Scribbles & Munch

      Ok, here's the scenario: you just got back from vacation, and there's almost no food in the house. You've only had time to get the basics - eggs, milk, fruit, etc - and thaw one of your pie dough rounds. You have visions of how to use it--October is walnut season, and a chocolate-walnut pie is sounding pretty damn tasty. Or maybe you'll do a twist and make a quiche. Or maybe...
      ...maybe you'll get sick. WHAM, your sinuses feel like somebody hit you in the face with a cast iron frying pan. No WAY you're going to cook anything when you're this germy, anybody who ate it would become diseased! So you're out of commission (and out of the kitchen) for about four days.
      Then, as you start to get better, you spouse gets sick. But you have to work. And your mother-in-law is coming to stay in just a couple days. And you HAVE to use that pie crust! So you look around your still scantily stocked kitchen and you see...you see...!

Wouldn't that make a lovely carriage? I just need a Fairy Godmother and some mice!

      That's right: a pumpkin. Specifically, a lovely organic yellow pumpkin that a friend gave you. Most people make pumpkin pies with canned pumpkin because the process of cutting open a pumpkin, scraping out the seeds...

      ...cutting the flesh into chunks...

      ...and cooking it down takes a long time. But hey, it's starting to get chilly, so why not roast that beauty low and slow in the oven until it starts to caramelize? Typically pies are made from Sugar Pumpkins, because they're sweeter (as the name might subtly hint), but all pumpkins can be cooked. Yellow pumpkins and the carving varieties have less flavor and more water in their flesh, making them easier to cut and longer-lasting, but much less flavorful. The answer? Cook that baby low and slow, let all the water cook out until you get sweet golden bits that fall apart at the touch.

Check out that decrease in volume!. That's concentrated flavor.

       So now it's time to turn this into a pie. And you're feeling lazy. So to heck with digging out a pie pan, we're just making a galette (I swear "galette" is French for "lazy-ass pie"). A galette is a kind of free-form pie, where you just roll out the dough...

      ...and pile in the filling...

      ...and then wrap the dough back up around the filling in pleats. Then, because you want to impress your mother-in-law, you grab an egg white that's been sitting in the fridge for a few days, wash the edges, and sprinkle on some pepitas and sugar.

      You bake it, let it cool, and then hang out with your mother-in-law. The galette gets served for breakfast. You have no idea how it's going to taste...fortunately, it ends up tasting fabulous!
     That was my last week. It's been hectic, and exasperating. Frankly, the galette was all the more successful for the circumstanced under which it was created. If you happen to have an eating pumpkin sitting around this autumn and you're looking for a twist on a classic, here's the recipe for what I made, and you are welcome to use it.

Z.D.'s What-Do-We-Do-With-This-Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients:
one medium edible pumpkin
pinch of kosher salt
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
one disk of raw pie dough
1 ripe D'anjou pear
1/3 Cup sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 egg white, beaten
1/4 Cup raw pepitas (shelled pumpkin seeds)

 - Preheat your oven to 300º F. Dice the butter and put it in a large roasting pan, place it in the oven to melt. Meanwhile, seed, peel, and chop the pumpkin into cubes (the size doesn't matter so much as long as it's uniform). Toss the cubes into the butter with the pinch of kosher salt. Roast until very tender, stirring every 15-20 minutes, about two hours total. Remove the roasted pumpkin from the pan into a large bowl, set aside to cool.

 - Up the oven temperature to 375º F. Roll out the pie dough into a large, roughly circular shape. Carefully lay the rolled out dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or silicone baking mat.

 - Peel and seed the pear, then cut into one inch dice. Toss in with the pumpkin, and add sugar and cinnamon. Spoon the filling into the middle of your dough, then lift the edges of the dough over the top, pleating to create a rounder shape.

 - Brush the top and sides of your galette dough with the egg white, then sprinkle the pepitas evenly around the edges. Sprinkle with a little sugar. Pop the galette into the oven and bake until the crust is golden brown and the filling is bubbling, 40-50 minutes. Cool before slicing.

     This beauty would be a particularly nice dessert topped with cinnamon whipped cream. Although alongside a nice place of eggs and bacon, this makes a nice breakfast, too.