Tuesday, July 31, 2012

TWD - Blueberry Nectarine Pie

I skipped last baking day, Semolina Bread just seemed impossible to make Gluten Free ;).  This time PIE was in the recipe title though and I was IN!  I wasn't decided if I was going to follow the book's pie crust recipe adjusting with gf flour or find a gluten free recipe instead.  I ended up opting for the latter because it made more sense to me to go with the tried and true.  I found a recipe with 5 stars on King Arthur's Flour site and decided to go with that.

It seems that the nectarine and blueberry season are winding down, but I still got my hands on some and got busy making the filling.   I have never pre-cooked filling before, so that was definitely something new to me.  It makes sense and perhaps I will try it with other recipes in the future, I like being able to make sure the flavour is what I want before committing to baking an entire pie! 

The crust came together easily, it was a bit difficult to roll out and fell apart a bit, which required some patching, but it all worked out in the end.  It certainly wasn't the prettiest of pies and I am a complete failure at crimping pie edges.  That has never been a strong skill set for me, so I pulled out the handy fork and just pressed the sides all the way around using that. 

I followed the baking instructions for the dough recipe, the bottom of the gluten free crust can get soggy so it was recommended that I bake the pie for 20 minutes on the bottom rack at a high temp and then move it to the middle of the oven and lower the temperature for the remainder of the cooking time.  I did NOT want a soggy crust so I followed those directions and the results were positive.  No soggy bottom, a bit dark around the edges but nothing a bit of foil wouldn't prevent next time.

All in all I liked the pie, I have a house full of pie critics, my family are very particular about the kinds of pie they like to eat.  They don't all like all pie.  No problem, the 14 year old boy child finished off everyone's leftovers, waste not want not :)  The hubs and I enjoyed our pie and we all enjoyed the blue bell vanilla ice cream that accompanied it :)

If you would like the recipe for this glorious dessert, you can visit this week's hosts Liz of That skinny chick can bake and Hilary from Manchego's Kitchen .  If you would like to see all of the different delicious pies, then go here to find the links to all of the participating bloggers.



Enjoy
Erin x

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

TWD - Hazelnut Biscotti minus the hazelnut :)

I'm baaack!!  I wasn't sure I was going to be able to make this one but I did it.  I didn't do it early, I made it TODAY, but it's done!  I missed both of June's baking days because I was so fortunate that I went on vacation for an entire month with my family.  We rented a vacation home for a month and while I intended on baking while I was there I just didn't.  The kitchen didn't have the supplies I needed and well, I was having too much fun with my family.  I will get to them though, I am determined.  Maybe not this month since we have three baking days but I will make them. 

If you are interested in the recipe you can go and visit the hosts this week.  Jodi of Homemade and Wholesome and Katrina of Baking with boys .  Alternatively you can purchase the book Baking with Julia, I highly recommend you do, it's fabulous!  If you have some time go here and check out how everyone did this time, it's fun to see all of the variations :)

I have never made biscotti before and those few of you that have read my blog before know that I am on a gluten/wheat free journey.  So I made this recipe using King Arthur gluten free flour blend.  My family doesn't really prefer hazelnuts so I opted to use chocolate chips instead and instead of hazelnut liqueur I used Kahlua.  So I guess they are chocolate chip/coffee liqueur biscotti, rather than hazelnut.

When we came home from our vacation we discovered that our air conditioning system was broken so our downstairs has been in the upper 80's for the last few days.  This didn't help my dough, in fact it looked like a pile of melted glop on the baking pan, even though I tried to mold it into a log shape it just spread out on the pan.  So I decided to pop it into the fridge for a while to see if that would help.  I wasn't hopeful and was wondering if it was the flour or the heat, or both.  It had seemed really loose when I mixed it so I had added about a 1/4 cup more flour which helped a little but not much.  When I pulled it out of the fridge I was able to shape it a little.  I had previously read through the tips and wet my hands down so the dough didn't stick as much while I was shaping it.  SO glad I did that!  I immediately popped it into the oven and crossed my fingers.  I wasn't sure if it looked the way it should but it seemed pretty close so I went with it.  I let it cool for about 10 mins and sliced away with a bread knife.  Then I put them back in the oven  for about 12 minutes and what I ended up with looked quite a bit like biscotti!!  I was so happy I didn't have to start from scratch since I had left it to the last minute!!

The hubs tried it and the first comment was "it doesn't even taste gluten free".  I take that as success, for those of you who have attempted gluten free cooking, it's not always a success.  :/ 

I boiled the kettle and made myself a nice cup of tea in my new Alice in Wonderland teacup (we vacationed in Florida and visited WDW while we were there).  The biscotti went quite nicely with my English breakfast tea :)  I am sure it would be great with coffee as well. 




I hope you enjoyed your biscotti as much as I did mine.  Thanks for reading :)