Eleven Pies and a Wedding

    Mike and Tina's Wedding took place this afternoon (Saturday, August 13).  The wedding itself was very nice.  Bishop Putnam performed the ceremony and gave them sage advice about the difficult task of blending two families. It was a joyful, happy occasion and caused me to ponder just how much life can change over the course of a year.

    I was involved in a pie baking marathon the past few days in preparation for the wedding. I had committed to making 8 fruit pies for the wedding.  I made five pies on Friday and another four on Saturday morning. My daughter Rachel also brought up two apple peach pies from Portland and assisted me with the pies we made on Saturday. We ended up with a total of four cherry, three blueberry, two apple, and two apple peach.  Sherry Green made some wonderful cream pies as well so it was a veritable pie heaven. It still would have been a very nice wedding even without the pies.

   My wife was so impressed with some pies that Rachel had made a few weeks ago that she has been encouraging me to try out Rachel's pie crust recipe.  As it turns out, her recipe comes from Chef Emeril Lagasse on the internet. I wasn't unhappy with my recipe from the Mormon Family Cookbook but since we were making so many pies it seemed a good time to experiment.  My old pie crust recipe consisted of 2 1/4 cup of flour, 1 teaspoon of salt, 3/4 cup of shortening, and 1/3 cup of water.  Emeril's recipe consisted of 3 1/4 cup of flour, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 cup of cold butter, 2/3 cup of cold lard, and 4-5 tablespoons of water. I only used about 1/2 teaspoon of salt in either recipe.  I thought that both recipes made a nice pie crust, but Emeril's pie crust was a little easier to work and sure smelled better when the pie was in the oven. It's hard to beat cooking with real butter.

   We carved some appropriate messages in the pie crust, including some quotes from the "Princess Bride".  Rachel always bastes her pie crust with egg white. She says it makes the messages stand out better.  I really enjoyed the pie baking marathon. I always enjoy cooking with Rachel. She is such good company in the kitchen and I always seem to learn some new trick or technique from her. I also really enjoy cooking with grandkids and the chance to pass along some useful skills.  My grand daughter Chloe got a lesson in making pie crust and we had a good time.