The Pie that’s a Cake: Boston Cream Pie

The essence of life is finding something you really love and then making the daily experience worthwhile. – Denis Waitley

Way better than store-bought.

You’ve seen them at the grocery store in the desserts cabinet of the baking section. Glossy chocolate atop yellow cake that’s been spit and filled with cream… with one glistening maraschino cherry (with a stem) on top…

It looks delicious. Don’t be fooled. 

If I had a dollar for every time I was sucked in by the allure of those Boston Cream Pies I would be a rich man. Well maybe not rich, but I would have all those dollars, plus what it cost me to buy the cakes!

The ones we purchase at both our grocery chains leave something to be desired. Have you ever bought a black forest cake or birthday cake at one of those counters? If you have, you know what I mean. I know they're doing their best, but they taste…"fake”. 

Fake cake. How is that even possible?

A Boston Cream Pie isn’t an insignificant undertaking. There’s three recipes involved: the cake, pastry cream, and glaze. Luckily each recipe is very easy.

I made mine on New Years Day (part of my "try things I don’t like" resolution) and needed the better part of a day for the baking, cooling and assembling.

But it was worth it. Oh my, was it worth it. Four pieces worth it. Never, ever, ever, ever again will I allow one of those cakes to fall into my shopping basket at the grocery. The difference is dramatic to say the least.

But why is this cake called a pie? For that we have to look at some history.

History of the Boston Cream “Pie”

In times past the dividing line between cake and pie was far less defined than today. Home cooks were well versed in making baked goods and would have had all the necessary bakeware for them at hand.

Cook's tip: To cut one cake into layers make a small slit in
the side and then pull thread through. Works like a charm.

In the New England of the 1800s pie dishes were far more common than cake tins. The first version of this cake may very well have been baked in pie tins, hence the name. Boston Cream Pie is quite similar to an earlier baked standard called “pudding cake pie.”

In 1856 the Parker House Hotel opened in Boston. It was the first Boston hotel to have both hot and cold running water. Fancy. They also had an Armenian-French chef, M. Sanzian. It is he who is credited with popularizing the “pie” in its present form.

His dessert was called Parker House Chocolate Cream Pie. As it moved beyond Boston, it retained the Massachusetts tie in its name – Boston Cream Pie. I don’t know if the chocolate refers to the topping, as today, or if the cake was actually chocolate. If anyone knows let me know in the comments.

Regardless, it gained wide popularity. No wonder. It's a fantastic dessert.

In 1996, Boston Cream Pie was declared the official state dessert of Massachusetts. It beat out Toll House cookies and Indian pudding, two other stellar desserts.

Boston Cream Pie

Prep: 15 min  |  Bake:  50-60 min

1-1/4 cups sugar 

3/4 cup butter, softened 

2 large eggs 

1-1/2 cups cake flour

1/4 cup cornstarch

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 cup milk

1 tbsp vinegar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 

Preheat oven to 350°F. Place a piece of waxed paper on the bottom of a 9” spring form pan. Close the paper up into the ring to make a seal. Butter and flour the inside. Set aside.

Combine the butter and sugar in a bowl. Cream together until the mixture is light and fluffy. Then add the eggs, one at a time, beating each in well.

Sift together the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add 1/3 of the dry ingredients, then half the milk, 1/3 more dry, the remainder of the milk, and the remaining dry. Beat well and then stir in the vinegar and vanilla.

Immediately pour the batter into the prepared pan and place it in the oven. Bake on the middle rack for 50 to 60 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the centre. 

(Timing note: while the cake is baking, make the pastry cream and chill it.)

Remove from oven and let the cake cool completely in the pan on a rack. Once cool, cut the cake into two equal layers.

Invert the top layer onto a cake plate or other tray (so the cooked top is facing down). Spoon the pastry over the cut side and smooth it out. Place the second layer of cake on top.

Make the glaze and immediately pour it over the cake. Smooth it out with a knife so it reaches the edge. The glaze will will set up in about 15 minutes.

Vanilla Pastry Cream

Prep: 5 minutes  |  Cook: 10 minutes  |  Chill : 1 hour

1-1/4 cups whole milk

3 egg yolks

¼ cup granulated sugar

6 tbsp flour

1 tbsp butter

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

In a small saucepan, warm 1 cup of the milk over low heat until it is just scalding (scalding is when small bubbles form at the edge of the pan but the milk is not boiling). 

