Ah…. couldn’t you just lose yourself in those dunes of dough?

With the form of a pie and the texture of a cake, this Russian Grandmothers’ Apple Pie-Cake from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan is just the sort of comforting fall dessert that almost makes you want to throw on a sweater and rake some leaves before you sit down at a sturdy wooden table and settle into a soft slice… preferably accompanied by a touch of creme fraiche, vanilla ice cream, lemon verbena ice cream, or even a glass of milk. Somehow, a traditional pie, with its crunchy crust, seems so harsh in comparison.

The pie-cake gave me a chance to show off the heirloom apples that I’d picked up at the Santa Monica Farmers Market that morning. I sampled each apple amidst my cutting and peeling — there were spicy Bellflowers, resonant Spitzenbergs, the most exuberant Fujis that I’ve ever had, subdued Hawk-Eyes, and zesty Annas. They were rounded out with golden raisins, sugar, cinnamon, lemon juice, and nutmeg (my own humble addition, out of habit, I suppose).

The Bellflowers from the See Canyon stand were my revelation of the day — when I tried a sample slice at the market, it tasted like it had been infused with cinnamon. So flavorful and alive. They’re rather large, oblong, and yellow-ish…

I originally wanted to make an infused liqueur to preserve that flavor, but they’re so delicate that they were pocked with too many little bruises for me to use them in good faith. So, into the pie-cake they went, while some hearty and singularly delicious Fuji apples became acquainted with the brandy.

As for the dough… Whenever I’m sizing up a dough or batter that I’ve never made before, I compare to another recipe that I know. I often think about my favorite basic cookie recipe — in which I simply combine butter with sugar, salt, and flour. It makes for a crunchy, buttery cookie. Since this dough is creamed and also has tenderizers such as baking powder, eggs, and lemon juice, I knew that it would turn out soft and tangy.

My baking dish was smaller than the prescribed one, so I piled the extra apples into my mini-pie dish, covered them with extra dough, and topped it with leftover crisp topping that I’d had in the freezer…

I hereby dub it the Apple Pie-Cake-Cobbler-Crisp.

Edit: The LA Times has an article by Russ Parsons about heirloom apples this week, along with an apple guide.

Only one fruit coaxed me into happily employing my oven during its well-deserved vacation… no less than the pride of Sonoma county…. the Gravenstein apple.

On Aug 19, I saw organic Gravenstein Apples for sale at the Hollywood Farmers market, and I knew I had to make pie, in all its kitchen-heating glory. After all, I hadn’t made pie this summer… perhaps not all year. I also bought some Pippins (green & tart) for variety, esp since neither the vendor nor I was sure at the time about how Gravensteins would take to baking.

I’d been putting off pie. Part of it has to do with my beloved Emile Henry pie dish. It seems like no matter how much pie dough I’ve made in the past, there’s never enough to cover the top and bottom of the deep dish. I don’t even like crust all that much, so it seemed like a frustrating problem of low priority.

This time, I tried out Sherry Yard’s Master 3-2-1 Flaky Pie Dough recipe in the Secrets of Baking. It uses the same ingredients as most pie recipes, but it was so delicious, even as raw dough (maybe it has to do with the touch of sugar in it). I couldn’t stop nibbling, however much I knew that it was making the possibility of having enough dough even more remote.

And it turned out that… there was not enough. To give you an idea of how disturbing this is, consider that the recipe called for 2 sticks of butter. A half pound of butter is not enough to take care of my pie dish! That’s double the amount of butter that is in a single batch of my chocolate chip cookies. I estimate that scaling up the recipe to 2.5 sticks of butter should be enough.

For the filling, I was torn btw cooking the apples beforehand (so that they wouldn’t release too much liquid in the pie or create a steam pocket under the top crust) or just chancing it with freshly sliced apples. Yard herself has an Mile High Apple Pie recipe extravaganza in her book that involves caramelizing the apples (in batches, no less!), and mixing in butter, cream, apple caramel glaze, and creamy caramel glaze… and topping it off with ice cream. I didn’t have the, er, apple juice that it called for… yes, that was it… and I continued to look around for other recipes.

