Hand Pies on Kitchen3N

Coconut Jaggery Hand Pies (Narkeler Pitha)

Thu, 01 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Pitha - a Bengali style sweet dumpling. Narkeler pitha - dumpling filled with coconut and date sap. Usually the dough is made with rice flour and water(?), filled with the coconut mixture, then deep fried. I never learned how to make pitha, but I did teach myself how to make hand pies.

Pastry Pillows

Mon, 27 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

I'm baaaaaaaack! After recovering from hosting Thanksgiving dinner, I'm back in the kitchen making some of my favorite things: small bites, filled with butter, sugar, then topped with more fat and more sugar. Yeah! Just in time for the holiday season, I'm whippin' out my trusty old "100 Best Cookies" catalogue from Better Homes and Gardens that I got way back when I used to live Poughkeepsie (2010). I don't celebrate Christmas, but I love all the holiday baking that comes along with the season. I've also been watching a whole lot of The Great British Baking Show so I'm super inspired by all the different creations I see on the screen. What shall I bake next? A Stollen (a German holiday bread studded with dried fruit with a marzipan center)? A chocolate twist bread? Chocolate revel bars? I'm enjoying the down time to explore cakes' buttery brethren - though I'll be back in the kitchen baking cakes as of tomorrow =).

I was fascinated by this recipe. Most pastry dough requires skillful combining of cold butter and flour in order to achieve flaky texture, but this fool proof dough creams together butter and cream cheese and mixes in flour. Somehow they puff up in the oven and look like glorious buttery pillows. The best kind of bedding I’d say! I did something sneaky and subbed mini chocolate chips for the jam in some of my later pillows. Hope you enjoy these as much as my friends and family have!

Strawberry Rhubarb Hand Pies

Mon, 18 May 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I gave into peer pressure, guys. When the first ramps popped up in my instagram feed, I rushed to the Union Square Green Market to pick some up. Not too long after, I picked up some rhubarb without much idea about what I was going to do with it. I am all about eating seasonal foods, local, humane, natural, sustainable, etc. But sometimes the thing that’s in season isn’t exactly worth all the hype. Ramps are great and all. If you are less familiar with them, they are a green leafy vegetable available for a few short weeks in spring. They are sold leaves, stalk, bulb and all and have a lovely mild onion flavor. I loved them first time I used them, as a topping on my homemade pizza. More recently, I chopped them up and stewed them with some tomatoes. I even bought a ramp pesto that works wonders on a tomato mozzarella panino.