie sheets are full. Bake for 12 minutes and then remove from the oven. Leave the cookies on the cookie sheets for 2-3 minutes and then remove to a cooling rack. Using the same parchment paper, continue with the remaining dough. Allow all cookies to cool completely before icing.

For the Icing
Like I said, I was using up leftover buttercream I’d stashed in the freezer after a round of recipe testing a month or two ago. If you want the exact icing I used, you can use the recipe below. It’s damn good. But, you can also mix your blackberries into any old icing, and the effect would be similar.

5 large egg whites (about 150 grams total)
1 1/4 c (250 grams) granulated sugar
1 pound (4 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature (NOT melted) and chopped into cubes
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/8 tsp salt
2 c fresh blackberries

Lightly wipe the bowl of a stand mixer with vinegar to remove all traces of grease. Using a pot that does not allow the stand mixer bowl to touch the bottom, add 2-3 inches of water in the base of the pot. Then, place the mixer bowl in the pot and heat over medium heat. Add sugar and egg whites to the mixer bowl and simmer, stirring constantly, until temperature of the mixture reaches 140 °F.

Move bowl to mixer and use whisk attachment. Whip at medium-high speed until mixture is thick, glossy, cool to the touch and forms stiff peaks. Switch over to paddle attachment and beat on medium speed. Add 2-3 cubes of butter at a time until incorporated, never turning off the mixer. The mixture will appear to curdle, but just keep mixing! Once icing has come to a silky, smooth texture, add vanilla & salt.

In a separate bowl, crush the blackberries with the back of a fork. Remove any large pits (they will be easily visible against the dark purple mixture). Add the crushed blackberries into the icing and beat until icing is purple and berries have been thoroughly mixed in.

Assembly
Once cookies have cooled completely, fill a piping back without a tip with icing. Give each cookie a generous swirl of icing. Serve immediately, or refrigerate. Once refrigerated, cookies are best served if allowed to come to room temperature, about 20 minutes.

A little over two months ago (gah, has it already been that long?) one of Brad’s friends from law school invited us over for a dinner with him and his wife, and we were asked to bring dessert. I had a busy week at work, so Brad volunteered to make our contribution. How kind of him to volunteer to prepare a dish to represent us at a dinner with his friends, yes?

*twitch* *baking-control-twitch*

It really was very nice of him. But you see I have this slight love of baking cakes, and the night before the dinner, I my control-freak-baking-nature took hold. I wanted to make something easy, tasty, and pretty, and I wanted to make it now.

This cake, you guys, is all of the above.

To be honest, I put this combo together the weekend before when testing a final batch of recipes for Scott & Crystal’s wedding cake. Enrobed in Swiss Meringue Buttercream, this chocolate cake with strawberries and whipped cream was a favorite and made it into the ceremony cake.

But it’s far too good to reserve only for wedding cake. This version is doable in less than 2 hours and doesn’t require the effort of icing the exterior. The cream and berries are icing enough, and it makes a stunning, seasonal dessert for dinner parties, summer barbecues, or birthdays.

It begins with my favorite, favorite recipe for chocolate cake. If you’ve been reading for a while (or browsing the recipe archives), you’ve seen it before in the Rich Dark Chocolate Cake with Raspberry Buttercream. It also played the principle role in the groom’s cake I made for Sierra & Sean last October.

I really can’t speak highly enough about this chocolate cake. It’s everything I’ve ever dreamed of: moist, stable, easy to make, dark and beautiful, and very chocolatey.

To make this a reasonably-sized dessert for a summer party, this recipe only makes two, eight-inch rounds. Since I like a thinner layer of cake, however, I sliced each layer in half. Once the cakes have cooled, storing them in the fridge for a hour or so makes this process a little easier as the cake will firm up a bit.

The “icing” for this cake is essentially whipped cream, but it has a small amount of gelatin mixed in. Though I was at first skeptical and sure that only pure whipped cream would be required, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by this addition. The small amount of gelatin helps the whipped cream hold it’s structure, and it gives it a lovely, fluffy consistency rather like Cool Whip.

And of course, the best part The strawberries! In my opinion, summer’s most photogenic berry. Strawberry season is almost over here in North Carolina, but many of you farther north still have several weeks of these blushing little gems just waiting to be sliced and spread across the surface of this cake.

While I would normally add just a bit of sugar to these berries to help them release their juices, this cake doesn’t need it. For one thing, I didn’t want red juices dripping down the sides of the cake. For another, the slightly tart bite of the berries is lovely against clouds of whipped cream and rich chocolate cake.

Putting this cake together, once everything is prepped, is quite simple. I used a similarly rustic approach for a strawberry shortcake I made last year, and I never get tired of how pretty it looks.

Layer by layer, this cake stacks up to be beautiful and delicious. You could easily swap out a different berry, too: it would be a dream with raspberries, or even a mixture of raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, or blueberries.

