Lisa's Swedish Pancakes

My favorite thing, after dessert, is stealth dessert: things that technically sort of qualify as a real meal, but are just as delicious as dessert.  In some cases these meals can involve some actual nutrition.  This is...sort of one of those cases, as long as you're convinced of the healthfulness of eggs and butter in large quantities.  You could think of these pancakes as being just like scrambled eggs, with a little milk and flour added, except that that makes them sound really disgusting.  And instead of disgusting, these pancakes are delicious.

The magic of Swedish Pancakes is that they are super-thin, and a little crispy around the edges, and very tender.  They're sort of like crepes, but much more eggy.  They're not particularly sweet, but they are an excellent vehicle for sweet things.

I once found the perfect swedish pancake recipe online, but then could never find it again. As a result I've tried several recipes over the years, with varying amounts of success.  This time I think I've finally figured it out!  This is sort of a combination of the my grandma's recipe (which was her mom's next-door-neighbor's recipe) and some other random recipes from the internet, based on several rounds of trial and error.

Lisa's Swedish Pancakes

4 eggs, beaten well

2 c milk

4 T butter, melted

1 T sugar

1 1/2 c flour

Combine all of the ingredients and stir well--don't worry about overmixing.  Stir vigorously while you add the melted butter to the milk/eggs, to avoid any premature egg-cooking.  The butter will sort of congeal and tend to float on top, so give the batter a good stir before ladling out each pancake.

Cook the pancakes in a non-stick pan, on medium-low.  I used about 1/3 cup batter in a 10" pan.  The secret of Swedish Pancakes is to make them very thin--after ladling in the batter, immediately pick up the pan and tilt it around to spread the batter across the entire bottom of the pan as evenly as possible.

Cook until the pancake starts to set and the edges start to look a little crispy, probably not more than a minute or two, then flip and cook for another minute or so.  Both sides should be sort of unevenly golden brown.  Roll the pancake around something delicious and serve immediately!

Swedish pancakes are good with a combination of sweet and tart flavors.  Lingonberry jelly with whipped cream (or canned cranberry sauce with whipped cream) is delicious.  We've also had them with black currant jelly.  As always, I also recommend replacing the whipped cream with greek yogurt.  Dust with powdered sugar, and enjoy!

3 Awesome Cookies

One of my favorite things about christmas is the cookies.  This year we made an old favorite and tried a couple of new recipes, which I'll share here.  On the left, Mint Crinkles.  On the right, Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Sugar Frosting.  In the back, Citrus Slices (AKA the best cookies ever).

Citrus Slices

First up, Citrus Slices.  Probably my favorite cookies ever.  Everyone who doesn't hate citrus in general loves these cookies.  Plus they don't have eggs, which is good for people who are allergic.  You can decorate them to make them actually look like slices of citrus fruit, or you can pile on the delicious icing. I like to err on the side of deliciousness and laziness.  In fact I probably wasn't even the one to ice these cookies.

Cookies:

mix together until creamy:
    3/4 butter, softened
    1/2 c granulated sugar
    1/2 confectioner's sugar

add:
    1 t grated peel each from a lemon, lime, and orange
    2 T lime juice
    1 t vanilla

gradually mix in:
    2 c flour
    1/4 t baking soda
    1/4 t salt

just until blended.  Divide the dough in half and shape into 8-inch logs, about two inches in diameter.   Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 4 hours (or as long as you can stand to wait--basically it just has to chill so that it's firm enough to slice).  Cut into thin slices, about 1/4 inch thick, and place on an ungreased cookie sheet.  Bake 10-12 minutes (until slightly golden brown on just the edges) at 350 degrees.  Be careful: overcooking the cookies makes them too dry.

Icing:

1 T butter, melted
2 c confectioner's sugar
1/2 t vanilla
1 T lemon juice
2 T orange juice

You can make the cookies fancy by sprinkling citrus-colored sugar onto the cookies before baking. Then pipe the icing on in lines on the sprinkled side, to make the cookies look like sliced oranges and limes and lemons.  You can even put little frosting "seeds" on.  Or you can just put large quantities of icing on each cookie, because it's delicious.

Mint Crinkles

Mint crinkles were an experiment this year.  I ended up liking them a lot, because my love for mint is second only to my love of lemon.  Basically we made them because Anthony and I saw packages of pre-crushed Andes mints at the grocery store.

