A Tribute to Summer

I am still on a high from my recent trip to Chicago for a fun-filled, work-free, kid(s) free, boy-free weekend with the ladies. I could set off to regale you with the details but I'm feeling a little less wordy today and yet have so much to share, so here's the abridged, cliff-notes version of the trip: 

Mango taco salad +Anthropologie+Magnolia Cupcakes for afternoon delight+Helmets and Segways+bruised arm+Walgreens hunting+late night heart-to-hearts+blue eyeliner+non-stop fragrance sampling+Sarah's brownies+Powder room @ The Drake+subway mad-dashing+silly giggling+ Walking for three hours for the love of food+slumped out at Macys because of the love of food+ "Almost" celebrity sighting+endless picture-taking+creased paper maps+Buca di Peppo group portrait+many minutes spent in awe of Buca di Peppo group portrait+wildberry preserve+delayed flights+wrong terminals+nonni's biscotti+many,many hugs=Weekend of indulgent eating with the chickadees (Gigi,Cookie and ST). You made me beam! 

On an unrelated topic we're commemorating hot days, abundance of summer fruit, beach fun, cute tees, cold lemonade and sandals, a.k.a "the arrival of the summer" with a luscious and sweet strawberry galette.

The aroma from baskets of ripe, succulent strawberries has rendered this girl a little light-headed and giggly right there in front of all the normal shoppers at the grocery store.                       


I am experiencing a strawberry-smitten summer, y'all. 


And in case you were wondering, there was no pastry meltdown. Second time's a charm it seems. Huzzah (followed by an imaginary cartwheel)!

Life lessons...from the Kitchen

I have been toying with the idea of a homemade pie for weeks now. I have made pies in the past but back then the crust always ended up being a store bought substitute because yours truly is not a planner and the "pie" idea  is always thought of 30 minutes before the dinner party arrives or 40 minutes before I have to skedaddle through the front door.

"This upcoming pie is going to be perfect because it will arise from a well-stocked pantry and a well-thought out recipe", said the singleton. Being as this is a carefully executed pie, I will attempt to replicate the sweet pastry dough from Page 444 of Dorie Greenspan's  "Baking from my home to yours" (on a side-note: she is brilliant and all her recipes are fantastic). This pie crust was going to turn into a galette. For the filling, I have decided its going to be a quince preserve base and canned peaches with a quick custard.Yes, I did say canned peaches.

Now, now don't judge and wrinkle your nose in disdain.

We have all ( yes even celebrity bakers) used canned fruit in our lifetime. It can be traced back to when we were children. Remember the assorted fruit custard dessert your mum used to make for company? Surely you don't think she cut up all that fruit....(if your mum did, then God bless her)

Eggs - check. Powdered sugar - check. Bookmark for recipe (in case the book closes in the middle of beating those eggs) - check. Off we go. 

And there I relearned it. A life lesson.Right there in my kitchen.

The pastry dough was coming along well. Except I forgot the part where I was supposed to chill the pastry dough for 30 minutes before I add my filling. Slowly but surely, my beloved crust was falling apart in my hands and I could feel cold cuts of butter giving up on me and threatening to turn into kitchen disaster # 560 and have me slumped on my kitchen floor, wailing, because I can't even get a rudimentary pie crust to wield to my will. "I will not give up" said the singleton. "Even a trained monkey can do this, it's so simple." The quince preserve used its super-powers to turn from semi-solid into liquid spilling all over my parchment sheet. The peaches? Well don't ask how even canned fruit decided to revolt against me.

The disheveled pie-crust made it into the oven against all odds and there I was feeling less excited about eating this well-thought out pie that I had mulled over for weeks and almost wishing that I had gone to the store instead. 30 long minutes later, it had baked no doubt but was still no closer to looking like a galette. And then to make matters worse (and because I'm human and want to tinker with something that looks bad in the hopes of making it better), I decided to perform an "omelet flip" to level one side of the pie crust that had sort of turned in. Big mistake, chickadee. Staring in my face, was the cousin of something that even the most accepting member of the pie family would disown. I poured in the custard because I had decided that this disaster was going to run its course and I would just write-off this entire afternoon and start thinking about pie in another six months around Thanksgiving.

Another long 30 minutes later,  my "mess" was ready to be rescued from the oven and back to kitchen counter. "I should at least taste it before I toss it". So I retrieved a spoon, hoping for the worst.

SURPRISE - it was lovely. Lacking in aesthetic appeal? Absolutely yes but absolutely delicious. The buttery crust and sweet peaches and comforting splashes of custard. All of it a winner in my book. 

So here it is my friend, the life lesson. No matter what you're going through and how furiously your boat seems to rock, remember that if you hold on and ride out the storm, it will eventually pass. Such is life in the big world. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel and sometimes even a surprise ending. In this case, a delightful spoon-full of it.