Learning 2 Bake – From Scratch XLV

Pompion Pie

This is my first Tasting History dish! I love the videos, but I hadn’t made anything until now.

I’m not a big fan of the “measure each ingredient into its own little bowl” mise en place, but I do like the “get everything out of the cupboard to make sure nothing is missing” version of it. From the picture, can you tell what I forgot to buy, yesterday?

I also have a rosemary plant in the window, but rosemary hates me. It’s over a year old and only two inches tall. At least this one sprouted, but it’s definitely not harvestable. The latest batch of thyme seed must have been irradiated somewhere along the line because I’ve planted it several times and it doesn’t even sprout. I have another seed packet, but haven’t gotten around to planting it, yet. I purchased those two. But, yay! I harvested my parsley!

This started with a trip to the liquor store to get “sherry or sack”. I don’t know what “sack” is and neither did anyone in the store, so sherry it is.

Some of the YouTube commenters recommended baking the pumpkin before peeling it. I didn’t want it precooked before the frying step, so I did not.

I did take the advice to slice it up, first. I’m hardly an expert at peeling things with a paring knife, but the pumpkin was difficult. I did the apples, too, just to be sure it wasn’t me or the knife. I didn’t manage my grandmother’s level of a single coil of skin, but note how much bigger the apple skin pieces are than the pumpkin skin pieces. It wasn’t dreadful, but a short pre-bake to soften it up certainly wouldn’t hurt.

If it’s hot enough to soften the pumpkin, it’s hot enough to scramble the egg. The egg mixture would have made an excellent quiche. While that was cooking, I rolled out the crust.

I made the crust the night before. The grocery store had Kerry butter at half price, so I bought a couple of pounds of it. This is my first time using it in pie crust, but I hear it’s very good. That frying pumpkin looked like enough for two, so split the apples.

Then I changed my mind. Now, I need to make another topless pie. I’m not sure what that will be, but it would be a shame to waste that nice crust.

It certainly looks good! It smells more like stuffing/dressing than it does a pie. I’m very excited to try it, but the contest is not until later so it must remain pretty.