Peach-Blueberry Pie with Reduced-Fat Pie Crust

There are certain foods I call “white shirt” dishes. These are foods that, like a white shirt, are a can't-go-wrong choice for almost any situation. In my view, a good fresh-baked fruit pie is one of these. Pie has been served by people in all walks of life for centuries, and with good reason: it’s basic, classic, delicious, and will be welcomed practically anywhere food is being served.


Another bonus: despite what you may think if you've never made one, pies are stunningly easy to make, even if you’re working completely from scratch. And even if you’re using a lattice top, simple step-by-step instructions for which are included below.


If all of that seems like a big responsibility for a humble baked good to carry, don’t worry. Pie can handle it, including the one I’m happy to bring to you today: Peach-Blueberry Pie.


A few cook’s notes:


Pie Crust: Use any you like, home-made or purchased, but to reduce the fat content I recommend a reduced-fat version I use on pretty much anything requiring a pie crust. The recipe, which is a slightly jazzed-up version of the one previously posted here under the title, “Impossible Pie Crust,” follows.


Fruit for the Filling: Although I’m not usually a fan of canned ingredients, for recipes like this I don’t at all mind using canned peaches if fresh, juicy ones are not in season. Similar to the reason canned tomatoes are often used in cooking by people who would otherwise never get near a can opener, canned peaches have a more consistent quality than fresh ones. (Just be sure to drain them very well, since they can bring a lot more liquid to your filling than fresh peaches will.) Fresh blueberries, however, are much better to use than the frozen ones. For reasons best left to the chemists to figure out, I’ve found that blueberries tend to toughen up when frozen and thawed.


Tapioca: While it’s possible to thicken with corn starch, using tapioca leaves a cleaner taste. For pie fillings, use instant tapioca; regular tapioca will still thicken but miniature tapioca pearls will be visible. Also, tapioca works best at fairly hot temperatures; I usually bake pies at 350 degrees, but with a tapioca-thickened filling I’ll bake at 425 for a shorter time. Letting your fruit come to room temperature before adding it to the filling also helps the tapioca’s thickening effect.


Thank you, Chef Alex: Credit to Alex Guarnaschelli for the simple but near-genius idea of adding preserves to pie filling.


Enough chit-chat…let’s make some pie! This recipe makes one 9” pie.


First, the low-fat pie crust. Since it’s just as easy to make four crusts as it is to make two, this recipe makes four crusts. (You’ll need two for the Peach-Blueberry pie, and can freeze the other two for up to three months.) Once you have the other two available in the freezer, you’ll think of all kinds of things to do with them!   


Combine 1 cup of apple juice, ½ teaspoon cider vinegar and 2 teaspoons of salt and put into freezer until almost icy.


In a mixing bowl, combine 1-1/2 pounds of all-purpose flour, 8 ounces of cake flour, and 6 tablespoons of sugar. Blend in 16 ounces of firm-textured butter substitute (cut into cubes or chunks) until the mixture resembles a coarse meal with visible pieces of butter substitute.


Add the juice mixture and blend until the dough holds together when pinched.













Divide the dough into four equal parts and wrap each in plastic. Chill two in the refrigerator for one hour, and label and freeze the other two for future use.












Now let’s make our filling!


Preheat the oven to 425.


Blind bake pie shell. (If you’re not familiar with how to do this, fear not; click here for a short tutorial video!)


While shell is blind baking, combine the following filling ingredients: 3-1/2 cups room temperature peaches, pitted, peeled and sliced into wedges; 1 cup room temperature fresh blueberries; 3/4 cup light brown sugar; juice and zest of one lemon; 6 tablespoons instant tapioca; 12 ounces peach preserves; 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract; 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon; 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg; and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Let the mixture rest for 10 – 15 minutes so the tapioca can absorb liquid.


When the bottom crust is ready, put the filling in, using a slotted spoon and draining the each spoonful very well before placing it in the pie shell. (Reserve the liquid for use to glaze the pie later.) Dot with butter substitute. [Ed. Note: When making the pie in the photo, I confess to having forgotten to add the butter substitute. Fortunately, since this was a lattice-top pie, I was able to apply it later.]


Apply solid or lattice top. To make a lattice top:

• Roll out the dough for the top crust large enough to fit over the pie shell. (This is the same as you would do if you were using a solid top.)

• Slice the rolled out dough into strips. (I use about ¾” wide strips, but you can make them however wide you like. Many people make a lattice top with strips 1-1/2” to 2” wide strips.)

• Place an odd number of strips across the top of the filled pie shell. The center strip should go right down the middle of the pie, and the other strips should be spaced evenly on either side of it.

