It's as easy as pumpkin pie

Thanksgiving is not just about dinner; it's an all-day affair in the kitchen. It's a holiday centered on food: on food you eat only once a year, on traditions, on coming together to prepare a feast. So, as you and your family come together for the feast, the last thing you need--as you simultaneously watch the cranberries, the turkey, the stuffing, the breads, and the rolls--is something complicated and time-consuming.

Every year my family and I make this pie on Thanksgiving. It's not what you'd expect. It's not a complex array of ingredients tactfully concocted together and lovingly prepared for hours. It's your average pie made from prepared ingredients, and cooked on the morning of the big turkey day.

This is Libby's famous pumpkin pie recipe. Who's Libby? Oh well. You know the Libby's brand pumpkin purée? Yeah, that's her.

The Recipe:

1 (15oz) can Libby's pumpkin purée
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon*
1/2 tsp ground ginger*
1/4 tsp ground cloves*
2 large eggs
1 can (12oz) evaporated milk
2 pre-made 9-inch pie crusts OR 1 pre-made 9-inch deep-dish pie crust (either plain or graham cracker)

*if you do not have all of these spices readily available, feel free to substitute the cinnamon, cloves, ginger combination with 2 tsps of pumpkin pie spice (available from McCormick)

Preheat your oven to 425'F. Combine the dry ingredients in a small bowl. In another, larger bowl, whisk together the eggs and the pumpkin purée, then add the dry ingredients. Slowly add the evaporated milk, whisking after each addition. Place the pie crusts on a cookie sheet to avoid any spillage or leaking. Fill the pie crusts, so that they are 3/4 full and place them on the center rack of the oven. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, and then reduce the heat to 350'F, baking for 40-50 minutes or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack for 2 hours, serve with whipped cream.

The Buzz : The Wall Street Journal goes hunting for the best Pumpkin Beers

Last week, I posted about my one and only experience with Pumpkin Ale, specifically Smashed Pumpkin Ale. To my disappointment, it was not very tasty or very pumpkin-y for that matter, and left a bitter aftertaste.

Yesterday in the cooking section of the Wall Street Journal, there was an article that voiced the same concerns that I had raised with pumpkin ale--its bitterness, acidity, and disconcerting medley of spices.

William Bostwick's article, "Gourd Lovin'", from the October 29th edition of the Journal gives the history of pumpkin ale, which has been brewing since the 17th century, and proposes some ales that stand out of the crowd.

I have reproduced the article below. You can look at the original at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204644504576651132079347592.html?mod=googlenews_wsj . Once again, this is William Bostwick's article from the Journal, and I do not take credit for it.

Gourd Lovin': A new batch of pumpkin beers is proving they're not just a seasonal gimmick

William Bostwick

When the leaves change color, beer store shelves turn orange to match. It's pumpkin beer season, and the trap is set. Each year, we can't resist plucking a bottle or two, but like a bowl of candy corn, their festive hue belies their taste: too sweet, too sour and sodden with perfume-y spice.

It doesn't have to be this way. The best pumpkin beers are the most unexpected. Far from pie-in-a-bottle, they blend in maple syrup, dark chocolate and the vanilla smoothness of oak barrels—dressing the humble gourd in elaborate costumes that buck almost 400 years of tradition.

Long considered the candy-corn of seasonal beers (colorful, but not so tasty), pumpkin beers are starting to prove otherwise. William Bostwick reviews some of his favorites on Lunch Break as Wendy Bounds and Connor Doughtery taste test the brews.

Pumpkin beer is as old as American beer itself. The first settlers from Europe, having braved the wild Atlantic for a strange and tavern-bare land, can't be faulted for slapping beer together from whatever scraps they could find. Into Colonial brew kettles went corn stalks, molasses, tree bark, persimmons and lots and lots of pumpkins. "We have pumpkin at morning and pumpkin at noon," a 1630s ditty ran. "If it was not for pumpkin we should be undone." To some, homegrown beer was not just necessity, but rebellion, a thumbed nose at British imports. But that doesn't mean it was any good.