Put one together for your Fourth of July celebrations… it’s worth the effort!

Chocolate Strawberry Cream Cake
Adapted from an earlier project and Sweetapolita

For the Cake
1 3/8 c all-purpose flour
1 1/3 c granulated sugar
1/2 c unsweetened cocoa powder
1 3/8 tsp baking powder
1 3/8 tsp baking soda
1 3/8 tsp salt
1/3 c canola oil
5/8 c buttermilk
2 large eggs
1/2 c hot coffee
1 T vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Generously grease two eight-inch round pans with pan coating and set aside. For flatter layers, wrap the pans with damp strips of tea towel.

Sift all dry ingredients into the bowl of a stand mixer or other large mixing bowl. Add all remaining ingredients and beat on medium speed for 2 minutes (use the paddle attachment if using a stand mixer). Scrape sides of bowl with a spatula and mix for 30 seconds more. Batter will be very fluid. Pour batter into the greased cake pans, using a kitchen scale to ensure you have the same quantity of batter in each pan.

Bake for 25-35 minutes on middle oven rack or until a toothpick comes clean. Remove pans to a cooling rack and let cool for 10 minutes or until sides of cakes have pulled away from the pans. Using another cooling rack placed on top of each cake pan, flip the racks and pans over and press on the bottoms of the pans to remove cakes. Let cake cool to room temperature.

For the Filling/Topping
1 pound fresh strawberries
1/8 c cold water
2 tsp gelatin
1 5/8 c whipping cream, very cold
3/4 c powdered sugar, sifted
1 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp salt

While the cake cools, wash strawberries and allow to dry slightly in a colander. Trim off the greens and slice the strawberries into a bowl and set aside.

Once the cake has cooled to room temperature, pour gelatin and water into a stainless steel bowl. Allow to sit for 10 minutes. Place 1/3 c of cream in a small pot over medium-low heat. Once cream comes to a simmer, pour slowly over the gelatin. Mix with a fork until gelatin has dissolved. Place the bowl in the fridge and allow to cool until the outside of the bowl is neutral in temperature. Stir the bowl often or the cream will begin to gel.

Using the whisk attachment of a standing mixer, beat the remaining cream, powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt on high until soft peaks form, scraping down the sides of the bowl once or twice. Reduce to medium-speed and drizzle the gelatin mixture into mixer bowl. Return to high and beat until firm peaks form. Mixture will resemble Cool Whip.

Assembly
Once your strawberries are sliced and your whipped cream is prepared, slice each layer of chocolate cake into two using a good bread knife. I find it’s easiest to rotate the layer while you are slicing, making sure you keep the knife level as it slices around the cake.

Place one of your new, small layers onto a plate or serving platter. Spread one fourth of the whipped cream over the top of the cake layer to the edges, leaving the sides bare. Spread one fourth of the strawberries evenly over the whipped cream. Repeat the order for the next three layers.

Refrigerate until ready to serve.

There are some foods that have always been magic to me. Tortillas, croissants, tortellini, cream puffs… those dreamy little bites that all seem borderline impossible for a person in a home kitchen to make. Incidentally, jam also mystified me. Perhaps it was really the canning part that seemed so out of reach, for until a couple years ago, I never canned my own.

I’ve learned, however, that jam is actually quite simple to make, and it doesn’t necessarily require large batches and canning. It seems you can boil together almost any fruit and have jam in a matter of minutes, ready to serve warm or to store in the fridge for many days.

This treat is a celebration of quick jam, a blend of two early harbingers of spring: strawberry and rhubarb.

While bundled stalks of rhubarb have graced the tables of the farmers market since early February, strawberries have only recently returned to the scene. Last week, a few pints of these precious red fruits have appeared between towers of broccoli and leafy greens, and just like every year, I could hardly wait to get my hands on some.

Last year, I triumphed in making a strawberry rhubarb pie (though not without a disastrous first attempt), but I wanted to try something quick, something easy, and something delightfully simple this year to celebrate the return of this masterful pair. A baguette and block of goat cheese seemed like the perfect vehicle for a gently cooked blend of the fruits.

These little toasts would be welcome at numerous occasions. A quick breakfast, a lengthy brunch, or even dessert are excellent venues. The barely sweetened jam is nicely balanced by the creamy goat cheese and a crisp bite of bread.

In a way, I can hardly believe I’m posting this as a recipe. But sometimes it is the simplest combinations of food that are the most satisfying. And a delicious way to welcome in the spring

Strawberry Rhubarb & Goat Cheese Toasts
Adapted generously from Rock Recipes

2 c chopped strawberries
1 1/2 chopped rhubarb
1/2 c sugar
1 T balsamic vinegar
1 baguette, thinly sliced
1 T unsalted butter
4-5 oz goat cheese

Combine strawberries, rhubarb, and sugar in a medium pot over medium-high heat. Stir often and boil gently for 10-15 minutes. To test set, spoon a few drops of jam onto a plate and place in the freezer for a few minutes. Quick jam should be runny but not fluid. Stir in the balsamic vinegar and cook for a minute more, then remove from the heat and set aside.