3/4 c andes mints

1/3 c shortening

1 c sugar

1/2 t baking powder

1/4 t salt

2 eggs

2 t vanilla

1 1/2 c flour

plus some mints to sprinkle on top

Melt the 3/4 cup of Andes mints (I recommend using the microwave, heating for short amounts of time and stirring between heatings) and then let the melted deliciousness cool for a few minutes.  Meanwhile combine the wet ingredients. Then stir in the cooled chocolate, beat in the remaining ingredients, and finally stir in the flour.  Chill 3 hours. 

After the dough has chilled, place 1 Tablespoon-sized balls of dough 2" apart on an ungreased cookie sheet.  Be sure to leave enough room between cookies, they spread out a lot. Bake 10 minutes at 350, or until edges are done and the tops are crinkly.  Take the cookie sheet out of the oven and sprinkle the tops of the cookies with mints, then bake for another minute to melt them.

Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Sugar Frosting

Actually my mom made these cookies and I didn't help at all.  But they were so delicious that I will share the recipe anyways, and maybe you can find someone else to bake them for you, too!

Cookies:

2 c butter, softened

2 c sugar

2 t baking soda

2 t baking powder

1 t salt

1 t cinnamon

1 t nutmeg

2 eggs

2 t vanilla

1 15 oz can of pumpkin

4 c flour

Drop heaping teaspoons 2" apart on an ungreased cookie sheet,and bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes.

frosting:

1/2 c butter

1/2 c brown sugar

1/4 c milk

1 t vanilla

2 3/4 c powdered sugar

Heat and melt the butter and brown sugar, stir in the milk and vanilla, and beat in the powdered sugar.  Frost cooled cookies.

All of these cookies are wonderful, and relatively easy to make.

Marcella Hazan's Fresh Pear Tart

Luckily for everyone, this is not just going to be a blog about pie (otherwise you'd have to hear about the concord grape pie we made a while ago....) or even just about dessert.  That said, here is a dessert recipe.

After seeing Julie and Julia earlier this year, Anthony and I immediately (i.e. on our way home from the theater) went to a bookstore in search of a cookbook.  We couldn't find Julia Child, and we tend to do more Italian cooking anyways, so we settled on Marcella Hazan's Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, which turned out to be an excellent choice.  Basically whatever ingredient we've had, we've been able to look it up in this book and find a delicious recipe.  The basic tomato sauce recipe is amazing.

So when we had several pounds of Seckel pears from the CSA, we were happy to find that there was a single recipe calling for pears.  After trying it, I can see why it's the only recipe--why would you want to do anything else (aside from eating raw) to a pear if you could make this tart instead? Even better, Ms. Hazan describes this recipe as "so simple that only an active campaign of sabotage could ruin it."

Marcella Hazan's Fresh Pear Tart

2 pounds fresh pears (she recommends Bosc or Anjou, I used Seckel)

2 eggs

1/4 cup milk (we were out of milk and substituted watered-down greek yogurt!!)

1 cup granulated sugar

pinch salt

1 1/2 cups flour

butter (for greasing the pan and dotting the top of the tart)

unflavored bread crumbs

Bake at 375 F in a 9 inch round cake pan for 50 minutes, or until golden brown.

I'm generally not a fan of peeling things, because it's a pain and I'm lazy and prone to cutting myself, but the texture of the pear skin would be very strange in this recipe.  So peel, core, and slice the pears into small pieces. (Taking pictures of the cooking process is a good excuse for getting out of the parts you don't like to do...)

Beat together the eggs and milk (or watered-down yogurt! She really was right that it's hard to ruin this recipe), add the sugar and flour, and mix well.  Add the pears to the batter and stir.  In the book, it was implied that there would be barely enough batter to coat the pears, but this was not the case--maybe because the pears were so tiny and more of the weight ended up being skin and insides?  But still, Marcella was right, and it wasn't enough to ruin the recipe.

Grease the cake pan with butter, and coat with bread crumbs, dumping out any excess.  Pour the batter into the pan and level with a spoon.  Dot the top with small pieces of butter.  No amount is given, so I guess it depends on how much you enjoy butter.

Bake in the upper third of the oven (I have no idea if it really makes a difference, but I did it anyways) for about 50 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out looking like it's gooey from pears rather than from raw batter.

Take the tart out of the pan while it's still warm.  It's equally tasty served warm or cold.  I recommend eating it with a dollop of greek yogurt on top (greek yogurt really can be substituted for any dairy product in any situation!)  It's very dense, and sweet but not too sugary--and if your pears are particularly ripe and sweet, you could definitely reduce the sugar in the recipe and it would still be delicious.

