Fall Treats ~ pumpkin pasties

Part one of what will be a few more posts on fall-themed baking treats (and I mean that -- it's not like I'm asking how you are when I really couldn't care less, heck, I might as well not ask at all, but I sincerely promise two more fall baking posts). I usually make pumpkin muffins, but I've done that so many times in the past that it's become blase. Besides these, I will make the pumpkin scones I've always wanted to try, plus two more that I won't talk about now that have nothing to do with pumpkin.

I've made Pumpkin Pasties before as a treat to snack on while reading the final Harry Potter book. What I particularly enjoy about these is that it's an individual pumpkin pie with a higher proportion of crust to filling than a traditional slice, while not having to commit to a full slice or looking moronic by asking for a slice 3/16th of an inch thick. (That was a totally random number that I've never asked someone to do.)

The filling is doubly spicy since I doubled the amounts, and it's just sweet enough to satisfy your sweet tooth.

The filling was pretty orange considering I doubled the spices, but something happened when I left it out overnight (covered-like with a piece of plastic wrap) and it no longer had a vibrant color. I can't remember how it looked the last time I made it, though I did refrigerate it.

For the crust I used Martha Stewart's recipe for Perfect Pate Brisee, and it really is perfect, more so because I wasn't afraid of adding too much liquid and the rolling of the dough was a roll of the pin. I did use Smart Balance Butter Blend instead of all butter, mainly out of curiosity and partly because I vary between all-butter and butter-shortening crusts. Unlike a buttery spread, this contains less water. It's like Smart Balances non-hydrogenated shortening they had but discontinued, combined with butter in stick form at a higher price than the shortening.

This may be a little more time consuming than a traditional pie, but it's more fun and is worth the tiny bit of extra effort it takes.

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I'll get the complaints, mainly that the crust was saltier than normally. I'm thinking it might have been due to the butter blend sticks since I typically use unsalted butter, so I should have decreased the salt in the recipe by half.
Secondly, the filling wasn't orange-hued, rendering those not suitable to the photo process and not as nice for presentation.
Third, I should have refrigerated the filled and crimped turnovers for at least half an hour because the pretty crusts lost their shape.

For the praise, the crust was very flaky and tasted great despite the saltiness (which wasn't too bad). I think of these as the foodie's answer to McDonald's pumpkin pie, seeing as both are similar in that it's more turnover than actual pie, and it can travel really well.

What to do with any leftover filling? I've forgotten all about mine and it's in the fridge somewhere, but some ideas are stirring it into a bowl of oatmeal, using it to make pumpkin shakes, or topping with toasted pecans and whipped cream and eating it as a crustless dessert.

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Pumpkin Pasties
Recipe from Britta.com

Makes about 3 dozen miniature pasties.

Ingredients

• 2 eggs, slightly beaten


• 3/4 cup sugar


• 1 1 lb. can pumpkin

(or 2 cups fresh, roasted in the oven then pressed
through a strainer)

• 1/2 tsp. salt


• 1 tsp. cinnamon


• 1/2 tsp. ginger


• 1/2 tsp. allspice


• 1/4 tsp. cloves


• I added a few gratings of fresh nutmeg


• 1 2/3 cups evap. milk (1 can)


• 9 oz pie crust pastry (enough for two single standard pie crusts)


• 1 egg, beaten (for brushing turnovers)


• Extra sugar for sprinkling

Directions

1. Combine filling ingredients and whisk until combined. Bake the pie filling only (no crust) in a large, lightly greased, casserole dish in hot oven (425°) for 15 minutes. Keep oven door closed and reduce temp to moderate (350°) and continue baking for 40-45 minutes or until table knife inserted in center of dish comes out clean. Cool on wire rack.


2. Make or purchase pie crust pastry. Roll thin and cut into circles approx 4" in diameter. Put a spoonful of the cool pumpkin mixture towards one side of the center of the circle. Fold over the crust into a half-circle and firmly crimp the edges closed. Slice three small slits in the top for venting, place on a greased cookie sheet, brush with egg and sprinkle with sugar, and bake only until crust is a light golden-brown. (For this stage, I increased the oven temperature to 400°.) Great served at room-temperature, then you don't have to worry about your guests possibly burning their mouths from the steaming hot pumpkin inside!