Preheat oven to 250°F. Thinly slice baguette at an angle, each slice a quarter of an inch. Spread slices out on a cookie sheet. Melt the butter and brush it lightly over each slice of baguette. Bake for 5-6 minutes or until crust is lightly browned.

Serve warm toasts with goat cheese and a spoonful of quick jam.

If fall is pumpkin-everything season, then early winter is certainly the moment for the tart, gem-like cranberry to rise to prominence. I find myself recently obsessed with the immense versatility of cranberries, but this simple recipe is, by far, the best way I’ve found yet to feature these beautiful little berries.

Cranberries are, on their own, incredibly tart, and I rarely see them served raw and unaltered. But they are also so fashionable in that state, aren’t they It’s sort of a shame that most of us consume the majority of our cranberries either liquified in fruit juice cocktails or gel-ified in classic, ruby-red sauce served aside turkey and cornbread stuffing at Thanksgiving.

This method gives the cranberries a nice level of sweetness to cut the sour but lets the berries glisten as a centerpiece of your holiday party spread. And while the berries require several hours of soaking in the fridge, these are incredibly easy to make. All you need is a bag of cranberries, sugar, and water.

The first step is to make a simple syrup, or, a mixture of sugar and water in equal parts. Once the sugar dissolves and the syrup comes just to boiling, the cranberries get a nice, long soak. I like to make the mixture the night before I need the berries and allow them to sit in the fridge overnight, but you can also start the morning of your festivities if you’re short on time.

After several hours of absorbing simple syrup, the berries are certainly sweeter, but still quite sticky. That stickiness is perfect for the final step: giving these pretty little rubies a glistening, sparkly coat of sugar!

I used a cookie sheet, shaken back and forth on the surface of a table, as a vehicle for covering the berries evenly with sugar. I attempted to roll them with a fork on my first batch, but the cookie sheet works much better. And a little sugar goes a long way: I used about 1/2 cup to give each and every berry its shiny coat.

And how shall we use them OH. LET ME COUNT THE WAYS. They would make an elegant topping to cheesecake. They make a great garnish for cocktails. I tossed a handful in a bowl of cranberry lemonade punch. But mostly, we ate them straight up, one by one, right out of the bowl. Sweet, tart, perfectly festive finger-food.

Let the season of the cranberry begin!

Sparkling Cranberries
Adapted from Tokyo Terrace

1 bag cranberries (picked through, removing any berried with soft spots)
1 c granulated sugar
1 c water
1/2 to 3/4 c additional granulated sugar

Wash cranberries thoroughly and drain in a colander. Combine 1 c sugar & water in a medium pot over medium-high heat. Stir until sugar dissolves and heat just until mixture comes to a boil. Remove the simple syrup from the heat and allow to cool for 5-10 minutes.

Pour cranberries into a glass or metal dish, preferably with a lid. Pour the simple syrup over the cranberries. Place the lid on the bowl or cover with aluminum foil and place in the refrigerator. Chill berries in the simple syrup overnight or for at least 8 hours.

After berries have chilled, pour into a colander and drain for about 10 minutes. Dump berries onto a medium cookie sheet. Sprinkle a bit of the 1/2 of sugar over the berries. Slide the cookie sheet back and forth over the surface of a table or counter so that the berries roll around in the sugar. Continue adding sugar a bit at a time to cover berries evenly and thoroughly. Allow berries to rest for 1-2 hours on the counter to allow the simple syrup to begin forming a hard shell. Sprinkle with additional sugar to cover any final sticky spots.

Serve as is, as a cocktail garnish, as a topping for cheesecake, or in any other way you can imagine. Keep refrigerated when not serving.

July and August in my childhood meant lots of raspberries. Produce in general, really: my grandparents planted each year a massive garden, and I strongly correlate the start of the school year with boxes of produce on the floor next to the fridge, pan fried okra at dinner almost daily, and raspberries.

Though I love most berries, the raspberry is by far my favorite. Sure, strawberries get a lot of credit as the first fruit of the spring, blueberries sustain me, strong and steady, through the heat of the summer, and blackberries dress up desserts with a splash of deep, fruity decadence. But raspberries, so fragile when picked ripe yet bursting with sweet and tart flavor, will never fade for me.

In Durham, raspberries don’t seem to be a popular cultivar. I’m not sure if it’s the climate or what, but I have only ever seen one, maybe two vendors at the farmers market here with these tiny red berries, and when they do it’s usually just a few pints at a time. So each week of the brief raspberry season in this city, I try to take full advantage. This week, I paired them up with a few luscious peaches for some hand pies!