• Fold down every second strip as shown, and lay another strip across the unfolded strips as shown.



• Unfold the folded strips.









• Fold down the strips that weren’t folded the first time and lay a strip across the unfolded strips as shown.





• Repeat until half the pie has a lattice top.











• Working in the opposite direction, form the lattice top for the other half of the pie.









• Using a kitchen scissor, trim the excess length from the strips. (Don’t pull it off by hand, which can overwork the gluten in the dough and make it tough.)


Wet a finger with cold water and rub it along the edges of the crust to make a smooth seal between the top crust and the bottom crust.





(Shown here with the finished edge.)












Place the pie in the oven.












After about 35 minutes, brush the reserved liquid onto the top crust as a glaze, and continue baking until the top is golden brown, about another 10 minutes. (Check the pie periodically during the entire baking time and, if the edges start to brown before the rest of the pie, cover the edges with foil or an aluminum collar.)


Let the pie cool before serving to allow the filling to thicken properly.


All that’s left is to put up a pot of coffee and invite some friends over to share your delicious pie! (Just don’t tell them how easy it is to make.)






Come back next week for another reduced-fat, easy-to-make, home-tested recipe! Till then, stay well, keep it about the food, and always remember to kiss the cook. ;-)

Bread Pudding Duet

This past week I was faced with a difficult choice. With two delicious bread pudding recipes available - Peach Bread Pudding and French Toast Bread Pudding – I was having a tough time deciding which to publish. Only after much thoughtful deliberation did the right choice become clear: publish both and avoid making a decision all together. (It’s why I order steaks “medium”.) You'll see the basic method is the same for the two recipes; the only difference is some of the ingredients.


For anyone who has not yet experienced the sheer joy of a good bread pudding, the idea is simple: soak bread thoroughly in a custard (think French Toast), bake it until the mixture is firm, and serve it topped with dessert sauces, fruit, ice cream, or anything else you like. Depending on the recipe, almost any type of bread can be used: brioche, challah, French bread. I recently was in an Irish restaurant and had the pleasure of eating bread pudding made with Irish Soda Bread. Some people – I swear I’m not making this up – even make it with donuts. For the recipes below, I chose sweet Hawaiian bread and vanilla ice cream topping for the peach bread pudding and, since challah makes such great French Toast, I used challah with a pancake syrup topping for the French Toast Bread Pudding.


A couple of additional notes on the ingredients:
• The fat is reduced through the use of fat-free half-and-half (in place of the usual heavy cream) and egg-substitute.
• Canned peaches are used instead of fresh. As noted in the recipe for Mango and Friends Chunky Fruit Salad from a few weeks ago, I normally favor fresh fruits over canned, but sometimes make an exception for peaches since the texture and flavor of the fresh ones can be very inconsistent through the season. (This is similar to the reason so many cooks choose canned tomatoes over fresh.)
There’s a lot of inactive time involved, but the recipes themselves are easy. Each recipe below makes 6 – 8 dessert-size servings.


To make Peach Bread Pudding:


Tear one pound of Hawaiian Bread into 1” pieces and toast it lightly or, better, leave it out overnight to get stale.


Once the bread is either toasted or stale, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. While the oven is preheating, divide a 29 ounce can of peaches in juice into a ¾ cup portion (about 1-1/2 full peaches) and the remainder (about 1 cup, or 2 full peaches). Mash the ¾ cup portion, and slice the remainder portion into wedges. Set both aside.


Form a custard by whisking together 2 cups of fat free half-and-half; 4 egg-substitute eggs; ¼ cup honey; ½ teaspoon of kosher salt; ¼ teaspoon of nutmeg, and ½ cup low-fat peach yogurt. When the custard is mixed, fold in the mashed peaches and set aside.
Place the bread pieces in an 8’ x 11” baking dish greased with butter substitute. Pour the custard mixture over the bread and let it rest for about 10 minutes while the bread absorbs the liquid. If necessary, press down gently on the bread to help the process.


Cover the pan with foil and bake until a knife inserted comes out clean, about 40 minutes. If you’d like the top browned, remove the foil and let bake for another 5 – 10 minutes. When you’re done, take the baking pan out of the oven, let the bread pudding cool and cut into rectangles with a knife or into rounds with a cookie cutter. Garnish the sliced peaches and a good vanilla ice cream, and you’ve got a tasty dessert without a lot of fuss!


Or, if you prefer the French Toast Bread Pudding:



Slice a one pound challah bread into 1” slices and carefully cut off the crusts. Toast the pieces lightly or, better, leave them out overnight to get stale.