Also still sort of pie shaped, and therefore good for breakfast.

Inaugural Post: Green Tomato Pie

In light of the Blog's name, the first post obviously must be a pie recipe. And not just any pie recipe, a weird pie recipe.

This summer (and into the fall) we've been getting a share of vegetables and fruits from a local CSA. We got a full share, rather than a half share, which has sometimes lead to an overabundance of vegetables. Usually this is nice (you can never have too many cucumbers when you're making pickles!) but sometimes this leads to having a refrigerator full of things that you have no idea how to eat. And what to do when faced with a large quantity of strange vegetables or fruits? Obviously the answer is google.

So when the CSA gave us a million pounds of green tomatoes (note: green as in unripe--not the other, also awesome, green heirloom tomatoes which taste like ripe tomatoes--these tomatoes are hard and sour!) the internet's answer (aside from frying) seemed to be pie. I think pie is the answer to a lot of problems.

There are a few Green Tomato Pie recipes on the internet, but I did what I usually do: I looked at the recipes and then didn't really follow any of them. In anticipation of this blog post, I actually measured what I added, which I usually don't do very precisely, because otherwise I wouldn't be writing much of a recipe! So, without further ado, Lisa's version of Green Tomato Pie:

Green Tomato Pie

Ingredients:

2 crusts worth of pie crust (any kind, store-bought is easiest! but when I make my own I like to use half butter and half shortening)

Filling:

about 6-10 green tomatoes (depending on size, enough to make 8 cups when sliced)

3 tablespoons lemon juice

lemon zest

about 1 1/4 cups sugar

3 tablespoons corn starch

large pinch of kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 Tablespoons butter

Preheat oven to 400F. Bake 20 minutes at 400F, then reduce to 350F.

First, slice the tomatoes into smallish pieces, no more than 1/4" thick. You want to end up with enough to fill your pie plate about level with the sides, but not much higher--the tomatoes won't reduce in volume after baking the way apples do. I used a 9-inch deep dish pie plate, and 8 cups of tomatoes were exactly perfect. Some recipes say to blanch the tomatoes and remove the skins, but I'm much too lazy to do that.

Mix the lemon juice and lemon zest in with the tomatoes. I didn't add the lemon zest this time, but I think it is worth putting it in if you have a lemon handy.

Next, add the sugar, corn starch, flour, salt, and cinnamon. I like to mix the dry ingredients together on top before mixing them in with the tomatoes. My tomatoes seemed extra liquidy, so I added an extra tablespoon of flour, but I think it would have been fine without it.

Next, put the filling into the pie crust. Try to spoon the tomatoes in so that they lay flat in nice layers, so there aren't too many gaps. Dot the top with butter, and lay the second crust on top.

Now you need to crimp the two crusts together. It's particularly important to make a tight seal for this pie, because the filling tends to be very liquidy and try to boil out of the pie plate--and you don't want to have to clean sticky burnt-on gunk off of your oven! I like to recruit someone who doesn't have long fingernails to complete this step for me. Poke some slits in the top crust using a sharp knife, to let out steam. I try to make a pretty pattern, and try not to get too close to the edges of the crust.

Finally: Bake! I baked the pie for 20 minutes at 400F, then about an hour at 350. Green tomatoes are pretty hard, so they need to cook for a long time if you don't want your pie to be too crunchy. It basically needs to bake for at least another half an hour or so past the point where you can really see the filling bubbling like crazy. Overcooking shouldn't be a problem, so err on the side of longer cooking times. If the crust starts to get done, you can cover the edges with a pie shield or some aluminum foil. I would also recommend putting a cookie sheet and/or additional aluminum foil underneath the pie plate to catch any drips.

After you take the pie out of the oven, let it cool completely! In my opinion this pie tastes much better cold. Yes, it is strange and scary and green, and yes, it tastes sort of odd. I was really skeptical at first, but the taste definitely grew on me--to the point where I was hoping we would get more green tomatoes so I could make another pie! That being said, all green tomatoes are not alike. Make sure you're not getting heirloom tomatoes. The best type of green tomatoes for this pie are really light green, unripe-looking tomatoes. If you taste them, they should be sour rather than bitter or tomato-y. Overall it's a sort of strange pie--I think the closest comparison is probably rhubarb pie--and the green color is kind of bizarre, but I personally find it very delicious. And "Tomato Pie" makes it sound vaguely nutritious (forget about all that sugar....) when eaten as my favorite sort of meal: Pie for Breakfast!