The apple pie recipe in Chez Panisse Desserts specifically calls for Gravensteins, and is the most humble of them all… Just 3 Tbs of sugar (or less! to taste), apples, and cinnamon. No starch to bind the juices… and no pre-cooking.

In situations like this, I stop and ask myself, “Do I want to do it the simple way because I’m being lazy or because I think it’ll taste better?”

I honestly thought that the Chez Panisse version would taste better for what I had in mind… That it would bring out the best in the apples. I’m a little wary of cinnamon these days, though — it’s good, of course, it is, but it’s a little mundane. I find myself turning to allspice more and more — it’s a bit more complex and delicate and different; I think I absorbed an appreciation for it from Pierre Herme’s cookbooks. So, that’s what I used, along with some whiskey-soaked dried cherries for some added excitement. And I made rounds out of the rmg dough as the top, brushed them with cream, and sprinkled on turbinado sugar.

And it was an amazing apple pie. True to the apples, with some wily background of spice, whiskied cherries, and oh, the butter. The apples on the bottom were a bit more moist than the apples on top and little liquid collected in the dish, but I was cool with that. Why not have different textures of fruit in a pie? The bottom crust held up admirably for a while, but it turned soggy eventually. Again, though, I like multiple textures of a single element… including pie crust. Maybe since I don’t like crust much to being with, I view soggy crust as more flavorful… and somehow more comforting.

Anyway, we just had our first officially cool weekend in LA — about the mid-70’s during the day — and I’m itching to bake anything with apples. Yesterday, I stocked up on ever-coveted Honeycrisp apples at the Santa Monica Farmers Market, and came home to have Google lead me to the truth — they’re crisp due to their high water content… which makes them bad for baking. Yep, they’re just right for eating out of hand, as if you didn’t want to bother turning your oven on.

Lesson learned.

Irony registered.

Apple-y plans brewing.

Melons, grapes, and figs bring theories of natural selection to mind. It’s as if they realize that by the time they arrive, you’ve already had your fill for the year of stone fruit in baking and compotes, and even if you hadn’t, your apartment may be too hot to justify turning on the oven. You may also be a little tired of hunting through boxes for the ripest fruits of the lot.

So, they cater to you. You have to buy a rather large amount in one go — either a whole melon, or a bunch of grapes, or a basket of figs — and preparation involves little more than a few cool strokes of the knife. Sure, you could heat them and play around with them, but only if you want. This year, I did not.

Two of my best melons came from a booth at the Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers Market on Aug 8. Both were relatively small and oblong, and grown near Auburn.

The honey pearl melon was a type of honeydew with a vibrant flavor and equally firm flesh throughout.

The sugar nut melon was a type of canary melon. I don’t usually like canary melons, but this one had a delightful clean flavor.

Inside…

When looking for melons, choose the ones with as much netting as possible and the least amount of green on the outside. They’ll be the ripest and most flavorful.

I always wash them well, too, because the rind touches the cutting board and knife an awful lot.

These are Kyoho grapes, which are a Japanese variety that has a lovely deep grape flavor. They’re a worthy substitute for Concords, which are hard to find in LA markets. Their skins are a bit thick, so you can also make a spectacular sorbet out of them if you prefer. Macerating the pureed grapes with sugar overnight makes the flavor even more intense. And it’s the dreamiest purple color that you ever did see. I adapted Claudia Fleming’s recipe for Concord Grape Sorbet, which also calls for ascorbic acid (vitamin C) to preserve the color.

Good grapes are hard to come by — crisp orbs of sugar are much more common. I get a little disappointed by fruit signs at the market that advertise how sweet, sweet, sweet the fruits are. Anyone can eat a spoonful of sugar at will. I would trust signs that advertise flavor, flavor, flavor much more.

As for figs, I haven’t found any good ones at the farmers markets yet, but once again Trader Joe’s is selling some pretty fine conventional and organic ones. And how low maintenance am I being with them? Well, I haven’t even taken their picture yet…

And figs are easy fruits to test for ripeness. They should be jelly-like inside, so once you pick one up, it should feel a heavy for its size and a little squishy. If it feels light or stiff, it’s not worth the bite.

All my raw fruit antics eventually circled back to my peaches and nectarines, which usually wound up like this.