In fact, it was—and too often still is—awful. Here's why: Sweet and nutty when roasted, pumpkins turn sour when their sugars ferment into beer, giving off an unpleasant cidery tang. In fact, one of the first published recipes for pumpkin beer (from 1771) included an ingredient that was more akin to pumpkin cider: pressed, fermented gourd juice. Brewers hid that taste with a mix of boiled spices like cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. And that's where it all went wrong.

A brewer I know says that if you can taste a single ingredient in a beer, there's too much of it. Beer is a tippy boat: paddle too hard and it flops into the deep. Belgian wheat beers are regular offenders, tasting occasionally like coriander or orange-peel soup. With pumpkin beers, the opposite happens. Few are one-note—no nutmeg soup here—but their pumpkin-pie potpourri can be even more intense than a single, overemphasized spice. Call it the Candle Shoppe Gestalt: The blend of scents is worse than any individual offender.

And yet that pumpkin-spice canon, established centuries ago, has persisted ever since, analogous now with the season itself. Thankfully, that's changing, as brewers bring new ingredients, wild yeasts and, yes, a subtler spice rack to this style of brew. It's high time for another rebellion in beer: a pumpkin ale that actually tastes great. Here are five that are leading the way.

1. Dogfish Head Punkin Ale, 7% ABV: Named after the bizarre tradition of Punkin Chunkin, in which catapults hurl gourds across a Delaware field, Dogfish Head's classic is a dry, meaty brown ale. The pumpkin provides body-building starch, the spices are restrained and a touch of brown sugar dries the beer out so it snaps like brittle toffee and crunching leaves.

2. Jolly Pumpkin La Parcela, 5.9% ABV: The American masters of wild yeast live up to their name, finally, with a pumpkin beer. Of course, it's so much more than that: a nose of mulled cider, dusted at the finish with cocoa; a sour bite, not from pumpkin but from wild bacteria; and toasted, even slightly burnt, spice to tie it up.

3. Uinta Oak Jacked, 10.31% ABV: Part of Uinta's Crooked Line series of special releases, Oak Jacked takes the Salt Lake City brewery's Punk'n Harvest Pumpkin Ale, bumps up its strength to 10.31% (get it?) and ages it in oak barrels for six months. The originally perfume-y beer bulks up and mellows out, its spices hidden behind a velvet wave of vanilla-streaked liquor.

4. The Bruery Autumn Maple, 10% ABV: The best pumpkin beer in the patch isn't a pumpkin beer at all. Fall tradition for these SoCal brewers means staying up all night to roast 600 pounds of sweet potatoes for every batch. They bring a nuttiness and yes, a slight cidery sourness, but it's wonderfully offset by earthy molasses, maple syrup and a fruity Belgian yeast.

5. Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale, 5.6% ABV: More spicy than spiced—this ale from Portsmouth, N.H., is bracing and bitter. Less aromatic than most, with more noticeable hops, it's not an obvious pumpkin beer, but not quite anything else. Who says autumn can't also be refreshing? This is the only pumpkin beer that rightly comes in a six-pack.

Mixed Messages

So, for those of you who are not in the New York metropolitan area, it's snowing. It's also October 29th and before Halloween.

My pumpkin made this face when he looked at the weather out the window. I made a similar face.

Talk about a Halloween fright!

The Buzz : Shipyard Smashed Pumpkin Ale

With the onset of the chill fall weather, I saw more and more ads popping up for various pumpkin-flavored ales. Mostly, I was curious--what did pumpkin ale taste like? was it a good thing for ale to taste like pumpkin? would it even taste like pumpkin anyway?

I went to Whole Foods at Columbus Circle last week, and asked their beer stocker what he would recommend. Whole Foods had a good selection of 6 or 8 different pumpkin options. I opted for a large bottle (to share) of Shipyard Brewery's Smashed Pumpkin Ale. It's presumably called "smashed" because of it's very high alcohol content--9.5% for ale.

I was excited to see what the flavor would be, and so a friend and I cracked one open and took a go.

