Category Archives: baking disasters

I Am A Pie Crust Failure

Posted on July 4, 2005 by Pamela

I do not understand why I cannot make pie crust.

I made a pie yesterday and bravely rolled out crumbled flour and by sheer force of will strong-armed it into the pie plate and patted scraps onto the top.

I made another pie today and I used *a different recipe* and again, only my determination made the thing hold together.

I read every “secrets of pie crust” recipe, article, side bar and website I come across. I have watched numerous others make pie crust even in my own kitchen using my own stuff. I have this problem at all times of year whether it’s cold or hot. I chill my water and fat within an inch of its life. I’ve used different kinds of flour.

I am possibly a bit timid with the water — but I thought you were supposed to be careful with the water. And by timid, I mean when it says to add, say 4 tablespoons and then if you need more, add it one more at a time, I add at least 2 more. Shouldn’t that be plenty? I guess not. Fat and/or water would seem to be what my pie dough lacks.

It’s not like the pies don’t taste good, but it’s not a lot of fun, scraping up flour crumbs and trying to patch the whole thing together.

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Amazing Ability

Posted on February 14, 2005 by Pamela

It’s a shame I haven’t found a way to capitalize on this amazing ability I have to make it rain. Way back when I lived in Lake Oswego and was a runner, I could get the clouds to give way simply by lacing on my running shoes. (I should probably qualify my “running” as an activity that looked more like fast walking. I think, back then, if chased by blood thirsty wolves, I could possibly run a whole mile in under 8 minutes. But only 1. Then I’d keel over. Now, I don’t know what would happen.)

This weekend the sun was out Friday and I thought what a great opportunity to get out in the yard seeing as how last weekend when I tried to go out there, it started raining. But Friday I had a zillion other activities going on. (A guy came over to give us an estimate on air conditioning and we’re going for it, yay! I know it sounds unimportant now, but wait until August.) But in my mind I was thinking we’d have sun all weekend so I’d have plenty of opportunities.

Saturday was drippy but yesterday I noticed sun. By the time I finished my chores and put on my work clothes and stepped into the yard, the sky had clouded over and as I walked out there with my tools, the drops started to fall. At first I ignored it but that lasted about 2 minutes and I had to run back inside.

I started doing something else and then Bob came home and we noticed the sun was out again so we decided to go for a walk. We put our shoes on and bam, rain again.

Meanwhile, I put out a medal consideration cooking performance this weekend. Friday I did my rosemary roasted chicken with vegetables. Saturday I made a Russian style soup with potatoes, greenbeans and sour cream and sauerkraut. Yesterday I made my gumbo with cornbread. I bobbled on the dessert.

I like to make Bob a special chocolate thing every Valentines Day and this year I saved a recipe from the Oregonian for Flourless Lavender Chocolate Torte using this designer chocolate that wasn’t cheap. I don’t know what went wrong but the thing didn’t set up in the oven. It just boiled in the pan. I left it in 10 minutes longer than the recipe called for and finally took it out and figured we’d have choco-blobs. As long as it tasted good.

It did harden in the fridge and I put it on a plate and it wasn’t pretty. I generously sprinkled powdered sugar. It tasted decent. I don’t think brilliant, but it was okay.

Between that and the gumbo I woke up at 1:30am and nothing would get me back to sleep. I did finish book #6 hypocrite in a poufy white dress by Susan Jane Gilman which is a memoir written by a woman my age who grew up in New York and had all kinds of funny adventures. But now I have to get through the day on about 4 hours of sleep.

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Crust Disaster: The Saga Continues

Posted on September 10, 2002 by Pamela

I made another apple pie last night and once again I had a mega-crust disaster. This has been an ongoing problem for the last two summers and I’ve been trying all these different tricks including three different brands of flour and I chill my water and chill the shortening and a bunch of slight variations on how I do it and every time is worse than the time before. Last night for the top crust I was — purely by force of will — patting together blobs of “dough” and dropping them onto the apples in the form of a top crust but it was a mess. It tasted fine so it’s not a big deal but it finally occurred to me that maybe I should try a different recipe. Maybe the old Betty Crocker standby was not meant for me.

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