And we can’t have hand pies without pie crust, of course. Until recently, I was very intimidated by pie crusts. But no more! With a recipe I originally adapted from Smitten Kitchen when taking my first stab at a full-blown pie, I now feel ready to take on any pie project that comes my way!

Before I learned to make this crust, I had almost convinced myself to get rid of these wide, low mixing bowls. Brad gave me a snazzy clear glass set for Christmas that doesn’t splatter and doubles easily as a set of serving bowls, and I was trying to think like an efficient non-hoarder.

But here’s the thing: pie crust NEEDS a wide, low mixing bowl. Trust me, I tried my first batch in the tall, skinny bowl, and it was way hard to cut the cold butter into the flour. Way hard. So these bowls can breathe a sigh of relief: no trip to the thrift store any time soon.

Once the dough is mixed, into the fridge it goes. For at least two hours. Don’t skimp on this. Just use it as an excuse to make yourself breakfast, and later, your pie filling. What starts as sticky, still somewhat disparate globs of butter and flour spends two hours in the fridges and emerges as a cohesive, easily rolled pie dough. So let it do its thing.

While it is, you can address those gorgeous fruits.

I was ready to abandon my hand pie project and just eat this as a simple fruit salad. This pie filling is as easy as it gets: raw peaches, raw raspberries, a bit of sugar and almond extract, and some instant tapioca to help the juices gel during baking. The peaches were perfect, and the raspberries were so ripe they nearly burst at the first touch of sugar.

We got pie dough! We got filling! Time to put ’em together in a bunch of tiny pies!

You can use any round cutting device that you want. I happen to have this handy little guy (the silver guy in the front) that cuts the original shape and later seals the pies with a handy built-in press. I’ve used it to make large raviolis, primarily, but it’s perfect for hand pies as well. But for once, the internet failed me: I could not find a link for one to share with you. Mostly because I can’t figure out what the hell to call it (biscuit sealer cutter wasn’t doing the trick). Points to anyone who can find this little treasure online!

A quick brush of egg wash to give us a nice golden crust, a sprinkle of sugar to make ’em purty, and about 30 minutes in the oven are the only steps left!

Some of your pies will leak. A little, or a lot. It’s okay! They’ll still taste awesome.

These little pies are a lovely way to show off some of the beautiful fruit that summer has to offer, and are delicious all on their own. They’d also be equally at  home snuggled underneath a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

But come to think of it, can you think of a pie that’s not?

Raspberry Peach Hand Pies

Makes 18-22 three-inch hand pies

1 batch pie dough
1 pint fresh raspberries
2 medium-sized yellow peaches, peeled and chopped
1/4 c sugar
1 tsp almond extract
1 1/2 T instant tapioca
1 egg yolk
1 T water
sanding sugar (for decoration)

Prepare the pie dough and allow to chill for two hours in the fridge wrapped in plastic wrap.

After the dough has chilled, preheat the oven to 375 °F. Place raspberries in a medium bowl and set aside. To easily peel the peaches, bring a small pot of water to a boil. Gently place the peaches in the boiling water for 30 seconds or so and then remove them with a slotted spoon. Place the peaches into a dish of cold water or run under cold water until the peaches are no longer warm. Halve the peaches to remove the pit, then slice into 1/2″ pieces and add to the bowl of raspberries. Add sugar, almond extract, and tapioca and mix well. The raspberries will begin to break down and release their juices almost immediately. Set the bowl aside.

Line two large cookie sheets with parchment paper. Dust a clean surface with flour and roll out one disc of your pie dough until it is about 1/8″ thick. Be generous with the flour to prevent the dough from sticking to the counter. Using a large biscuit cutter or other circular cutter about 3″ in diameter, cut out an even number of circles, using as much of the dough as possible. Remove scraps from around circles and press them back together in a ball and return it to the fridge.

For half of the circles, carefully spoon about 2 tablespoons of filling onto the center of each circle. Take the remaining circles and stretch them out slightly so they will completely cover the circles with the filling. Drape this stretched circle over the filling and press the edges down all the way around the circle. If your cutter has a sealing edge, press down firmly to ensure a seal is made. If not, press the tines of a fork around the edge of the circle to ensure the dough seals shut. Repeat until all pies have been sealed and place pies on the cookie sheet about 1/2″ apart. Use the tip of a knife to make a small slit in the top of each pie to allow for venting. Place the cookie sheet in the fridge while you build the rest of the pies.

Roll out the second disc of dough and repeat the pie-building process. Continue to recombine your scraps and re-roll them to maximize the number of pies you can complete.

Once all pies are ready and on the cookie sheets, combine the egg yolk and water in a small bowl and beat until mixture is slightly foamy. Brush over the top of each pie. Finally, sprinkle sanding sugar over all of the pies. The sugar won’t melt during baking, so use as much or as little as you like.