It was a very full and heady beer with a strong taste, that was almost spiced. It had good foam, and did, indeed, give a good buzz. The pumpkin taste, however, was different than I anticipated: there was definitely a pumpkin aftertaste (in a good way), but it fell short of my expectations.

So, in conclusion: good, tasty beer, but not very pumpkin-y.

The gentleman at Whole Foods also recommended Pumpking Ale, which he said had a good flavor. So, perhaps it's time to try that next!

Alice's Teacup Pumpkin Scones

You read that correctly. This is the recipe for Alice's Teacup Pumpkin Scones. As in, the actual Pumpkin Scone recipe from the famed New York bakery and tea-parlour, Alice's Tea Cup.

I love Alice's Tea Cup. I am pretty sure that every woman loves Alice's Tea Cup. What's not to love? As an Alice in Wonderland lover, I love not only the spectacular creations that come from the kitchen--from their famous scones to crisp tea sandwiches, tea-infused cocktails, and grilled items-- but also love the decor, ambiance, and whimsy of the place, which welcomes children of all ages for tea, parties, lunches, and dinners. It is a decidedly feminine environment, great for a girls' night or tête-à-tête with a friend, but it's also lovely for couples' lunches and brunches, as well as drinks. I have brought members of the male sex to Alice's and, despite their apprehensions, they survived and emerged pleased and well-fed.

The standard order from Alice's is a pot of tea and two scones. You choose from any of their hundreds of varieties of teas and from their daily selection of scones, which includes standard and novelty flavors. Old-faithfuls include buttermilk, pumpkin, ham and cheese, and some kind of berry, whereas novelties range from coconut to oatmeal cranberry and various chocolates.

Pumpkin is one of my, and everyone's, favourites. It's just so good. And here it is, courtesy of my friend Liz who obtained it by clandestine measures (or perhaps just read the Alice's Tea Cup Cookbook which I should have bought ages ago).

Just in case you're interested, here's the Amazon product page:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0061964921/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=8537715684&ref=pd_sl_j1i67kwfs_b


Tea and scones from a recent Alice's visit.

The Recipe:

The scones:

3 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
2-1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp kosher salt
2 tbsps ground ginger
2 tbsps ground cinnamon
1-1/2 sticks unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1-1/4 cups buttermilk
1 cup canned pumpkin puree (all pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling)
2 tbsp pure vanilla extract

The glaze:

2 sticks unsalted butter
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 tsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/2 cup heavy cream

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, ginger, and cinnamon. Then, with clean hands, work the butter into the dry mixture until it is thoroughly incorporated and has the consistency of fine breadcrumbs. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients, and pour the buttermilk, pumpkin puree, and vanilla extract into the well. Still using your hands, combine the ingredients until all the dry mixture is wet, but do not knead!

I am warning you now: you might want to get some disposable latex gloves for when you're handing the dough. It is, without exaggeration, the most unruly dough I have ever encountered--very sticky, impossible to work with without having it attach itself to you, and hard to flatten into a disk in the next step.

Turn the mixture onto a floured surface and gather the dough together, then gently pat the dough to make a disk about 1 1/2 inches thick. Make sure you four the surface well, or it will be hard to work the dough. Using a 3 or 3 1/2 inch biscuit cutter (or an upside down glass or cup), cut out as many scones as you can and lay them on a nonstick baking sheet. Gather the remaining dough together lightly to cut out more scones--just don't knead the dough too much, and make sure to keep it floured. You will be rewarded with the lovely scone texture when they're done!

Bake the scones for about 12 minutes, or until lightly browned. Let the scones cool slightly on the baking sheet (about 20 minutes) before glazing them.

While the scones are cooling, prepare the caramel glaze: Place the butter, brown sugar, lemon juice, and salt in a saucepan over medium head and whisk gently until the mixture is smooth. Just as the mixture comes to a light boil, add the heavy cream and reduce the heat to low. Whisk well for 2 minutes, or until the glaze is thickened and smooth; then remove the pan from the heat.

