Today is Pi Day, and if you thought I was going to let that pass without recipes to match, you clearly underestimate my Geek status.
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| A tasty sacrifice in the name of higher math. |
We ate slices of the Gladstone Cherry Pie for brunch (sorry, the recipe is a secret), timing our first bites to be at exactly 9:26am (and 53 seconds). Then dinner was
mushroom lentil pot pie with gouda biscuit topping, one of my favorite vegetarian dishes. Then, for a little something different, I made faux cream tartlets for dessert. Although I love pastry crust with a deep abiding passion, too much of a good thing...well...you know. So I decided to go an alternative route with Faux Berry-Banana Cream Tarts.
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| Pretty, and pretty tasty, too. |
This dessert is tasty, pretty, rich, and creamy. And it happens to be vegan. I based this recipe on a raw vegan dessert a friend made for me years ago. Now if you're a vegan, good on you. And if you're a raw foodist...well, sorry to say, but I typically don't truck with such nonsense. If the Good Lord meant for us to eat raw, She would never have invented the deep fat fryer. Anyway, my version isn't raw, because toasting the almonds makes the crust that much more delicious. But if you want to leave them raw, knock yourself out--it takes all kinds to make the world, after all.
Z.D.'s Faux Berry-Banana Cream Pie
Makes about six tartlets
Ingredients:
1 & 1/2 Cup raw cashews
hot water
1 & 1/3 Cup raw almonds
15 large, pitted dates
kosher salt
1 Cup frozen blueberries
1/2 Cup nut milk (cashew if you can get it, otherwise almond is lovely)
1 tsp vanilla
1 to 3 tsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 Cup sugar, divided
2 small, ripe bananas
Directions:
- Preheat your oven to 350º F. In a small bowl, place the raw cashews, and cover with hot water. Spread out your almonds in a single layer on a baking sheet, and place in the oven. Roast for twenty minutes, stirring two or three times to prevent burning on one side. Then remove, and set aside to cool.
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| It's unreasonable how wonderful almonds smell when they're toasting. |
- Meanwhile, in another small bowl, cover the dates with hot water, and soak for at least fifteen minutes. Then drain, and place into the jar of a food processor. Pulse a few times until dates turn into a sticky paste, then add in the almonds and a pinch of kosher salt. Process in long pulses, scraping down the sides, until all comes together in a slightly sticky "dough."
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| I probably could have blended this a bit more, but the smell of the delicious toasted almonds was distracting me. |
- Divide "dough" into six small tartlet pans (about 2 Tablespoons per pan--if you have larger tartlet pans, you may only have enough for four tartlets). Dampen your fingertips lightly with cold water, then press the dough evenly to cover the bottom and sides of the pans. Set aside (or cover with plastic wrap and chill in fridge up for 5 days).
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| These are 2.5 inch tartlet pans. |
- Drain cashews, and place into the jar of a high-powered blender. Add blueberries, nut milk, vanilla, and 1 tsp of lemon juice. Blend according to your device's instruction until you have a thick puree the consistency of whipped cream. Taste for sweetness, and add remaining lemon juice and sugar by spoonfuls - blending after each addition - until "cream" is desired taste. Cover and set in the fridge while you slice the bananas.
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| I forgot to take a picture of the blender action, sorry about that--but if you wind up with leftover "cream" just jar it in the fridge and use as a smoothie base in the next few days--yum! |
- Thinly slice the banana and lay slices in the bottom of your tarts. The idea is to get some banana with each bite, but not so much that it leaves no room for cream. Then spoon the blueberry "cream" over and mound slightly.
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| Pretty on the inside, too! |
At this point, you're basically done! You can decorate them by swirling patterns into the "cream," topping with berries or desicated coconut, or - here's an idea for spring - edible flowers. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for up for a couple days, if desired.
I have a (mostly unrelated) question for you as my reigning pie expert.
ReplyDeleteRelated because, well... it's about pie.
Unrelated because it has nothing to do with the (delicious sounding/looking) pies you've written about in this post.
I have the annoying experience of slouchy pie crust. Whenever I need to pre-bake a crust (as for a quiche), no matter how carefully I crimp the edges so there's some overhang,* the sides slide down the pie plate.
I have a lovely recipe that makes for perfectly textured crusts, and according to its directions, I form the crust, chill it, line it with foil, add pie weights, and bake it until it's dry-ish. During this first half of the baking, there is SOME slouching happening, but not a lot. Then I remove the foil and weights, and let it go to my desired brownness level, and during this last step, the poor crust gets tired or something, because it loses a good deal of its height.
The crusts are still usable, but much less pretty and tall than I'd like them to be. Help me, oh pie guru!
*Once, I went a little too far with the overhang and the poor thing ended up melting off and falling to the bottom of my oven to become a pie crust charcoal brick. (and the pie still slouched)
I think what you're experiencing isn't crust slouch, it's shrink. As moisture evaporates from the dough during baking, it loses volume and shrinks. If I'm correct, your answer lies in the proportion of fat to water (and vodka, if you're using it), and also in giving your dough time to rest in the fridge so that the individual flour granules absorb and hold onto the water. So I recommend a) try my dough recipe and see if that makes a difference because it is balanced and includes rest time, and also b) never bake a bare pastry crust.
ReplyDeleteIf you're making a cream pie or other non-bake pie, you'll want a nut or crumb crust that can be fully toasted ahead, rather than a pastry crust. If you insist on a pastry crust (and why not, it's yummy!), you'll need to fully bake it with foil and pie weights, and only the edges will get brown. Cover the edges with foil until the last ten minutes or so, then let just the edges show if you want a blush of toast, but it won't brown like a fully-baked filled pie. This will help prevent shrinkage, and actually help prevent soggy bottom, too, as a dry-as-cracker crust will absorb more moisture from the filling.
I tend to always guess on the water/vodka mix proportion. Maybe I just throw in too much?
ReplyDeleteI'd go 1:2 on ice cold vodka to very cold water. And dribble it in as you toss, so you get even distribution. You can add this liquid more generously than straight water, but too much and you'll get smooshy dough.
DeleteI'd go 1:2 on ice cold vodka to very cold water. And dribble it in as you toss, so you get even distribution. You can add this liquid more generously than straight water, but too much and you'll get smooshy dough.
DeleteThat crust looks devine.
ReplyDeleteIt is a fun and tasty alternative, I must say.
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