MAKING IT UP AS I GO ALONG

Mom. Put down your phone.

I place it on the floor and throw my hands up.

Bang. You're dead. Now, mom, just snuggle with me in my bed. Please.

No, thanks.

I don't know how to lie down next to a child at night without falling asleep.

Just for a moment. Come on.

Okay, Dash. But please keep me awake. I have so much to do.

Aren't you done writing your book? You're taking forever.

I collapse on the bed. He drags his comforter up to my chin.

Mom. How can I keep you awake?

Ask me questions, Dash.

Why do you put that face powder on in the morning?

To even out my skin tone.

Why do onions make you cry?

They make other people cry too.

Do oysters breathe? Do they have mouths? Do they eat?

Yes. I don't know. Yes.

How many bones are in the body?

I aced my anatomy final at 20.  And then again at 30. 

103 bones.

Wow.

 Now it's my turn, Dash. I have a question.

Okay.

Did you like my blackberry pie?

Yes. Yes, I did.

Cool. Because it was my first one. So I was a little nervous about it.

It was deeeeeeelicious.

Oh that's so freaking cool. I thought it was delicious too.

Don't say freaking, mom. It's a bad word.

Did you know that my love for you is so deep that I feel it in the marrow of my bones?

Eww. Mom. God. Yuck. Just stop talking. Close your eyes. You are getting veeeeeererrrryyyy sleeeeeepppppyyyyyy. 

I pull George the stuffed cheetah straight to my chest.

Dashi?

What?

How much do you love me?

Way more than pie.

I startle awake in the middle of the night with a sweaty Dashoctopus glued to my torso, fingers grasping my collar bones, legs wrapped around mine as if he's climbing a tree. I unhook, unwrap, and unstick my creature and roll him over to his skeleton pillow.

I pick my phone up off the floor and Google "how many bones are in the human body?"

Whoops.

I carefully lift Dash's arm up off of his chest and start palpating his hand, looking for all 27 of his six-year-old hand bones.

Mom. What are you doing? Stop. 

I just want you to know that I was wrong. There are 206 bones in the body. Not 103. 

Whatever. Good night. Happy Dreams.

So the pie...

Weaving together the strips of dough on a warm afternoon was a bitch, requiring all kinds of patching, tucking, and faking-it tweaking.

A quarter of the latticed lid fell down into the macerating fruit even before I put it in the oven. It continued to descend into the steamy jam as it cooked.

I pulled it out of the oven and put it back in and pulled it back out put it back in.

I talked to it.

I got down on my knees and then my belly and photographed the scrappy mashup from every angle—splats, leftovers, and all.

This is not your great-grandmother's pie. There were no lessons passed down through hands or tales or stained recipe cards. I made it up.

It was a hot beautiful mess.

BLACKBERRY PIE
printable recipe

serves 6-8
Remember to make your pie dough a few hours or a day ahead.
I used a 9" round pie plate (8" square works great too).
I approached this pie the way I make tarts: not too sweet and a bit undercooked. Taste your berries. If they're tart, add a few extra tablespoons of sugar. The pie will be juicy and runny and messy. It will probably bubble over. And if you want how-tos on latticing your pie, head on over to Simply Recipes or Food52, because I don't know what I'm doing! But it's fun to play. Improvise if you feel like it. I did! It will taste the same.

ingredients:

2 batches pie dough, chilled for at least 2 hours

6 cups blackberries

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

1 egg

1 tablespoon heavy cream

2 tablespoon turbinado sugar

directions:

Remove the discs of dough from the fridge and set aside to soften for about 20 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 400°F.

In a large bowl, toss together the berries, salt, sugar, flour, vanilla, lemon juice, and zest. Set aside until the juices start to flow. About 20 minutes. Stir occasionally.

On a piece of parchment paper, roll out one disc of dough to about an inch larger in diameter than your pie plate. With a pizza cutter, a knife, or scissors, cut into 1" strips. Set aside. If it's a hot afternoon, chill until ready to use.

Roll out the other disc of dough to about about an inch larger in diameter than your pie plate. Press into the pie plate, leaving an inch overhang. Fill with the berry mixture. Start latticing with the pre-cut strips. See links above in the recipe intro for details. Visuals really help.  Or wing it like I did: weave the strips together into a lovely quadrant pattern and hope for the best. With your thumb or a fork, crimp the the top lattice pieces down to the lower disc of dough. Trim off excess and freeze scraps for later use.