To glaze a scone, hold it by the bottom, dip the top in the warm caramel glaze, and place it back on the baking sheet.

Elegant Autumn Desserts : Spicy Maple and Pumpkin Flan

For those of you who did not read my post from this past weekend, I had the real treat of taking a cooking class at the Institute of Culinary Education in the Flatiron District of Manhattan. The class, entitled Elegant Autumn Desserts and taught by executive pastry chef, Vicki Wells, covered many sophisticated autumn desserts that look fantastic but are relatively simple to make.

As promised, I am re-making each of the desserts from the class at home to (a) see if they work in a non-magical cooking class setting, (b) eat them again, and (c) share them with you.

The first of these desserts in this series is the Spicy Maple and Pumpkin Flan, which was probably my favorite.

This flan is not difficult or time consuming, but does take a few tricks to make it work. The result is an incredibly smooth and subtle maple and pumpkin flavor that is to die for.

The Recipe

For the flan molds:

1 cup sugar
1 tsp heavy cream
1 tbsp butter
2 tsps rum

First, set up about 8 small ramekins in a deep baking pan so that they are ready when you pour in the caramel.

You will now need to caramelize the sugar. This can be a tricky task, especially if you have not made caramel before. I will give you one warning I wish I had had when I first made caramel last year: DO NOT TOUCH IT. EVER.* Put your sugar in a saucepan and add just enough water to moisten it. This will not be much. You do not want to bathe the sugar, just to make it damp. Then put it on the stove over medium heat and let it warm. You will not want to stir it with a spoon because the sugar will solidify. Just make sure to swirl the pan often, to move the mixture around. The mixture will soon start to develop big bubbles and will then very suddenly start to turn color. While the sugar is cooking, prepare your cream, butter, and rum and have them on standby. As soon as the sugar turns a caramel brown, remove it from heat and add the other ingredients. Swirl and let it combine. Then, pour a small amount into the ramekins (about 1/2") and let them cool and set.

For the flan:

1-1/2 cups heavy cream
1/2 cup milk
5 egg yolks
5 tbsps sugar
1-1/2 ounces maple syrup
3-1/2 ounces canned pumpkin
1/8 tsp Green Mountain maple extract (available at Fairway!)
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 300' F.

Dry roast the spices in a medium saucepan. You will just need to heat them for a few seconds, until they release an intense aroma. As soon as this happens, add the cream and milk and whisk. Add half the sugar and bring to a boil, whisking. Then remove from heat and let cool 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine the yolks very well with a whisk. Add the other half of the sugar, the maple syrup, and the maple extract.

Temper the cream to the yolk mixture. Pour in a little of the cream and whisk well before adding another small amount. Do this until it is all combined. Add the pumpkin and stir very well, until smooth. Strain and remove the foam.

Pour into the caramel filled molds. Now, create a water bath with boiling water. The water should go 1/3 of the way up the ramekin sides. Bake them until they are set and no longer jiggle. Let them in room temperature and transfer to the fridge when cooled slightly.

When ready to serve, turn the ramekin over a plate and tap to release the flan.


*Sugar's boiling point is much higher than water, so not only is it scalding, but it will also solidify, while still scalding you, which makes it impossible to get off before severe damage is done. I was dumb. Learn from me.

Elegant Autumn Desserts at the Institute for Culinary Education

Yesterday morning, I had the pleasure of attending my first class at the Institute for Culinary Education, located on 23rd street between 5th and 6th avenue. As I had been getting more interested in baking and cooking, and as I had been devoting more time to it recently, I became interested in finding recreational cooking or baking classes in the city that would (a) get me out of the house, (b) let me meet new people, and (c) let me learn some very valuable kitchen skills.

But where was I going to find these cooking classes that I had in mind? I Googled it.

The Institute for Culinary Education offers a full range of recreational cooking classes for those interested in cooking, baking, wine and bar-tending, and cheese.

The class that caught my eye was "Elegant Autumn Desserts" taught by chef Vicki Wells, the Executive Pastry Chef at Buddakan who has worked with Sarabeth’s Kitchen, Hotel Plaza Athenée, Maxim’s, Montrachet, Rakel’s, Metro, El Dorado Petit, Le Bernardin and Trattoria Dell’Arte.

