Pinstrosity: Mix It Up Monday: Patriotic Food

Are you still trying to decide on what to bring to the 4th of July party? Need an extra plate of something on your buffet table for your friends? Here are some great 4th of July recipes and food to give a shot this year!

This first one is one I have personally tried and loved. In fact, you've seen it on the blog before, but I'll post it here again for you. The Caramel Apple Pie in a Cinnamon Roll Crust. Mmmmm! If I had to choose between pie or cake, I'd choose pie any day. Especially this one.

http://www.ohnuts.com/blog/cinnamon-bun-pecan-pie-recipe/

The directions said you can use pre-made crust, or make your own from scratch, so I turned to my trusty pie crust recipe (it really is simple and really yummy). I did a double batch of pie crust dough for the bottom so I would be sure to have enough and it ended up being perfect. It really was easy to put the crust together, the directions are simple. Here's what my crust looked like after getting it in the pan:

Then, this is the recipe I used for the pie. I'm not normally a huge apple pie fan, but I love this recipe and it's so easy. Cut up the apples, put the lattice top on, and then you make a caramel sauce and pour it through the lattice. SOOOOOoooo yummy and easy. For the lattice top I rolled out the plain dough, then spread some melted butter, cinnamon, and sugar on top. I then smooshed the dough back together gently (because you don't want to mix it too well), and rolled it out again to get a sort of cinnamon/sugar marbled effect going on. Then I cut my lattice strips and put the top on. Here's the pie right before going into the oven:

And here's the finished product!

So we know it looks cool, but what about the taste? Let's just say that I will forever do my apple pie crusts like this now. It's adds such a subtle but yummy yummy yummy flavor to the pie. And I apparently didn't get the bottom crust flattened as thin as I thought so I ended up with a thicker crust (which I LOVE) that is extra yummy to eat because of the cinnamon in it and the pie filling soaked in. This one is WELL worth the time it takes to make it. MMMmmmmmmm.

Well, since I love pies so much, I'll give you another pie! This is from one of our early posts.

The Original Pin

http://www.womansday.com/recipefinder/stars-stripes-pie-121895

Doesn't that look amazing?! Oh man, I want to go make pie now. This was Marty's first pie attempt, which I'm rather impressed that she'd do this as her first pie...it would have scared me away to try and make this pie on my first pie making experience. So 100 points to Gryffindor (and Marty) for that.

Marty tells us "I tried to make this for 4th of July. I followed the recipe exactly with the exception that I used strawberry pie filling instead of cherries because I don't like cherries. I used pie filling from a can and in the amount called for in the recipe. This was my first pie. It looked quite pretty before I put it in the oven. I even made sure I had 13 stripes. I was very excited."

The Pinstrosity

Still not bad. Here's what Marty had to say about it:

"Well, the filling overflowed all over my oven. Clearly, it called for too much filling. Also, as you can see, it doesn't look like the Woman's Day picture. It also didn't taste good. Next time, I will not fill it as full and I will make my own filling. I will try again next year."

I love Marty's resolve. So many of us quit after projects don't turn out quite how we want them to. Way to go Marty.

So on to dissecting this pie.

The Pie Filling

Marty used strawberry pie filling instead of cherry pie filling because she's not a big fan of cherries (which I probably would have done too...not a cherry fan). The only thing that probably affected was the color of the red in the pie; it wasn't as vibrant as the cherries.
Like Marty, I think there was too much pie filling. When I read the original recipe I thought, "Holy cow, that's a lot of filling. That'll never fit in a 9" pie pan." I have trouble keeping 1 can of filling from going over the sides of the pie, let alone 3 and a half! I would probably start with one can and then add fresh fruit into it to get the consistency right. That's one of my favorite pie tricks, adding fresh-or frozen sometimes-fruit to the pie filling; it gives a great textures and adds nicely to the flavor of the pie. I especially do this with berry filling (and especially with strawberry filling) since sometimes the canned pie fillings have a funny aftertaste, which may have been Marty's taste issue, I don't know...having not tasted it I can't say what to do about the taste.

The crust.

I'm just not a fan of pre-made pie crusts. I'm not a fan of the flavor and they are usually thinner than I like them. I know it's easy to just pick one up at the store, but I just have never had great luck with them (I know some have wonderful success stories with them, but not me). I would always suggest making your own crust. It's really easy, and yummy, and you get to make it as thick as you want (I LOVE thick pie crust).

Here's the super simple and yummy recipe I love:
http://mowercooking.blogspot.com/2012/02/pie-crust.html

It looks like Marty needed a higher crust in her pie to help hold in all the filling. Making your own crust will let you customize things to get the desired effect. The crust around the edges also makes a nice frame for the stars and stripes, pulling the whole design together. And it'll help the stripes not to slip around when baking. What I would do, is to cut the stripes longer than the width of the pie, then lay them over and pinch the edges of the stripes into the crust to help solidify everything. Then after that you could crimp the crust (or do whatever crust design you want).
Placing the stripes in line with the blueberries rather than at an angle also might help give more of a flag look to the pie, if that's what your going for. I think Marty's looks fine, but there's another option for the pie.

And now I have 4 more pie pins for you. These looks scrumptiously patriotic (not that I've heard anything described as scrumptiously patriotic, but that seems fitting for these pies).