Let’em eat pies

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Every Thanksgiving, people get up before dawn to cram a 35-pound turkey into the oven. It’s all about the bird. For one day, the pursuit of a moist, juicy, perfectly browned and basted gobbler supersedes all else, except football. There are turkey hot lines filled with people crying fowl – How do I roast it? The dog dragged it off the counter; can it be saved? Do I stuff it before I bake it?

What cooks everywhere don’t realize is that the bird is secondary. All the guests really want are the pies. Sure, they like turkey. Yeah, the stuffing and mashed potatoes and turnips are swell. But while there’s always turkey and stuffing and cranberry sauce left over, the pies barely make it past the second football game. Coincidence? You be the judge.

Thanksgiving is not the time to fool around with wild recipes, it’s a time to give thanks, especially for family traditions, such as your grandmother’s mincemeat or your mom’s pumpkin pie.

“Use a tried-and-true recipe or a recipe from a food writer that you trust,” said Brooke Dojny, a Sedgwick summer resident who has written a passel of cookbooks and has a monthly column in Bon Appetit. “It’s just not the time to be trying an untrustworthy recipe, because there’s so much time and energy involved in making a pie.”

Dojny suggests sticking to “the Thanksgiving trinity” – mincemeat, pumpkin and apple pies.

“Mincemeat is still very popular in northern New England because of our heritage. That’s sort of a historic connection to our past,” Dojny said. “I suggest in my book and in general to buy mincemeat in a jar and dress it up a little with bourbon or rum. I add chopped, firm pear and a little orange juice and orange and lemon zest to try to freshen it up, to lift the flavor up.”

For pumpkin pie, Dojny says the recipe on the back of Libbey’s canned pumpkin yields a tasty dessert. The important thing is finding a recipe that works for you.

“In my pumpkin pie recipe, I add a pinch of black pepper,” Dojny said. “It’s just kind of an interesting touch. It offsets the sugar.”

Maureen Redfield, who owns Redfield’s Restaurant in Northeast Harbor with her husband, Scott, has her own tricks for jazzing up holiday pies.

“We may add some sort of delicious, aged rum, especially to pumpkin pie, and [we use] fresh herbs,” Redfield said. “We basically use everything from scratch and we do use a lot of spices and herbs.”

Among the holiday sweets at Redfield’s, which stays open through the season except for Thanksgiving and Christmas Day, is Walnut and Hazelnut Pie glazed with locally made jams.

Jill Miller, a baker in the much-lauded kitchen at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, also suggests using nuts to put a new twist on holiday pies, both in the filling and in the pastry.

“You can always add a praline and give it a Southern flair,” Miller said, “You could make a nut crust or you could do a tart crust that could be a little sweeter.”

At Montes International Catering in Bangor, Carmen Montes and her husband, Arturo, get all sorts of requests, from raisin pies to white chocolate cream pie with rum and amaretto, and everything in between.

While they have more than 10 pies on their holiday menu, Carmen Montes said people still stick to traditional favorites – even her own guests.

“We let the kids pick out what they want,” she said. “Our friends come over and they want apple and pumpkin pie every year.”

If you feel like adding something different to your usual holiday lineup, try one of the following sweet treats created by local cooks. One extra pie never hurt anyone – especially at Thanksgiving. Just don’t expect it to last too long.

Sweet Potato and Pear Pie

Pastry for a 9-inch pie shell

5 cups (about 2 large) peeled, diced sweet potato

2 large, ripe pears (bosc or anjou), peeled and diced

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

3 tablespoons Poire Williams or Calvados (pear or apple brandy)

4 large eggs

cup maple syrup

cup brown sugar

cup heavy cream

1 tablespoon ginger

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

Cook sweet potatoes covered in water in a medium saucepan until very tender, about 20 minutes. Drain.

Melt butter in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add pears and saute for 5 minutes. Stir in pear or apple brandy and simmer, stirring occasionally, until soft, 12-15 minutes.

In a food processor fitted with a steel blade, process the potatoes and pears until very smooth. Set aside to cool.

Beat eggs, maple syrup, sugar and cream together. Add cooled potato mixture and blend. Whisk in ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg. Pour the filling into the pie shell.

Bake the pie at 375 degrees F until the top is golden and the center is set, 50-60 minutes. Serve at room temperature with whipped cream.

Makes 8 servings.

Recipe courtesy of Jill Miller.

Walnut and Hazelnut Pie, Redfield’s Restaurant

Note: Any of your favorite Maine jams can be used in this recipe. Any combination of walnuts, hazelnuts or almonds can be used.

2 cups pastry dough

3 eggs, separated

3/4 cup sugar

cup ground hazelnuts

cup ground walnuts

3 tablespoons raspberry jam

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Roll out the dough and use to line a 9-inch, buttered pie pan, pressing the dough well into the base and sides.

Run a rolling pin over the edge of the pan to remove excess dough. Set aside to rest in a cool place.

Beat together the egg yolks and sugar, until light in color. Add the ground nuts and mix thoroughly.

Whisk the egg whites until stiff, and gently fold into the above mixture

Spread the jam over the base of the dough and then pour on the nut mixture

Bake in a 350-degree oven for about 35 minutes. Allow to cool before serving. This tart can also be served cold.

Recipe courtesy of Scott and Maureen Redfield.

Carmen Montes’ Pecan Pie

Adapted from the Culinary Arts Institute Cookbook, which is no longer in print

3 tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3/4 cup sugar

3 eggs

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1 cup dark corn syrup

teaspoon salt

1 unbaked 9-inch pie shell

1/2 cup pecan halves

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

Cream butter with vanilla extract. Gradually add sugar, creaming well. Add eggs, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition.

Beat in chopped pecans, corn syrup and salt. Turn mixture into unbaked pie shell.

