Shirley stopped by this afternoon. She was on her way home from volunteering at the Full Circle Farm and was hoping for some apples from my trees. I had not 10 minutes before receiving her call to see if I was home, been walking among the trees and thinking that I wasn't going to be able to eat all of these apples before either they spoiled or the mice managed to nibble just enough out of each one to make it unappetizing to even me - I who am just as likely to cut out the bad part and eat the apply anyway as I am to hand it to the dog to eat.
So, I enthusiastically invited her over, even though I forgot to unlock the door, and helped her pick apples after she arrived. I forced a couple pears into her bags before she could resist too much, as Kris hasn't been eating them, and I can't stand them. Admittedly, I'm a little annoyed that he hasn't been eating the pears, since I planted that tree for him in the first place. Not annoyed enough to remove the tree, though, as I learned the lesson of "plant what you'll eat" only last year, and the tree went in three years ago.
Shirley let me know that she was cooking this afternoon with the apples. She was planning some apple walnut zucchini tasty thing. I had intended to head up to the City for today's Super Happy Dev House, but, well, Shirley's cooking declaration inspired me to also cook with apples. I stayed home instead and made a couple apples pies, listening to book four (of which, oh, good lord, the first 20% is the gory, painfully dull details of Bella's wedding. Do I really need to read a book about some 18 year old's marriage to a vampire? Really?).
So, today was a happy, lazy day of cleaning up crap, doing laundry, and baking apple pies.
I really like the William Sonoma Pie and Tart book, circa 2004, which has a pie crust recipe that both tastes great AND doesn't need to be refrigerated for a while after rolling out. Though, I am annoyed that the apple pie recipe says "pile apples high in bottom crust," as I always end up with a 6" gap between the pie crust and the baked down filling.
At one point, I ended up with excess crust, so I rolled it out, doused it with some of the cinnamon and sugar juices from the apples. I put it into the toaster oven at 350° and waited to see what would happen. Shirley had commented recently to me (possibly in the four hours of driving to the Good Life event) that she wanted to make homemade poptarts. I figured I could use this extra crust as a test, and mentioned it to Kris:
"You might be having homemade poptarts."
He looked up at me.
"They might be APPLE poptarts," I continued.
"With appropriate levels of whipped cream and sugar?"
Man after my own heart.
The second pie is for Megan, who had brought over a pie for a communal dinner months and months ago, and left the pie dish with me. I think they had just started packing up their house in anticipation of the tear down, and wasn't going to need the pie dish for a while.
One of these days I'm going to make a pie in every tin and plate I own. All eight of them. No, wait, nine of them.
Better make one or two savory, or I'll be in a world of hurt.
