carnies and champagne

easy as peach, pear, & ginger pie

dessert for the beef stew dinner party was also a bit difficult. I had wanted to make ice cream, but got a little irresponsibly tipsy friday night and forgot to freeze the ice cream maker bowl, so that was out. and I kind of wanted to make custard instead, but that seemed like a lot of excessively soft food. so I landed in the middle and went with pie.

I had grabbed a bag of frozen peaches for the ice cream & had how to cook everything open, so started with bittman’s peach and ginger peach pie variation and then added some pears. because the amount of peaches I had didn’t fill the pie adequately and my produce box (from boston organics) had pears in it.

the thing about pie crust is that if you make a really good pie crust, then the effort is totally worth it. if you make a pretty good pie crust, then you may as well make the thing. however, I do not make a good pie crust. someday when I have a kitchen with more counter space, I will perfect pie crust, I swear, but in the meantime, pillsbury crusts work just fine. and I had a few leftover from thanksgiving that were easily thawed.

pre-heat oven to 450 degrees. place 1 9-inch pie crust in pie pan.

toss 1 bag frozen peaches and 1 sliced pear with 1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice (I used meyer, because that’s what I had).

mix 1/2 cup sugar, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 1/8 tsp allspice, 1 1/2 Tbsp cornstarch and 1 Tbsp minced fresh ginger. (bittman says you can use 2T instant tapioca instead of cornstarch, which I would probably prefer but I didn’t have any.) toss fruit with this mix.

pour fruit into pie shell, highest at the center and dot with 2 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into bits. cover with a second 9-inch pie crust and seal edges with a fork or a fancier method that you may actually be good at but I am not. brush the top with a little milk and sprinkle with demerata sugar (granulated white would work, but isn’t as pretty). cut 3 2in slits in the top crust.

if your oven runs hot (i.e., if you often burn the edges of things before the center is done), cover the edges with tinfoil and put the pie in the oven.

cook for 10 mins, then lower the heat to 350 degrees, cook for 40 mins, remove the foil from the edges, cook for about 10 more mins (until golden brown).

I served with whipped cream because in my world dessert is just an excuse for whipped cream. my preferred cream is whipped with 1 - 2 tsp of vanilla and a few handfuls of granulated sugar depending on the amount of cream being whipped. some people are adamant that you must use confectioner’s sugar, but my mom taught me this way and I like my cream a bit less sweet and I always have regular sugar, but not always powdered. whip it in a mixer, using a hand mixer, an eggbeater (hi mom!), or a whisk (dad’s preference) and plop on top of each slice of pie served. serve the pie warm for best results, and then cold for breakfast the next day.