Bumbleberry Pie

I don't do pie. I have a love/hate relationship with the crust.  All my life, my mother was the expert pie baker.  She taught me everything I know about cooking and baking and yet, I could never really master pie crust.  Oh, I can make one and it's edible but I have angst.  When I met Sean and discovered he was a pie baker extraordinaire. my angst increased.  Emma says Sean and my mother need to have a pie bake-off with her being the judge.  Because, of course, Brian does not eat pie.  Or cake.  Or any other kind of dessert expect vanilla ice cream and the occasional chocolate chip cookie.  "you can't make me eat that piece of pie mommy".  Ok honey, you don't have to eat that piece of pie.  More for your sister.

Years ago I read a very nice little book about pie.  Humble Pie, Musings on What Lies Beneath the Crust.  The author, Anne Dimock, writes about how pie has been  part of her life from the day she was born.  She writes about New Englanders loving pie for breakfast (of course, that and baked beans).  She writes about no matter what is going on in her life, there will always be pie.

Every summer, when we go to Maine, Emma and my mom make Blueberry Pie.  Sometimes Bumbleberry pie.  The berries in Bumbleberry are blueberries, raspberries and blackberries.  The recipe comes from the King Arthur Baking Book.

Emma loves pie.  Emma was also sick with a cold this weekend and I had the ingredients for the pie in the freezer.  So I decided to make it.  It came out pretty good and high praise from Emma when she said the crust was flaky.  I'll bring Sean a piece tomorrow and get the ultimate opinion.

I used blueberries (picked from Butler's Orchard), Blackberries (picked from the community garden), Sour Cherries (picked from Homestead Farms) and Peaches (Farmer Allan).  The pie is pretty tasty.

Fruit, with sugar, lemon juice and tapioca, ready to be cooked and thickened.

In the bottom crust

Top crust added

Yum, Bumbleberry Pie

This week's cookbook

I read a lot of cooking magazines and have a lot of cookbooks but meal planning is not something I do that often.  Usually I just open the fridge and try to figure out what to make every night.  During the summer it's easier since I come home with fresh vegetables every other day.

Tonight, I took out some fish fillets and then grabbed the cookbook The Six O'Clock Scramble.  My friend Sherry gave this to me a number of years ago because her friend is the author.  There is also a newsletter the Scramble

I used the Quick Tilapia with lemon, garlic and capers.  Saute some chopped garlic in olive oil, add fish fillets.  Salt and pepper to taste.  Cook for 4 min, turn and season.  Add a glug of lemon juice with a sprinkle of capers and cook for another 4 minutes.  I served this with Israeli couscous and steamed carrots with butter.  Very easy and tasty.

Old Cookbooks

My friend over at Mommy Porch received some nice new cookbooks for Christmas and wants to do a feature every month on one.  She borrowed the idea from Taste and Tell and what's a good idea if not to share?  I didn't get any cookbooks for the holidays (hello Beanies, cookbooks for your mother, a good gift idea) so I thought, hey there are a butt load of cookbooks on my shelves - maybe I should revisit some old ones.

The first one to be revisited is Laurel's Kitchen.

I don't remember where I got this book but it was the first cookbook along with A Diet for a Small Planet, that I received in college.  When I was a sophomore I decided to become a vegetarian.  When I was a junior, I was living off campus in Montreal with my friend Rachel (we went to McGill).    We loved to cook and cook we did whenever we needed to procrastinate. 

Paging through this cookbook this week my thoughts were "did we really use this book?"  It's worn, the pages are dog-eared and there seem to be food stains all over.  30 years later, I just can't remember making any of these recipes.  We did have some Moosewood cookbooks that we used too but today, I have no desire to make any of the recipes in this book!

For example, every single bread recipe calls for all whole wheat flour mixed with whatever grain required - rye, oatmeal, etc.  Those loafs must have made great doorstops!  Brewer's yeast, soy flour, cashew gravy, better butter made with soy - ugh.  Thank you Deborah Madison for showing me the way to better tasting vegetarian fare.  This book still hold sentimental value for me so for now, it's back on the shelf.