Lazy Daisy Cake

What happens when a food blogger suddenly stops blogging? Do they stop eating, too? I can only answer for myself, and it's not necessarily that nothing blog-worth came out of the kitchen, but rather that sometimes I just want to eat without having a photo shoot of my plate. Of course, I kept putting off an 'I'm leaving for a bit' note because I never intended not to blog, I just sort of kept procrastinating and then I began to knit.
Yes, that's right, I replaced kitchen utensils and ingredients with knitting needles and yarn. I've made four shrugs, one short-sleeve sweater shrug, and a few other things. I've cheated, for which I owe you all an apologizing. It gets worse, I've been perusing knitting blogs. (But I did not start one... I just joined an online knitting community.)

Anyway, I felt that a 'Lazy Daisy Cake' was the most appropriate post to make for my return, and I promise you that if I realize I might be spiraling down a path of laziness (this makes the second time I've done this), I'll let you know. That I'm lazy.

What is a lazy daisy cake? It's a hot milk sponge cake with a broiled coconut caramel frosting. Really quick, really simple. If you don't like coconut, replace it with chopped, sliced, or slivered nuts.

While I like the cake, the sweetness of the frosting being mellowed by the rather plain cake, the cake part isn't anything of note, being rather dry and flavorless (it's not the lack of sweetness I take issue with). I've realized that it's more a platform for the topping, but imagine a unity of a moist cake with a flavor that is great on its own, but blends flavors with the topping. I was asked to take on this challenge, and I haven't made much headway, though I had an inspiration a minute ago when I started thinking about this cake again. With that being said, I won't be posting a recipe yet. Just Google the name if you want to make it and you'll find a recipe for the regular version.

Readers, fellow foodie friends, what's you favorite treat to make when you are lazy, tired, the kitchen is messy, but you want something more than graham crackers with peanut butter or chips and salsa? (Stay home and eat all the freakin' chips, Kip!)

Daring Bakers and Peter Reinhart's Pizza Dough

Unintentional hiatus aside, this month's Daring Baker's challenge, brought to us by Rosa from Rosa's Yummy Yums, Glenna from A Fridge Full of Food, and in memory of Sher from What Did You Eat? whose idea this was, is Peter Reinhart's pizza dough recipe from The Bread Baker's Apprentice. What makes this recipe unique is the overnight proofing, which develops both the gluten and flavor of the dough.

We had quite a bit of leeway when it came to this challenge, the only real requirements being that the recipe had to be followed exactly, we had to try and take a picture of ourselves... Tossing two out of six pieces of dough had to be fully tossed in the air. I know. But I've really wanted to do it, and I sort of have been tossing the dough before, just not fully.

Here are the disks of dough after the 2-hour post refrigeration proofing time. The dough was really soft, and you could tell by feeling it that it was going to be great.

That's the best picture of me that was taken. It seems really abstract.

I gave each piece about one full toss, any more would have resulted in an epic failure.

I used leftover spaghetti sauce instead of the normal fresh tomato sauce I typically use, but it tasted really great, albeit it was chunky and hard to spread. The toppings for two of the pizzas were sautéed portobello mushrooms and sliced black olives.

The other two had black olives, mushrooms, and pepperoni.

The pizza look very authentic, which I was pleased with. The crust was crispy on the outside and slightly moist and chewy inside. I made each pizza about 12-inches in diameter, resulting in a very thin bottom crust. Probably 9-inches would have been better, but since I was cooking these on a baking stone I didn't worry about it.

Here you can see the crust innards and the underside of the pizza. The caramelization of the sugars in the dough made the color gorgeous. I was a bit overcautious and used too much flour to keep the dough from sticking, and there was an essence of browned flour with each bite. Oops.

For the last two dough pieces the next day at dinner, I used a Cooking Light recipe for Spinach and Caramelized Onion Pizza, which consisted of an garlicky white sauce on the bottom. I added pepperoni.

While the flavorings were delicious, the bottom crust was much too thin to handle the toppings. I didn't upload the pizza, but the bottom crust never fully cooked and it looked like wonton wrappers. I didn't bake these on a baking stone, however, because I was afraid that an accident would occur due to the toppings. If I made 4-5 balls of dough instead of six, it probably would be better able to handle a few more toppings.

I was grateful for this challenge because I finally made an overnight pizza dough. I'm sold, and I will definitely come back to this recipe in the future.

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Basic Pizza Dough
Original recipe taken from “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice” by Peter Reinhart

Makes 6 pizza crusts (about 9-12 inches/23-30 cm in diameter)

Ingredients
4 1/2 cups (20 1/4 ounces/607.5 g) Unbleached high-gluten (%14) bread flour or all purpose flour
1 3/4 Tsp Salt
1 tsp Instant yeast
1/4 cup (2 ounces/60g) Olive oil or vegetable oil (both optional, but it’s better with)
1 3/4 cups (14 ounces/420g or 420ml) Water, ice cold (40° F/4.5° C)
1 Tbsp sugar
Semolina/durum flour or cornmeal for dusting

Day One

Method
Method:
1. Mix together the flour, salt and instant yeast in a big bowl (or in the bowl of your stand mixer).