Bake pies at 375 °F for 25-35 minutes or until crusts are golden brown. Pies without a strong seal may leak slightly. Remove pies to a cooling rack and allow to cool for at least 20 minutes before serving.

Pies can be served warm or cool. Serve them by themselves, with vanilla ice cream, vanilla pudding, whipped cream, or whatever makes you happiest. Pies can be stored at room temperature for 3-4 days in an airtight container.

If you’ve never spent time in Southwest Ohio, you might be surprised to know that it is home to some pretty unique foods. Aside from standard midwestern fare, not only one but two chains of restaurants devoted to Cincinnati chili speckle the region, each of which has ardent followers who flock there for liquid-y chili served atop spaghetti and under a mountain of cheddar cheese.

As someone who grew up in the Southwest, chili means something very different to me. The local fare I was far more enthusiastic about was the delectable dessert served at Graeter’s Ice Cream. Sold both in ice cream parlours and also by the pint at area grocery stores, Graeter’s features seasonal flavors amongst a collection of favorites, and one of their most beloved varieties is Blackberry Chip.

I’ve been scheming to invest in an ice cream machine for the last couple of years, and I finally took the plunge earlier this summer and got one. Frivolous Perhaps. Necessary Certainly not. But utterly worth it Ab.So.Lutely.

This ice cream features one of my favorite tastes of summer: blackberries! Sweet but tart, these berries not only lend their lovely flavor to the ice cream but also provide their spectacular hue. The whole berry doesn’t end up in the final ice cream, just the juice, but with fresh berries you’ll end up with plenty of blackberry flavor.

Once the berry juice is ready the actual cream of the ice cream is prepared. It turns out, there are so many ways to make ice cream, and I had noooo idea. I’ve eaten ice cream for years! Soft-serve, hard-packed, fancy-pants pints, cheap-and-by-the-gallon, at ice cream shops, at home. This particular recipe is considered a “custard-based” ice cream, which incorporates eggs and actually involves some cooking before the freezing process can begin.

Before you know it, the ice cream is ready to freeze!

Another thing: if, like me, you’re new to ice cream making (because let’s face it you should go and get one of these bad boys immediately), the ice cream won’t be ready immediately. The “frozen” state of the ice cream when it’s done is slightly thinner than soft-serve. I think I was expecting it to come out of the maker ready to pile on an ice cream cone, but it doesn’t. But it’s solid enough, so I added the chocolate and started counting the hours until the ice cream was ready to serve.

And the wait was worth it! A little difficult to scoop straight out of the freezer, but oh my lordy, this business is good.

For fun, I bought some ice cream cones. There is nothing quite so decadent as eating fresh, homemade ice cream on a waffle cone in my own house.

If waffle cones aren’t your thing that’s okay too. Because of course, ice cream can always come by the pint.

Blackberry Chocolate Chunk Ice Cream
Adapted, just barely, from The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food From My Frontier

2 pints fresh blackberries, washed and patted dry
1 1/4 c sugar
juice of one lemon
1 1/2 c half-and-half
5 egg yolks
1 1/2 c heavy cream
6 oz dark chocolate

Place blackberries and 1/4 c sugar into a small saucepan. Squeeze the juice of one lemon into the saucepan as well (it’s okay if the seeds drop into the pan, you’ll be straining them out later). Mash up blackberries a bit with the back of a spoon or a potato masher and cook over low heat until the blackberries are broken down and the mixture is slightly syrupy, about 20 minutes.

Place a fine mesh strainer over a large bowl and pour the blackberries into the strainer. Press as much juice as possible into the bowl using a whisk or a spoon (you can also use a food mill instead of a strainer if you have one). Set the bowl aside to cool and discard the pulp and seeds that remain in the strainer.

Wash out your saucepan and combine the half-and-half with the remaining 1 c sugar. Heat over medium-low. In a separate bowl, beat the egg yolks until they are thick and are beginning to pale in color. Pour just a bit of the warm half-and-half into the beaten yolks while whisking continuously, then pour the egg yolks into the saucepan. Return saucepan to the stove and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture is thick, about 5-7 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.

By this time, the blackberry juice should be fairly cool. Pour the heavy cream into the berry juice. Finally, pour the egg mixture into the berry juice and stir well. Following the instructions on your ice cream maker, freeze the mixture. For most ice cream makers, this should take about 20 minutes. During that time, chop your chocolate into small, rough chunks. You can also use chocolate chips if you prefer. Once the ice cream has reached the consistency of soft-serve (mine is actually a bit thinner than that, and this may vary based on the kind of ice cream maker you have) add the chocolate and stir well.

Transfer the ice cream to a freezer-safe container and allow to chill for several hours, or preferably overnight.