Also, if you want to preserve the fruit a bit longer without the heat of boiling preserves, you can, of course, make sorbets… or homemade fruit liqueurs. I’ll write a post about this some day — as I have about a dozen of them going right now — but again, they require little more than chopping, mixing, and waiting… which sounds like just the right kind of project for long August days. This site is an excellent resource.

And if you already know a little something about making your our fruit liqueurs, feel free to show off your knowledge by answering this question that lingers in the back of my mind every time I look at my glass-cloaked infusing legions…. If it takes maybe 30 minutes to infuse the flavor from, say, orange peel into hot cream, why does it take maybe 4 months to infuse it into alcohol?

Because I had leftover batter, a skillet, and a whim.

In The Last Course, Claudia Fleming says that her Orange Cardamom Shake was adapted from a drink made by Dominican Republican prep cooks in the Gramercy Tavern kitchen. It looked a bit thin to be a shake to me, so a little googling revealed that it was based on the Morir Soñando, a Dominican Republican drink made with juice, milk, sugar, and ice. “Morir Soñando” translates as “to die dreaming.” Since that’s so much more poetic than “shake,” I am re-christening my version with that name. Incidentally, I also came across a Mexican drink made from fresh fruit and milk, called a Licuado… another lovely name.

Anyway, my first adaptation of the shake was delicious — popping with orange and cardamom — but the ensuing sugar buzz almost cancelled out the benefits of the taste (to be fair, I used ice cream where she called for creme fraiche, so that degree of sweetness wasn’t her intention). So, in between cherry tomato peeling sessions this week, I’ve been making milky syrups, juicing oranges, and drinking many morir soñandos with Chad.

They’re fantastic on a hot summer afternoon. They are somewhat filling, but less so than a bowl of ice cream or an American-style shake. And it’s a good time to use Valencia Oranges, often referred to as “juice oranges.” They’re in season during the summer, so it’s okay to give stone fruit a break or two. It’s also okay if they have patches of green peel; I almost prefer it b/c it means that they haven’t been artificially colored.
Basically, the drink is a combination of sweetened, flavored milk (rather like a milk-based simple syrup) and orange juice. Ice and ice cream are blended in for added coolness, thickness, and flavor. Its texture is thinner than heavy cream, and it has a delightfully frothy head.

• I’ve been lucky enough to use my homemade Philadelphia-style noyaux ice cream, made from the almond-like nuggets in the middle of stone fruit pits; it has an Amaretto-like flavor that suits this drink very well.
• I once used yogurt instead of ice cream, but I didn’t like the tang or the texture. It was too smoothie-like — not much fun in a spiked drink…
• Dark rum is a great addition. I never measure it. Just pour in however much you like, or none at all.
• I’ve prescribed a relatively small amount of sugar. You may want a little more; the sweetness of your ice cream can affect this, too.
• This recipe is easily customizable. The spice, ice cream, and alcohol can be changed to make different flavors. Cinnamon, allspice, clove, lemon, vanilla, chocolate, peach, Amaretto, Brandy, Vodka, Grand Marnier…
• Organic where possible is best, esp since the orange peel is used. I also like Organic Valley Milk.
• If you make a big batch of milky syrup, you can use it up drink by drink over the course of a few days.
• I suspect that you could do away with the infusing part (and omit the orange peel), and you’d still have a nice drink. I’ve never tried it, though.

Orange-Cardamom Morir Soñando
Yield: about 3 Servings

1 cup Whole Milk
1/4 cup Sugar
Strips of Orange Peel from 1/2 an Orange
Large Pinch of Ground Cardamom
1 cup Orange Juice, from about 3-4 oranges
1 scoop of Ice Cream, such as Noyaux or Vanilla
1/2 cup Ice Cubes
Alcohol to taste, such as Mount Gay Rum Eclipse

Over medium heat, bring the milk, sugar, orange peel, and cardamom to a simmer, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Remove from the heat, cover, and infuse for 20 minutes. Strain, and chill until cold.

In a blender, combine the chilled milk mixture, orange juice, ice cream, and ice. Blend until smooth. If desired, add alcohol, and pulse to combine.

Serve immediately.