While the milk is warming, whisk together the remaining 1/4 cup of milk and the egg yolks in a bowl. Then add the sugar and flour and mix until completely smooth.

Once the milk is steaming, add 1/4 cup of it to the eggs and whisk well. Then add another 1/4 cup and whisk again.

Transfer the egg mixture to the rest of the hot milk and continue whisking. Cook on medium heat until thickened, about 5 minutes. The custard will fall in ribbons from the whisk. 

Remove from the heat, stir in the vanilla extract and butter, and chill. Place plastic wrap directly on the surface of the pastry cream before refrigerating to prevent a skin from forming.

This pastry cream recipe can be used to fill many other pastries as well – not just this cake.

Soft Chocolate Glaze

Time: 5 min

3/4 cup powdered sugar

1/4 cup cocoa powder

2 tbsp milk (or more)

1 tsp vanilla extract

In a small bowl, combine the powdered sugar and the cocoa powder. Using a fork or whisk, stir in the milk until the mixture is smooth and glossy. Stir in the vanilla extract.  

If not using immediately, put plastic wrap directly on the surface to prevent a skin, but you should use it right away as it has a tendency to set up and will be harder to get smooth later.

Even set up the glaze will be easy to cut. It will just be harder to get on the cake than if it's used right away.

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Winter Necessity: Peppermint Whisky Cough Syrup

The whole imposing edifice of modern medicine, for all its breathtaking successes, is, like the celebrated Tower of Pisa, slightly off balance. It is frightening how dependent on drugs we are all becoming and how easy it is for doctors to prescribe them as the universal panacea for our ills. – Prince Charles

Turn candy canes into cough remedy. Boozy cough remedy.

Ho, ho, ho! Here's how to turn Christmas candy into boozy cough syrup. Intrigued? Read on.

This is a post especially for a sort of “pen-pal” of mine –  Facebook friend who I have never met. How many of us have those? Hopefully we'll rectify that situation this year. We're only 2 hours apart.

I posted I made this yesterday. Her reply was succint: “Might try it as preventative medicine”. I believe it was because of the whisky.

I’ve been sitting on this recipe for a while – waiting until after Christmas when candy canes go on sale. 

There is absolutely no use for a retailer to hold on to candy canes after December 25, so they go on deep discount sale. I got mine for one dollar and some change.

This recipe comes highly recommended by those who have made it. I tend to agree it must help somewhat, when you look at what it's made of.

Almost all the ingredients that are in this homemade cough remedy have been proven in one way or another to help with a scratchy throat.

Whisky has an anti-inflammatory action on mucous membranes. Lemon contains over 80% of your recommended daily doage of vitamin C. Peppermint (and its menthol) is a decongestant.

It takes a while to melt the candy – 10-12 minutes.

Because menthol thins mucus, it is also an expectorant, meaning that it helps loosen phlegm to break up coughs. It soothes and calms sore throats and dry coughs.

A recent study showed that ingesting honey can shorten cold symptoms by two days over “traditional” (pharmaceutical) medicine alone.

So why not take a chance to cook up some cold remedy on the stovetop?

This doesn’t taste overwhelmingly of whisky. If anything it’s more honey and peppermint.

There’s a popular cough suppressant whose catch phrase is “It tastes awful, but it works.”

Just think if you could have something that you can make at home, tastes good and works too?

Peppermint Whisky Cough Syrup

Once all is combined, let cook for 3-4 minutes.

Cook: 20 min  |  Yield about 350 ml 1/4 cup of water

1/2 cup broken peppermint candy canes (8 canes)

1/4 cup lemon juice

1/2 cup whiskey

1 cup honey

Put the water and broken candy canes in a saucepan. Continuously stir over medium heat until the candy is completely dissolved. If not the candy may stick.

Reduce the heat to simmer and add the lemon juice and whisky. Stir well. Then add the honey.

Bring the mixture to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and let cook for 3-4 minutes.

Let cool and bottle. Keep in a cool place for up to 2 months. 

Use about 1-2 tablespoons at a time to calm a scratchy throat.

