10:38pm, quiet, quiet night … with the exception of the dishwasher running in the background.
So several months back, I was very much hit by the Pinterest bug. What don't you love about Pinterest? You scroll through them pics and whatever tickles your fancy, you pin it!! Easy peasy, Pinterest is easy!! (Hey!! That rhymes!!)
Anyway, I learnt quickly that Pinterest is a good way to start a picture board of things you love, wish to have, etc. One of my boards is called "Chef Buddy Crocker": it depicts all the different dishes that I love and would love to try and make …
http://www.pinterest.com/budfuad/chef-buddy-crocker
I usually Pin at night, just before I sleep - its my quiet Moomy hour, you see. And lately, I saw many Pins for hand pies … so when I found one for an Apple Hand Pie, I knew I had to make it soon.
That "soon" was today!!
The recipe is simple enough … at least that's what I thought. The only thing I don't like about it is the waiting period, because I had to pop the bowls of flour and cubed butter in the freezer to chill. But no worries … I have read that with pastry, cold butter works best because it makes the pastry very flaky. Flaky sounds good so wait I must!
I was supposed to use a pastry blender but lo and behold, I do not have that gadget (we just moved here so give me a break!). *rolls eyes* Improvise it is. I tried using my potato masher but the flour went everywhere. By this time, I thought I'd just use the old rubbing-in technique. That had worked well before for me whenever I make my famous Apple Crumble.
I forgot I was working with flour and cubed butter that had sat in the freezer for 1 hour!
Boy, I have never felt my fingers go stiff from cold like this ever!! At one point, I did went back to the potato masher but it was just too messy. So I had to plough through this painful process …
While I rubbed the cubes of butter into my flour, I had a mantra going on in my head - This had better be good. This should be good. This had better be good … this should be good BECAUSE MY FINGERS ARE BLOODY FREEZING!!
Finally … o finally, the mixture resembled coarse bread crumbs. Phew. I was just so happy I didn't get any frostbite.
So several months back, I was very much hit by the Pinterest bug. What don't you love about Pinterest? You scroll through them pics and whatever tickles your fancy, you pin it!! Easy peasy, Pinterest is easy!! (Hey!! That rhymes!!)
Anyway, I learnt quickly that Pinterest is a good way to start a picture board of things you love, wish to have, etc. One of my boards is called "Chef Buddy Crocker": it depicts all the different dishes that I love and would love to try and make …
http://www.pinterest.com/budfuad/chef-buddy-crocker
I usually Pin at night, just before I sleep - its my quiet Moomy hour, you see. And lately, I saw many Pins for hand pies … so when I found one for an Apple Hand Pie, I knew I had to make it soon.
That "soon" was today!!
The recipe is simple enough … at least that's what I thought. The only thing I don't like about it is the waiting period, because I had to pop the bowls of flour and cubed butter in the freezer to chill. But no worries … I have read that with pastry, cold butter works best because it makes the pastry very flaky. Flaky sounds good so wait I must!
I was supposed to use a pastry blender but lo and behold, I do not have that gadget (we just moved here so give me a break!). *rolls eyes* Improvise it is. I tried using my potato masher but the flour went everywhere. By this time, I thought I'd just use the old rubbing-in technique. That had worked well before for me whenever I make my famous Apple Crumble.
I forgot I was working with flour and cubed butter that had sat in the freezer for 1 hour!
Don't let those innocent cubes of butter fool ya!
Boy, I have never felt my fingers go stiff from cold like this ever!! At one point, I did went back to the potato masher but it was just too messy. So I had to plough through this painful process …
While I rubbed the cubes of butter into my flour, I had a mantra going on in my head - This had better be good. This should be good. This had better be good … this should be good BECAUSE MY FINGERS ARE BLOODY FREEZING!!
Finally … o finally, the mixture resembled coarse bread crumbs. Phew. I was just so happy I didn't get any frostbite.
The cubed butter has finally been incorporated into the flour + salt!
As I had mentioned before, there was a lot of inactive cooking time (i.e. the dough kept going back into the fridge to rest). It was fine by me since it gave me time to prep for dinner and the apple filling.
And after all that waiting and rolling and more waiting …
Apple Hand Pies :D
Ta daaaaa!! :D You should have smelt the aroma of the pastry that was coming out of the oven. The pastry itself was so buttery and just heavenly!! I should have added more of the apple filling but that's alright. I'd do that next time.
And the name was perfect too - Apple Hand Pies. Perfect for your hand, perfect size to make you go for seconds! I only used half of the dough tonight and I got 10 little pies (about 3 inches in diameter). I followed the recipe pretty much to a T; only difference was I added a bit of cinnamon to my apples. Cinnamon and apples go together like … bees and honey, rosemary and lamb, fish and chips …
I should really stop, huh?
So those were our dessert (and most likely my breakfast for tomorrow!) … and dinner was Chinese-style Beef & Broccoli and stir-fried cabbage & carrots with tang hoon. My mum used to make this stir-fried cabbage for me when I was still living at home. Hehehehe and now I'm cooking it for my little family :-D
Tonight's dinner!
There you have it. My first post on food. I doubt it's the last … for I'm sure there'll be more to come. It's fun to do it here on a proper blog than trying to post consecutive pictures of a dinner-in-progress on Instagram. It ain't perfect - not like how The Pioneer Woman captured her cooking - but I'm learning! :D
For now … let me put my feet up and enjoy the lingering smell of apples and cinnamon and butter in the air! Nighty night! :D
No comments:
Post a Comment