To serve, allow ice cream to rest on the counter for a few minutes to allow for easier scooping. Serve very often.

The various food blogs and aggregates I browse are alight with red, white, and blue this week. And it’s no surprise! What better way to celebrate America’s Independence Day than with some desserts that feature fresh fruit that coordinates so well with Old Glory You probably already have your plans in place for whatever festivities await you today, but if you don’t, get out your baking gear and try this one.

These little desserts are based on a recipe out of the Joy the Baker Cookbook. I’ve mentioned before that the blog of the same name is one of my favorites to follow, and I was thrilled to finally get my hands on her cookbook. I find it inspiring that someone who is not classically trained in culinary technique, photography, or writing has created such a mind-blowingly successful blog and now has a published book to show for it.

It’s the first of many recipes in the book I’m eager to try.

I’ve never made a tart before, but a happy stroke of fate found the cookbook in my hands and a pack of miniature tart pans on sale at the same time. With removable bottoms, these fancy little pans allow for a cute and classy presentation of an already pretty dessert.

The tart crusts are surprisingly easy to make… no rolling of pie dough required! They do need an hour-long chill in the freezer so they don’t get all puffy in the oven. But that will give you plenty of time to prepare the rest of the tart filling and topping.

Chocolate ganache, which plays a starring role in this dessert, is also really easy. Dangerously easy. Some good dark chocolate, some cream, and a bit of butter create a smooth and creamy ganache that spreads like magic.

And the toppings, of course, come together with hardly any effort at all. The whipped cream can be done by hand in several minutes, or if you have a mixer, several seconds. The berries hardly need any help at all at this time of year.

And before you know it, you’ll have a pretty little treat to bring to your Fourth of July gathering. The spicy crust and rich chocolate are complimented nicely by the cool, fresh berries and cream.

Happy Independence Day!

Chocolate Ganache Berry Tartelettes
Adapted from Joy the Baker Cookbook

Makes 4, 4-inch tartelettes

For the Crusts
1 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1/2 c powdered sugar, sifted
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground ginger
1/2 c unsalted butter, cold and cubed
1 large egg yolk, beaten

In a large, wide bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, cinnamon, and ginger. Add butter cubes and work into the flower using your fingers. Work butter into the dry mixture until a consistency of very coarse meal is achieved. Using a fork, add the beaten egg yolk and combine well. Mixture will appear to be quite dry and crumbly.

Spoon the mixture into 4 miniature tart pans with removable bottoms. Using your fingertips, press mixture into the bottom and sides of the pan evenly all the way around. Remove any excess dough from the top to form a flush, horizontal edge around the rim of the pan. Place pans in the freezer for at least an hour. Chilling the dough will help to prevent the crusts from puffing up. While crusts chill, prepare ganache below.

After ganache is prepared and crusts have chilled, preheat oven to 350 F. Cut four squares of aluminum foil, each one large enough to lay on top of a tart pan, and grease one side of each square with butter. Remove tart pans from freezer and cover with aluminum squares, buttered side down. Bake covered pans for 18 minutes. Remove aluminum squares and bake for another 12 minutes or until crusts are golden brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.

For the Ganache Filling
6 oz dark chocolate, roughly chopped
Scant 1 c heavy cream
3 T unsalted butter, at room temperature and cubed

Chop chocolate and place in a medium bowl. Heat cream in a small sauce pan over medium-low heat until it comes to a simmer. Pour half of the cream slowly over the chocolate pieces and allow to sit for 1-2 minutes. Gently whisk chocolate and cream mixture until combined, starting at the center of the bowl and moving out. Continuing to whisk, add remaining cream and mix until combined. Add butter cubes and stir with a spatula until all butter has melted. Ganache should be smooth and shiny. Set aside at room temperature.

For the Toppings
1 c fresh strawberries, hulled and halved
1 c fresh blackberries
1/2 c heavy cream, very cold
1 1/2 T powdered sugar, sifted

After crusts have been removed from the oven and are cooling, wash and prepare berries. If you are using large blackberries, carefully cut them in half. Set berries aside.

In a medium bowl, combine very cold heavy cream and powdered sugar. Whisk or beat vigorously until cream forms soft peaks. It is helpful to place the entire bowl in the fridge for a few minutes during this process to cool the cream, which will help it whip up faster.

Assembly
Carefully remove crusts from tart pans and remove the bottom, as well. By this point, ganache should be thick but spreadable. Spoon a large dollop of ganache into each crust and spread evenly. Top each tartelette generously with berries, keeping one berry of each type set aside. Dollop whipped cream onto each tartlette. Add a strawberry and a blackberry to the top of the cream on each to make ’em pretty.

Tart is best served immediately, but can also be stored in the refrigerator for several days. If storing, remove from the fridge for 30 minutes prior to serving.

Before I say anything else: Happy Mother’s Day!