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New Favourite: Steak & Kidney Turnovers

Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls...Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine. – James Joyce, Ulysses

Extremely flaky pastry enclosing beef, mushrooms, onion, garlic and carrots
in a thick herby gravy.

OK – everyone who loves beef kidneys raise your hand. Hmmm. I don’t see many hands raised. 

I wouldn’t have been raising my hand too quickly either, until after I ate these pastries. And no, they do not give your palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine. I would suggest Mr. Joyce wasn't a fan...

The victims. Kidney $1.50; steak $5.30.
Serves 6 people.

But I am now. I was full of trepidation at the start of this exercise. But the kidney, steak, vegetables, some simple spices and herbs all combine to make something that has great nuance and depth.

Pretty tasty. That’s what I said when I tested the filling. It was far beyond what I was expecting. Far beyond.

Kidneys can be an acquired taste. In this recipe I dialled down the kidney flavour without decreasing the kidney amount. I did it by increasing other flavours in the mixture. Clever, eh?

Usually steak and kidney it can be pretty basic. If you’re a newbie to kidney then maybe you want to check this recipe out instead of something more "English pub style."

Kidneys are inexpensive. Beef kidneys are also very good for you. They are high in protein and provide several important vitamins and essential minerals.

I’m not going to blather on at great length. There’s three recipes here today: the steak and kidney filling, a fantastic flaky pastry (kind of made like puff pastry), and a sweated cabbage and carrot side dish.

So, enough words, on to the food!!

Steak & Kidney Turnovers

Prep filling: 2 hours  |  Making turnovers: 20 min  |  Bake: 40 min  |  Yield: 6

1 recipe pastry (see recipe below)

2 tbsp vegetable oil

1 medium onion, sliced

250 g mushrooms, quartered

1 rib celery, diced

1 med carrot, diced

4 garlic cloves, crushed

4 tomatoes, quartered

1 lb beef steak, cubed

3/4 lb kidney, cleaned and cubed*

8 allspice berries

2 bay leaves

1/2 tsp thyme

2 cups beef stock

salt & pepper, to taste

1 tbsp butter

1 tsp flour 

This filling should be made at least a few hours ahead.

This pastry is made partly like puff pastry.
After chilling, the dough is done two "turns."

Heat the vegetable oil in a Dutch oven or other heavy pot with a lid. Add the onions, mushrooms, celery, carrot and garlic. Sauté for about 5 minutes.

Then add the tomatoes, steak, kidney, allspice, bay leaves, thyme, beef stock and some salt and pepper.

Cover, slightly ajar, and simmer for about 1-3/4 hours or until the liquid is almost all gone and what is left is thick. Remove from the heat and stir in the butter. Then sprinkle the flour on top and stir again.

Taste for salt and pepper, and adjust if necessary. Let cool before using.

* To clean the kidney simply start to cut off small mushroom sized pieces of meat. Inside you will see a white “core”. Do not use this. part of the kidney, or any visible fat.

Two "turns" is rolling the dough out, folding in thirds (top
pic) and then folded into thirds again, like this photo.
The process begins to make all those beautiful thin layers.
Four more "turns" and I would have puff pastry, supposedly.

Flaky Pastry

Prep: 15 min  |  Chilling: 1 hour

2 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup salted butter, 1/2” cubes

1/4 cup cold water

2-1/2 tbsp white vinegar

Mix the flour and salt in a bowl. Add the cubed butter and toss well. Then, with your hands, flatten the cubes of butter until all have been done.

Mix the vinegar and water together and add to the butter/flour. Mix until it just forms a rough dough. Flatten into a rectangle, wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1/2 hour.

At the end of 1/2 hour, on a floured board roll out the dough to a rectangle about 18” x 12”. Fold in thirds, and then thirds again to make a 6x4 block of dough. Wrap and refrigerate again, at least for 1/2 hour.

Cut the dough into six 6" x6" squares, fill and bake.

To Make Turnovers

Preheat the oven to 400°F.

Roll the dough out to 18” x 12” again. Use some flour to ensure the dough doesn’t stick. Trim the dough into six 6”-square pieces.

Wet the outer perimeter of a piece of dough. Mound some filling in the centre. Fold the dough over itself to make a triangle. Firmly pinch the edges together to seal. Place on a baking sheet and pierce three vent holes in the pastry.

Repeat with the remaining five squares.