2. Add the oil, sugar and cold water and mix well (with the help of a large wooden spoon or with the paddle attachment, on low speed) in order to form a sticky ball of dough. On a clean surface, knead for about 5-7 minutes, until the dough is smooth and the ingredients are homogeneously distributed. If it is too wet, add a little flour (not too much, though) and if it is too dry add 1 or 2 teaspoons extra water.

3. Flour a work surface or counter. Line a jelly pan with baking paper/parchment. Lightly oil the paper.

4. With the help of a metal or plastic dough scraper, cut the dough into 6 equal pieces (or larger if you want to make larger pizzas).

NOTE: To avoid the dough from sticking to the scraper, dip the scraper into water between cuts.

5. Sprinkle some flour over the dough. Make sure your hands are dry and then flour them. Gently round each piece into a ball.

NOTE: If the dough sticks to your hands, then dip your hands into the flour again.

6. Transfer the dough balls to the lined jelly pan and mist them generously with spray oil. Slip the pan into plastic bag or enclose in plastic food wrap.

7. Put the pan into the refrigerator and let the dough rest overnight or for up to thee days.

NOTE: You can store the dough balls in a zippered freezer bag if you want to save some of the dough for any future baking. In that case, pour some oil(a few tablespoons only) in a medium bowl and dip each dough ball into the oil, so that it is completely covered in oil. Then put each ball into a separate bag. Store the bags in the freezer for no longer than 3 months. The day before you plan to make pizza, remember to transfer the dough balls from the freezer to the refrigerator.

Day Two

8. On the day you plan to eat pizza, exactly 2 hours before you make it, remove the desired number of dough balls from the refrigerator. Dust the counter with flour and spray lightly with oil. Place the dough balls on a floured surface and sprinkle them with flour. Dust your hands with flour and delicately press the dough into disks about 1/2 inch/1.3 cm thick and 5 inches/12.7 cm in diameter. Sprinkle with flour and mist with oil. Loosely cover the dough rounds with plastic wrap and then allow to rest for 2 hours.

making the pizza, place a baking stone on the lower third of the oven. Preheat the oven as hot as possible (500° F/260° C).

NOTE: If you do not have a baking stone, then use the back of a jelly pan. Do not preheat the pan.

10. Generously sprinkle the back of a jelly pan with semolina/durum flour or cornmeal. Flour your hands (palms, backs and knuckles). Take 1 piece of dough by lifting it with a pastry scraper. Lay the dough across your fists in a very delicate way and carefully stretch it by bouncing it in a circular motion on your hands, and by giving it a little stretch with each bounce. Once the dough has expanded outward, move to a full toss.

NOTE: Make only one pizza at a time.
During the tossing process, if the dough tends to stick to your hands, lay it down on the floured counter and reflour your hands, then continue the tossing and shaping.
In case you would be having trouble tossing the dough or if the dough never wants to expand and always springs back, let it rest for approximately 5-20 minutes in order for the gluten to relax fully,then try again.
You can also resort to using a rolling pin, although it isn’t as effective as the toss method.

11. When the dough has the shape you want (about 9-12 inches/23-30 cm in diameter - for a 6 ounces/180g piece of dough), place it on the back of the jelly pan, making sure there is enough semolina/durum flour or cornmeal to allow it to slide and not stick to the pan.

12. Lightly top it with sweet or savory toppings of your choice.

NOTE: Remember that the best pizzas are topped not too generously. No more than 3 or 4 toppings (including sauce and cheese) are sufficient.

13. Slide the garnished pizza onto the stone in the oven or bake directly on the jelly pan. Close the door and bake for about 5-8 minutes.

NOTE: After 2 minutes baking, take a peek. For an even baking, rotate 180°.

If the top gets done before the bottom, you will need to move the stone or jelly pane to a lower shelf before the next round. On the contrary, if the bottom crisps before the cheese caramelizes, then you will need to raise the stone or jelly.

14. Take the pizza out of the oven and transfer it to a cutting board or your plate. In order to allow the cheese to set a little, wait 3-5 minutes before slicing or serving.

NOTE ON SAUCE: Your sauce (any) should not be too thick as it will thicken in the hot oven. Less is more but make the less truly more by using quality ingredients.