Strawberry Rhubarb Pie - Oh My!

We have upcoming obligations for mother's day weekend and wanted to be sure to fit in my mother in law's mother's day celebration, so we had my in-laws over for dinner last night. I wanted to be sure to make something special for dessert, so I figured I'd try my hand at lattice crust atop a strawberry rhubarb pie.
 

Of course, being a neurotic baker and only occasionally successful at pastry undertakings; I default to Cooks Illustrated for all things that I'm not 100% confident about. That means that I religiously use their vodka pie crust recipe, subbing out the vegetable shortening and replacing it with hand-rendered leaf lard for flavor. And I also used their recipe for the filling which calls for instant tapioca over corn starch or flour as a thickener.
 

The lattice is easy enough, you simply cut straight strips of pie crust, weave them together while atop the pie, trim, then fold the bottom crust up and over and crimp!
 

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie - slightly adapted from Cooks Illustrated
3 cups fresh, sliced strawberries
3 cups fresh rhubarb stalks, cut into 1-inch pieces
3/4 cups granulated sugar (if you like your desserts tart, cut out a couple tablespoons of sugar)
1 tbsp grated orange zest
2 tsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp quick-cooking tapioca
Pie crust 12 inch bottom and 12 inch top
 



*Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
*Toss strawberries and rhubarb with sugar, lemon juice and orange zest, vanilla extract, and tapioca; let stand for 15 minutes.
*Place the 12 inch bottom pastry into a 9-inch Pyrex pie pan, leaving 1/2" dough overhanging the lip. *Pour fruit mixture, including juices, into pie shell.
 *Assemble your lattice and trim lattice to fit 1/2" inside the bottom crust.
*Fold over bottom crust and crimp either with your fingers or a fork.
*Glaze crust with a beaten egg and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
*Gloat that you made gorgeous lattice tops.
*Place pie into preheated oven and bake for 20-25 minutes before reducing temp to 350 and baking for an additional 30-40 minutes.
*Transfer pie to wire rack to cool. Avoid covering as this will cause condensation and make your crust soggy.
 


Overall, I am very pleased with how the pie turned out. I would drop the amount of tapioca just a hair, and that has been reflected in the recipe, and I prefer my desserts less sweet than most, so in the future I'll cut the sugar by a couple tablespoons to reflect that.
 

A nice outdoor space/something to keep me going...

It feels like winter/spring lasts forever in the PNW. First we get autumn which slowly turns into cold rainy "blah" of winter weather. Then eventually we get a few weeks of sporadic sun and it makes everyone hopeful. Then it regresses back into rain and stormy weather. It seems the next 1.5 weeks will be rain, wind, and unpleasantness (read: the plastic cover on our deck making loud noises when it's particularly windy). Days like this are when I need to look back on photos when it was not totally rainy, dreary, and depressing. Here are some of my favorites from last summer. I am SO looking forward to 60 degree nights and air conditioning!

Here are some veggies going under one of my plastic raised bed covers! They were very productive last year despite the cool summer. I attribute it more to the plastic over the beds than the blood meal in the soil!


And the herb garden (all in pots!) just getting started last year (in JUNE! can I make it that long!?)


And a month later, another veggie bed under plastic!


And the same original bed, a month later! Oh what time does!


The Japanese Full Moon Maple that was given to my mom shortly after my brother died. I call it the "Jonah Tree." Gorgeous!


Hens & Chicks


And the "herb garden" a month later


Even May holds promise! Here's our fire pit getting some use last (early) summer!


A happy lit and covered table after dinner


And burning up some leftover cedar decking after making s'mores!

I can't wait for summer!

You ever make quiche? I do, try it!

My husband, Craig, who purportedly hates both pastry of any kind, as well as "eggy" dishes will happily gobble down quiche. Know why? It's tasty and pretty simple to throw together with leftovers.

First you start with your crust. You can use a frozen one. I'm not particularly fond of them and prefer using Cook's Illustrated's recipe for the perfect vodka crust. It's easy, albeit a little time consuming. I swap out home-rendered leaf lard for shortening. Pig fat always tastes better.
















Once your crust has been assembled, poked with a fork, etc, freeze it. Then line with foil and bake it at 400 degrees for 20 minutes or so.


Then remove your foil(carefully!) and pop the crust back into the oven for another 10-15 minutes til it seems fairly solid.




Now prep your ingredients.

I started by sauteeing my mushrooms


And got everything else grated and chopped up and ready to be added to the crust.


Here are the egg mixture ingredients.


I think I used a dozenish eggs, about a cup of cream, and salt and pepper. Once the crust comes out of the oven, start layering in your fillings. I did 2 layers of each, weighting the second layer of cheese (which should be the top)heavier than the first.






Then pour in your whisked up egg/cream + salt and pepper mixture. Then pop it in the oven.


Bake it until it's no longer liquidy in the center (it will continue to firm up after it comes out of the oven) when shaken gently. I removed mine about 20 minutes into baking as the pie crust edges seemed to be browning up a little. To prevent them from burning, I make some protector thingies out of foil to cover up the crust a little.






Let it cool down and either eat slightly warm, at room temp, or cold! I generally refrigerate the quiche prior to serving it as it helps to solidify the filling considerably.



Other good fillings:
Spinach
Bacon
Chevre (drool!)
Spam!
Basically any leftovers that aren't going to exude large volumes of liquid when baked