Once the challah is either toasted or stale, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.


Form a custard by whisking together 2 cups of fat free half-and-half; 4 egg-substitute eggs; ¼ cup honey; ½ teaspoon of kosher salt; ¼ teaspoon of nutmeg, ½ tablespoon of vanilla extract, ¼ teaspoon of ground cinnamon, and ½ cup low-fat plain yogurt.


Place the challah pieces in an 8’ x 11” baking dish greased with butter substitute. Pour the custard mixture over the challah and let it rest for about 10 minutes while the challah absorbs the liquid. If necessary, press down gently on the challah to help the process.


Cover the pan with foil and bake until a knife inserted comes out clean, about 40 minutes. If you’d like the top browned, remove the foil and let bake for another 5 – 10 minutes. When you’re done, take the baking pan out of the oven, let the bread pudding cool and cut into rectangles with a knife or into rounds with a cookie cutter. Top the pudding with syrup, sliced fruit, or anything else that goes well with French Toast, and you’ve got another tasty dessert, also without a lot of fuss!


So now you have two delicious bread puddings to make and serve! And, as you can see from the above recipes, bread pudding provides a lot of opportunities to put in – or take out – anything that’s to your liking to make endless variations of this tasty, classic dessert.


If you‘d like a cookbook style, notebook ready copy of these recipes, just let me know, make sure I have your e-mail address, and they shall be yours!


I’m looking forward to seeing you again next week. Till then, stay well, keep it about the food, and always remember to kiss the cook. ;-)

Mango and Friends Chunky Fruit Salad Sauce

A warm welcome to Isabel, a new subscriber (and fine baker) from the Facebook side!


With warm weather on the way, it’s a good time to gather up recipes for dishes that not only taste great, but that are also cool and refreshing. In the past I’ve been able to share a recipe for my favorite cold, tangy gazpacho. Today we have Mango and Friends Chunky Fruit Salad Sauce. (It’s a pity something that tastes so good ended up with such an awkward name, but even after much thought I just couldn’t come up with a better one. If anyone makes this and, after tasting it, can suggest a better name, I’d be happy to consider it.)


Mango and Friends Chunky Fruit Salad Sauce is something like chunky applesauce, except it’s made from a lovely-tasting combination of mango, pears, cantaloupe and peaches. What do you do with it? Anything you do with applesauce: enjoy it as is, especially with a bit of sharp cheddar cheese (as seen in the photo); bake it into cakes and muffins; spread it on potato pancakes; use it to glaze chicken…you get the idea.


As recipes go, this one is both easy and delicious. If you’ve never cut up a mango before, you may find that part of it a little challenging at first, but you’ll manage it. (Cutting up your first mango is something like cutting up your first whole chicken. You’ll turn it over and around a lot, cutting where it seems to make sense to, wondering how in the world people on cooking shows can do it so neatly, and eventually finish with a pile of pieces, no two of which look alike. Don't worry; they'll work just fine.)


Another recipe note: you’ll see that all the fruit used in this recipe is fresh, except the peaches. You can make this with fresh peaches if you like, but I chose canned here for the same reason cooks generally use canned tomatoes instead of fresh ones: consistency. Great peaches, like great tomatoes, are available for about two and a half minutes a year; the rest of the time, you take your chances as to how they taste and feel. (Okay, the two and a half minutes is a bit of an exaggeration, but you know what I’m getting at.)


Something else worth pointing out: the fruit mixture is seasoned using, among other things, salt. The salt and fruit combination may strike some people as strange, but one of the best bits of cooking advice I ever got was never to underestimate how nicely a bit of salt can bring out the flavor of fruit.


This recipe makes 4 to 5 cups, depending on the size of the fruit you use and the thickness to which you cook it down.
Prepare the fruit by peeling and coring 4 pears, and slicing them into ¼” thick pieces; peeling and slicing ½ a medium cantaloupe into ¼” thick pieces; peeling 1 mango and cutting into bite-size pieces; and cutting two well-drained 15 ounce cans of sliced peaches in juice into bite-size pieces.


Combine the pears, cantaloupe, 1 tablespoon of brown sugar, the juice and zest of 1 lemon, 1/3 cup orange juice, ½ teaspoon of ground cinnamon, ½ teaspoon of kosher salt and ¼ teaspoon of ground nutmeg in a saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to a simmer.


After the mixture has simmered (uncovered) for about 10 minutes, add the mango and peaches. Stir to combine, bring the heat up again until the mixture boils, then lower the heat to a simmer. Simmer until the mixture has a “chunky applesauce” consistency, about 1 hour. (Use a masher after about 50 minutes, but be sure to leave the overall texture chunky.)