The class was limited to 10 people and was spread over four hours on a Saturday morning. The price was reasonable, considering the time in the kitchen, the price of the materials, and the fact that you got to take bags of goodies home.

Within our four hours we made a Warm Apple Cider Cake with Bourbon Vanilla Ice Cream, Spicy Maple Pumpkin Flan with Gingersnaps, Pears Poached in Pinot Noir, Double Chocolate Shortcakes with Oven-Roasted Cranberries, and a Warm Greenmarket Apple Charlotte with Clove Molasses Ice Cream.

Each one was relatively simple to make, and came out looking and tasting divine. Each used tools and ingredients that are easily available and that shouldn't be too much of a drain on the budget.

The Cider Cake was built on a great basic recipe that takes a normal spice cake and adds onto it with variations of the liquid used. While we used bourbon, you can substitute any alcohol or even coffee as the liquid. The cake was filled with a tangy cider reduction and topped with bourbon vanilla ice cream, which was so good that I might invest in an ice cream machine.



The Pumpkin Flan might have been my favorite of all the desserts. It incorporated the welcome fall flavors of maple syrup and pumpkin into a smooth flan topped with a caramel layer and sauce. The flan was served with a dollop of fresh whipped cream and a gingersnap as garnish.



The Chocolate Shortbread tasted very similar to a chocolate mousse that Alex makes. It took a chocolate shortbread biscuit which was then topped with cranberries and chocolate pastry cream. This was another dessert that I could never tire of eating.



The Apple Charlotte was a variation on a French apple upside-down tart, which was made with a brioche crust and filled with caramelized apples and apple compote. A perfect version of an apple tart for fall.



I will undoubtedly be attempting these recipes again over the next few weeks, and with each attempt, I will post the recipe for the desserts I have described above. So, stay tuned, and get hungry!

Also make sure to check out ICE's list of classes at : http://rec.iceculinary.com/

Restaurant Review : Balon

I had the pleasure of going to a beautiful wine bar and restaurant on the Upper East Side the other day. Located at 81st street between 2nd and 3rd Avenue in Yorkville, Balon is an excellent and cozy spot to linger with a glass of wine and to enjoy some spectacular food. 81st street on the East Side is a restaurant goldmine: four of my favorite food-haunts are located within a one block radius (there's Yuka, a high quality all-you-can-eat for $21 sushi bar; Alice's Teacup III, for tea and scones; and Luke's Lobster, for expensive but mouth-watering seafood and lobster treats). I would pass Balon when I went to these other restaurants, and every time I passed, I wanted to go in.

The ambiance is what first caught my eye. On a warm evening, the bay windows are opened above an iron grille decorated with vines and christmas lights to reveal a modern, minimalist interior decorated in warm tones offset by warm lighting. The interior is garden themed, and guests are welcomed to sit back in wicker chairs at tables decorated with bright roses. My friend and I were seated in the window seat for two, where we stayed for over 2 hours without interruption.

The wine list is impressive and offers wine either by the glass or the bottle. While it might be described as expensive, it is by no means overpriced for the quality of the food, ambiance, and service. Wines range from moderately priced to pricy (from $9 to $18 a glass), giving patrons a wide choice. The food selection is impressive and expertly-crafted. Entrees are in the $20-$24 range, but you can enjoy a dessert for $10.



My friend and I each opted for a glass of wine and a dessert. She chose the pumpkin bread pudding with a glass of prosecco, while I had a glass of Crozieres red accompanied by a molten chocolate lava cake.

Both were, to put it plainly, incredible. My friend and I agreed, without hesitation, that that was one of the best desserts we had ever had. My wine was excellent and the serving size was not skimpy. My dessert was ample and to die for.

Balon is excellent for a special evening with friends, or if you're looking for somewhere quiet where you can linger for hours. I would not hesitate to go back, and hope that I have an excuse to do so soon.