Whisk together egg and cream. With a pastry brush or a spoon, paint exposed tart dough with the mixture. Sprinkle with with turbinado sugar.

Bake until lattice top is golden brown and fruit is bubbling and starting to soften (about 45 minutes). If the pie starts to brown too quickly on top, turn the temperature down to 375°F and cover with tin foil. Serve with vanilla bean ice cream. It's great cold for breakfast splashed with heavy cream or half and half.

RECIPE COUNTDOWN TO 2010: NUMBER 5

NUMBER 5: SHORTCRUST PASTRY

Tomorrow I'm going to post recipes for lamb pie and chanterelles tart. But first I thought I'd talk a bit about shortcrust pastry. You can buy a frozen tart shell at the supermarket. Often they are quite good. But if you have time to do one at home it's pretty straightforward.

Kids love dough. Even when it's just flour, salt, butter, and water. It's just like working with clay. And it tastes so much better. Give your kids the scraps to taste and use to make their own mini-tarts. Last week Dash and Bella did one with strawberry jam.

For the first time in (almost) 40 years I can make shortcrust pastry dough for a tart, galette, or pie without referring to a recipe. I have my own recipe. A template. Very satisfying. I might add cornmeal and pepper to one or vanilla and lemon zest to another.  But it's basically the same each time. Here's a bit of what I've learned.

TIPS:
1. When you first start making this dough you'll learn more if you do it by hand. It's hard to overmix when you're doing it by hand. I can't tell you how many times I've over-pulsed dough with the Cuisinart. It's really hard to see what's going on in there. Get your hands into the dough instead.
2. To incorporate the butter into the flour mixture you need to squeeze the butter and flour between your fingers quite vigorously, as if you're trying to snap your fingers.
3. Use very cold butter and liquid.
4. Make the dough ahead of time so that it can chill in the fridge for at least an hour before you roll it out.

STEPS:
1. Combine the dry ingredients.
 2. Cut the cold butter into 1/2 inch square chunks. Mix in the butter until the dough looks like coarse cornmeal with pea-sized chunks.
 3. Add some of the cold liquid. Lightly mix with your fingers or a fork.  Press a bit of the dough together between your fingers. You want it to just come together into a dough. Add more liquid if it's too dry.

4. Place onto a long piece of plastic wrap and use the sides of the plastic wrap to press the dough together and flatten into a disc. Look closely. You want to see chunks of butter.

5. Chill for at least an hour. Roll out using lots of flour on the board and rolling pin. Press into a tart pan, pie pan, or place flat onto a sheet pan for a galette.

VARIATIONS:

Once you get comfortable making this recipe you can play around a bit by adding the butter in 2 batches. Add the first half of butter to the flour mixture and mix until it looks like coarse cornmeal. Add second half of butter and mix it in until second half of butter looks like large peas. This makes the dough tender and flaky at the same time. Proceed with steps 4 and 5.

Play with adding different flavors depending on the filling. To the flour you could add: salt, pepper, lemon zest, cinnamon, sugar or cornmeal. You could replace some of the cold liquid with: milk, cream, vanilla, lemon juice, or orange juice.

BASIC SHORTCRUST PASTRY RECIPE:  
This works well for any recipe that calls for tart, double-crust pie, or galette dough. Just double the recipe and split into 2 even discs for double-crust pie dough.  It freezes really well for months.

printable recipe

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons unsalted butter (one stick), cut into small chunks and very cold

3-6 tablespoons ice water

Mix flour and salt in a bowl. Cut butter into 1/2 inch square chunks and toss into dry ingredients. With your fingers or a pastry cutter, incorporate the butter into the flour mixture until the butter chunks are the size of peas. Add half the cold water and mix it in with a fork. Add more water if you need to, enough so that when you squeeze the mixture in your fingers it's just moist enough to form a dough. Pour dough out onto a large piece of plastic wrap. Use the sides of the plastic wrap to press the dough into a disc. Wrap tightly and refrigerate for at least an hour before rolling it out.