Refrigerate overnight in a sealed container, then use anywhere you would applesauce.
You can’t get fresh-made good taste much easier than that!


For a cookbook-style, notebook-ready copy of this or any other Kissing the Cook recipe, just drop me a line or a comment, and include your e-mail address. It will be yours before you know it!


See you next week! Till then, stay well, keep it about the food, and always remember to kiss the cook. ;-)

Oh Crepe!

Ok, I admit it. I messed up.

Normally I'm fairly rigorous about my mise-en-place, that French cooking term which translates, roughly, to "Exactly how dumb would you have to be to start cooking without checking first if you have all your ingredients?" (It does lose something in the translation.)

A couple of weekends ago, my vision of a perfect-50's-television-family Sunday morning breakfast of freshly made peach crepes came crashing back to reality when, part way through mixing the batter, I found I didn't have the milk called for in the recipe. Rummaging through the refrigerator, the closest thing to milk I could find was sour cream. Hardly an ideal substitute, but it's my firm belief that if an idea is the only one you have, it doesn't matter much if it's good or bad. (MacGyver would be so proud.)

As you might expect, the sour cream made for a much thicker batter than would the milk. If you've ever made crepes, you know that, while they're not at all hard to make, the thickness/thinness of the batter is critical. I found that increasing the amount of water called for in the original recipe brought the batter back to its intended thickness, while still allowing the nice flavor added by the sour cream to come through. The disaster for which breakfast was originally headed was, I am happy to report, avoided. It turned out so well that the sour-cream version has now become my go-to crepe recipe.

Crepes, of course, are one of the great, versatile foods. Fill them with fruit for breakfast, with meat for dinner; I've even heard of filling them with lunch meat and cheese, similar to a wrap, for lunch. Remember, it's your crepe. Have fun with it! (My son did try using peanut butter and it was terrible. Even crepes, it would seem, have their limits.)

For the filling, a peach-compote of sorts was easy to make using an approach that will probably seem familiar to anyone who has ever made fruit jam.


To make about 8 crepes, combine 1 cup of all-purpose flour, ¼ teaspoon of salt, 2 tablespoons of butter substitute (melted), 2 egg-substitute eggs, 1 cup of low-fat sour cream and 1/2 cup of water in a bowl and mix well with an electric hand mixer on high. Add additional water, ¼ cup at a time, until the batter is the consistency of heavy cream. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest in the refrigerator for 1-2 hours.

After the batter has finished resting, heat a non-stick sauté pan over low heat. When it's heated, remove it from the stove, melt about a teaspoon of butter substitute in it, and add about ¼ cup of the batter. (Unlike pancakes, crepes are very thin.) Swirl the batter around to cover the surface of the pan, put it back on the stove and increase the heat to medium. (I recently saw one of my favorite tv chefs, Michael Chiarello, add a teaspoon of toasted chopped hazelnuts to the batter at this point. What a great idea!) When the crepe is browned on the bottom and firm enough to be flipped (usually about two minutes, but keep an eye on it), flip the crepe or use a spatula and your fingers (carefully!) to turn it over and cook it on the opposite side until it has the desired brownness. (If you're new at flipping, don't be discouraged if the first few flips don't work out. It's really the only challenging part of making a crepe, and it does get much better with just a little practice. The first time I made crepes I had to throw out the first three or four attempts. Stay with it. And this is a case where a good pan really does make a difference.) Repeat the process until all the batter is used, rebuttering the pan after each crepe, and stacking the cooked crepes as they finish. Keeping the stack covered with a clean towel to prevent them from drying out.

Of course, even good crepes need a nice filling.


For the filling, combine in a medium saucepan 1-1/2 cups of sugar and the juice and zest of 1 lemon. Heat it over very low heat, stirring often, until the mixture is melted. (This should take a few minutes.)

Once the sugar mixture is melted, add 6 peaches, sliced into eighths, ¼ tsp ground nutmeg, and 1 tablespoon of butter substitute, and increase the heat to medium. Cook until the peaches are soft and the liquid is reduced. Turn off heat and let the peach mixture rest to allow the liquid to thicken. Fill the crepes, roll them up, sprinkle them with a little confectioner's sugar, and serve warm.

(An equally nice apple filling can be made by using apples instead of peaches, and 1/2 tsp of ground cinnamon along with the nutmeg. I used golden delicious and it was delicious, but experiment with whatever your favorite apple is.)


After you've filled and folded over the crepe, don't forget to sprinkle confectioner's sugar on top!

Till next week, stay well, keep it about the food, and always remember to kiss the cook. ;-)