Since moving away for college eight years ago (eek), I haven’t been able to spend Mother’s Day with my mom. I think I’ve lucked out for Father’s Day a couple of times as June was more conducive to cross-country travel, but Mom has had to settle for phone calls and packages.

This is a special Mother’s Day, too. My mom is retiring this year after decades of work in elementary libraries and classrooms, teaching young Coloradoans (myself included) to read, to write, and to appreciate books. I have many fond memories over the years of going to the library with my mom for work and for fun, of stapling long strips of playful bulletin board borders to the edges of her displays, of ogling over the annual book fair catalogs and knowing that if there was one place she would buy us anything we asked for, it was books. Her fervor for the written word has, no doubt, cultivated my own passion for books and penchant for writing. She’s the #1 fan of this little food blog and tenders her support through comments, encouragement, and little e-mails alerting me to typos (which, by the way, I welcome from ANYONE who spots one – I want to squash typos out like bugs). So thanks Mom! For everything. I wish I could spend today with you!

But since I can’t, how about blog-worthy pie?

This pie has a little backstory. Until this spring, I’d never made a pie crust from scratch, and I’d never made a fruit pie at all. But there is something about pie. Some old-school, down-home, re-assuring something that I couldn’t resist any longer. Ironically, my mom was never really a baker of pies (she tended toward cakes and cookies for her desserts), so I’ve always been somewhat intimidated by pie. Which sounds ridiculous, really.

Anyway, once strawberries started to make their grand entrance this spring, I decided I wanted to tackle this culinary mountain so that I could no longer awkwardly change the subject when someone asked about my favorite pie to bake. It seemed an obvious choice to start with a true classic: strawberry rhubarb pie.

Strawberries, I’ve worked with before in a variety of contexts. But rhubarb was a new ingredient for me. It hardly looks like a fruit at all. Long, green, stiff stalks that look more like celery or a sturdy cousin of Swiss chard, it hardly looks like something I’d want to bake into a dessert. It’s tangy and extremely tart on its own, and apparently, the leaves are somewhat toxic to humans. The more you know.

But strawberries and rhubarb have been historically coupled together: the overly sweet strawberry plays nicely with the tart rhubarb, and where strawberries are soft, rhubarb retains a firmer texture despite a long stay in the oven.

But the filling wasn’t my true concern. I was actually more nervous about tackling homemade pie dough. So many recipes to choose from! So many “miracle” tricks! They couldn’t all be the answer, could they Empowered by my recent success with a lovely quiche crust, I decided to try an all-butter crust.

(For added Mother’s-Day coolness, that is my grandmother’s pastry cutter. It has literally been used to make pie doughs for DECADES. Best to stick with what works, right?)

I followed an excellent tutorial with tips about making and rolling pie crust (from the lovely Deb at Smitten Kitchen – who else?), and find that pie dough was not nearly as intimidating as I was building it up to be. Keeping the butter COLD was key, and making sure the dough chilled for a couple of hours turned these frighteningly sticky patties of dough into perfect pie crusts a couple hours later.

With my bottom crust in place it was time for the filling.

You might be wondering why my ruby red strawberries and fresh sliced rhubarb are marred by unappealing little bits of white stuff. I take this opportunity to showcase the not-so-photogenic secret to making this pie miraculous: instant tapioca

A cautionary tale… you see, this is not the first strawberry rhubarb pie I have made this season. In fact, I made one just two weeks earlier than this batch of photos, but the result was far from perfect. In a brazen show of culinary naivety, I decided that I need not heed the warnings that this filling would be a soupy mess if I used cornstarch alone to try to thicken the juicy fruit. I didn’t have any tapioca on hand didn’t feel like running to the store, and used the cornstarch anyway.  I pulled from the oven what appeared to be the perfect pie.

Right?? Perfectly golden crust, no juicy explosions, bright red fruit peeking through the lattices. But then I sliced into it…

Like water through a broken damn, the juice and fruit that made up my pie filling flowed out of the crust as soon as a slice was sloppily removed from the pie plate. To make matters worse, the bottom crust hadn’t cooked all the way, so instead of matching the golden crispy crust on top, it was a stretchy mass of gummy flour and butter. I was heartbroken! How could I have gone so wrong?

Two things: one, I discovered that in fact, my oven cooks about 10 degrees shy of what it says on the meter. Important. No wonder everything I’ve cooked since the new oven got installed has taken longer than expected. Two, use the tapioca. I’ve since learned that instant tapioca seems to be a rather commonly-used ingredient for fruit pies. And for damn good reason.

Back to the second pie:

Even after my disastrous first pie, I was still, still, nervous about these little white bits. What if they didn’t go away Would my filling be gritty But it was too late to go back at this point, and I was determined to see if the tapioca was all it was cracked up to be. I topped off the pie with some latticed pie dough (shockingly easy, I’ll show you how in the recipe below), plopped it in the oven, and hoped for the best.