Bake at 450 degrees F for 10 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees F. Arrange pecan halves over top of filling. Bake 30-35 minutes or until set. Cool on wire rack.

Recipe courtesy of Carmen Montes.

Mince Pie with Decorative Top Crust

From “The New England Cookbook” by Brooke Dojny, reprinted with permission of the author and Harvard Common Press.

If you prefer to use a traditional family recipe for the mincemeat, or to prepare the filling from a recipe, do so. Dojny recommends using store-bought mince filling and spicing it up a little.

3 tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3/4 cup sugar

3 eggs

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1 cup dark corn syrup

teaspoon salt

1 unbaked 9-inch pie shell

Cream Cheese Pie Crust (recipe follows) or other dough for a double-crust pie

1 ripe but firm pear, such as a bosc or comice, peeled, cored and finely chopped (1 cup)

1/2 cup orange juice

1/4 cup dark rum or bourbon

3 cups prepared mincemeat (1 28-ounce jar)

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

1 teaspoon grated orange zest

1/4 teaspoon fresh-grated nutmeg

1 egg, lightly beaten with 1 tablespoon water

For the crust:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt

8 ounces cold cream cheese, cut in 1-inch lumps

1/4 pound (1 stick) cold, unsalted butter, cut in 1/2-inch slices

5 to 7 tablespoons cold milk or ice water

Pulse the flour with the sugar and salt in a food processor. Distribute the cream cheese and butter over the flour and pulse until most of the cheese and shortening is the size of small peas. Sprinkle 5 tablespoons of the milk or water evenly over the flour mixture and pulse just until no dry flour remains and the dough begins to clump together in small balls. If the mixture is too dry to press into a dough with your fingers, sprinkle one of the remaining 1 to 2 tablespoons milk or water and pulse a few more times

Divide the dough in half and turn out onto two sheets of plastic wrap. Shape and flatten into 5-inch discs, wrap, and refrigerate the dough for at least 1 hour or freeze. Remove from refrigerator 10 minutes before rolling it out. If frozen, thaw in refrigerator overnight before using.

For the pie:

Roll half of the dough out on a lightly floured surface to a 12-inch round. Ease into a 9-inch pie plate. Trim the overhanging dough to 3/4 inch all around. Turn the edges under, flush with the rim of the pie plate, and crimp or flute. Place the prepared shell in the freezer for at least 30 minutes. Roll out the second disc of dough to a 12-inch round. Using a cookie cutter or working freehand, cut out enough shapes (see note) to almost completely cover the top of the pie. Slip onto a cookie sheet and refrigerate or freeze.

Combine the chopped pear with the orange juice and rum in a medium-sized saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring, and simmer over medium heat for 8 to 10 minutes, until the pear is softened and most of the liquid is evaporated. Stir in the mincemeat, lemon juice, lemon zest, orange zest and nutmeg and simmer for 5 minutes to blend the flavors. Cool to room temperature before using or cover and refrigerate for up to a week

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.

Prick the bottom of the frozen pie shell all over with a fork. Bake until pale golden brown, 14 to 18 minutes. If the pastry starts to puff up, press the bottom gently with a large spoon or oven-mittened hand to flatten. Fill immediately or cool on a wire rack. Reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees.

Spoon the filling into the prebaked pie shell. Arrange the cutouts over the filling, overlapping slightly to cover most of the top, but leaving small spaces for vent holes. Brush the top crust with the egg glaze.

Bake until the crust is a rich golden brown and the filling is bubbly, 35 to 45 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

Serve barely warm. If the pie cools completely, reheat in a 350-degree oven for a few minutes before serving.

Note: Use whatever shapes you like – leaves, hearts, turkeys, pumpkins, stars, or a purely decorative shape.

Recipe courtesy of Brooke Dojny.

Upper Crust

Even the best cooks have a hard time making piecrust. It’s easy to overwork the dough, leaving the crust tough and bland. Cookbook author Brooke Dojny offers the following hints to achieve pastry perfection.

. Make sure the butter or shortening are cold or frozen. If the shortening is cold, you are much less apt to overwork it when you’re cutting it into the flour.

. Use a food processor.

. Add the water really slowly so it doesn’t end up in one place. “Most people tend to overwork it,” Dojny said. “That’s why you want to add your water slowly and gradually.”

. Pulse the food processor just until you’re able to press the dough together with your fingers – not until it forms a ball over the blade. By then, it’s overworked.

. Be sure to add enough water.

. Once you can grab a handful of dough, turn it over onto a sheet of plastic wrap and use the wrap to gather it together. With the other hand, shape the dough into a flattened disk.

. Have a trial run. Make two, three, or four dough batches. “The more often you do it, the better you get,” Dojny said.

. If all else fails, buy premade pie shells. Not the kind in the pan, but the kind you unfold and put in your own pie plate. “They’re not as good as a good homemade crust, but they look homemade because you can crimp your own edge and they taste just fine,” Dojny said. “I don’t want to discourage people from making their own crust. A good homemade crust is really delicious and superior to store-bought.”

. Thanksgiving isn’t a particularly low-calorie day, so go all out and use lard in the crust, if you can stomach the thought. “I think [lard] makes a delicious piecrust, but it’s getting a little bit hard to find,” Dojny said. “It makes an incredibly flaky crust. You have much more leeway than with butter.”

. If you have to choose between a homemade crust and a homemade filling, make the filling and buy the crust – especially for apple pie. Pumpkin pie mix out of a can is fine, but scrap the canned apple filling. “It usually has that awful, gloppy cornstarch,” Dojny said.

. Carmen Montes suggests making a large batch of dough, rolling out the individual crusts, placing them in a pie plate, and freezing them.