Out it came! The top wasn’t quite as perfect-looking as the previous pie due to some small juice explosions, but this was probably due to the fact that my oven was actually at the proper temperature this time. The bottom crust looked like was the right color to be done (I checked this time). I waited a few hours to let the pie cool, and then I nervously made a slice to see if the consistency of the filling had improved.

Look at that! It was completely different! The gritty white particles had disappeared and created a perfectly gelled filling. I was floored. I’ll never doubt tapioca again.

So hooray! Following a dismal failure in the kitchen, I redeemed myself with a pie that was not only pretty to look at, but was also really good to eat. Maybe, one of these years, I can make one at Mother’s Day and share more than a picture of it with my mom. And maybe you can too!

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie
Adapted slightly from Smitten Kitchen

For the Crust
2 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1 T sugar
1 tsp salt
2 sticks (or 1 cup) unsalted butter, COLD and cut into 1/2″ cubes
1/2 c + 1 T very cold water

In a wide bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, and salt. Add cubes of butter and combine with flour mixture using a pastry cutter or a fork. Be sure to incorporate all of the flour and work the mixture until it has the appearance of a very coarse meal. It’s okay if some butter pieces are still larger, about the size of a pea… it’s important to not work it too much.

Add 1/2 of the water and glue the mixture together using a rubber spatula. Once the mixture is mostly combined, work it into a single clump using your hands. You may need to add a bit more water – be careful not to add too much or the dough will be too moist. Dough will be slightly sticky, and will appear to be too sticky to roll out. Divide the dough into two equal clumps and place each clump on a piece of plastic wrap. Fold the plastic wrap over on top of each clump and press into a round disc, about an inch thick. Then, wrap the plastic wrap around each disc.

Chill dough discs in the refrigerator for at least two hours.

For the Filling
3 1/2 c rhubarb, chopped into pieces about 1/2″ thick
3 1/2 c strawberries, sliced into large pieces or halved
1/2 c white sugar
1/4 c dark brown sugar
1 T lemon juice
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 c instant tapioca (I found Minute brand in the baking aisle)

While your dough chills, prepare your fruits. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and stir gently to avoid crushing the strawberries too much. Set aside.

For the Assembly
1 large egg yolk, lightly beaten, and mixed with 1 tsp water

Once your dough has chilled for at least two hours and your filling ingredients have been combined, preheat oven to 400 °F. Get out your pie plate and set it near the area where you will be rolling out your dough. Generously flour a clean surface and a rolling pin. Remove one disc of dough from the refrigerator and remove the plastic wrap, then place it on the floured surface, sprinkling more flour on top of the dough. Roll out the dough, flipping every couple of rolls and re-flouring under the dough, until you have a circle about 14″ in diameter, or, enough to line the bottom of the pie plate with at least an inch of dough hanging over the sides. Carefully slide the dough into the pie plate. If you like, you can gently fold the dough into quarters to transfer it to the plate and then unfold it. Press the dough into the plate so that it is flush with the entirety of the inside of the plate.

Add the filling to the bottom crust and spread out evenly.

Repeat the rolling process with the second dough disc. If you’re planning to put a full lid on your pie, make several slices in the center of the rolled out circle to ensure ventilation and place the crust over the pie. If you are using lattices, slice the dough into strips about an inch wide. Lay the strips across the pie in one direction,  leaving about 1/2″ between the strips. When you have applied enough strips in one direction, lift every other strip and fold it back over itself at the center of the pie. Place a strip going the opposite direction at that line, then fold the strips you lifted back down across the pie. Now, lift the opposite set of strips and fold them back over themselves, adding another strip next to the first and continuing to leave a 1/2″ gap. Continue until half of the top is complete, then repeat the process on the other half.

Trim all dough, both from the bottom crusts and the lattices on the top, until about 3/4″ remains as an overhang. Then, tuck all overhang under the bottom crust so that nothing overhangs. You now should have a thick rim of dough around the top of your pie plate. To crimp the edges, hold your thumb and index finger about 1/2″ apart on the outside of the rim and press your opposite index finger into the gap between them on the inside of the rim. Repeat by moving your fingers so your thumb is now in the recess where the index finger of the same hand just was until you have crimped the entire rim.

Using a pastry brush, gently brush the egg yolk & water mixture over the entire top crusts. Place pie in the oven on a center rack and bake at 400 °F for 20 minutes. Then, reduce heat to 350 °F and bake for an additional 30-35 minutes. Pie is done when top AND bottom crusts are golden brown (this is where a glass pie plate comes in especially handy) and filling is bubbling.

Remove pie to a cooling rack and allow to cool for several hours, or even overnight.

Pie can be served warm or cool and should keep on the counter for 3-4 days.