Bake for 35-40 minutes, until golden brown and some “gravy” is bubbling through the vent holes.

This was a nice accompaniment. A little sour
and a little sweet.

Sweet Sweated Cabbage

Prep: 5 min  |  Cook: 15 min  |  Serves 6

1 tbsp oil

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 tbsp ginger, minced

1 med onion, sliced

1/4 med cabbage, shredded

1 med carrot, julienned

1/2 tsp turmeric

2 tbsp honey

2 tbsp cider vinegar

salt & pepper to taste

Combine all the ingredients in a pan. 

Cover and let simmer for 15 minutes, until the cabbage is partly wilted.

Serve while hot.

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Repost: Doggie Feet and Sidewalk Salt

Sidewalk salt turns pleasant walk into painful ordeal

With the full onset of winter, the road salt is out in full force. Have you ever been walking your dog and they raise a paw (or paws)? They look at you so pitifully. "Why do I hurt?" It's because the salt they are walking through is burning their feet.

This morning's sidewalk condiment, just up the road a few feet. This is nothing.

Rock salt and most chemical de-icers irritate a dog's paws and turn a winter walk into a painful ordeal. It's dangerous on the walk, and again when they return home and try to lick it off. Road salt has chemicals added to increase its effectiveness. Ingesting it can be toxic.

This morning on our walk I ran into this problem with Henry. We had a skiff of snow the previous night and snow removal companies were out in full force. In places the salt was actually over an inch thick. I would suggest this is neither environmentally, or financially, wise.

When Simon was quite young, and I unaware of this problem, he actually collapsed on Spring Garden Road because his paws burned so terribly. I had to physically pick him up and carry him about 1/4 of a block. Simon was a Bouvier and weighed about 65 lbs at the time. It's amazing the strength you can muster when your child is in pain.

Form Wikipedia (Road Salt):

"Calcium chloride is preferred over sodium chloride, as CaCl2 releases energy upon forming a solution with water, heating any ice or snow it is in contact with. It also lowers the freezing point, depending on the concentration. Whereas the minimum freezing point is −21.12 °C for 23.31 wt% of salt, the freezing near this concentration is so slow that the eutectic point of −22.4 °C can be reached with about 25 wt% of salt. (Do you understand any of that? I don't. - D) NaCl does not release heat upon solution; however, it does lower the freezing point. Calcium chloride is thought to be more environmentally friendly than sodium chloride when used to de-ice roads, however a drawback is that it tends to promote corrosion (of vehicles) more so than sodium chloride. NaCl is also more readily available and does not have any special handling or storage requirements, unlike calcium chloride."

We can't very well change the policy for an entire city, but what can we do as individual home owners? 

The US National Animal Poison Control suggests using sand or cat litter for traction instead of salt. It won't melt snow or ice, but won't hurt your (or other pet owners) dog's feet. My mother uses only sand in consideration of her dog.

What can we do to protect our pets? 

Wash their paws before going out and apply either Vaseline or Bag Balm (a farm product for cow's udders). When you return, repeat. As a preventative measure keep the hair trimmed on the bottom of your pet's feet. This will help stop the build-up of the salty slush that causes their pain.

Of course, there's always boots, but some dogs (Simon was one) won't abide them. It is good for a laugh, though.

Currently we're in the midst of a full-on snowstorm. I dread our walks the next few days.

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Recipe: Basque Style Chicken and Ham

It has been said: The whole is more than the sum of its parts. It is more correct to say that the whole is something else than the sum of its parts, because summing up is a meaningless procedure, whereas the whole-part relationship is meaningful. – Kurt Koffka

This is the result of cooking for one hour. Eggplant is an amazing thing.

So when we add two plus two in the kitchen we may get four, but we may also get something else as well. Something new…

What goes into a pot and what comes out never ceases to amaze me. The world is a culinary adventure just waiting for you to take part. I love it.

This is what it looked like before cooking.

This night I took a culinary trip  to the Basque region of northern Spain. My connecting flight was the grocery store.

Basque cuisine is among the best international cuisines. Much like Italian cuisine, traditional Basque food is not complex or elaborate. It is a food from the common people.

Basque cuisine is based on the best ingredients available in the region. As such it revels in simplicity of preparation, yet complexity of flavours.

Basque cooking is not based on elaborate sauces or spice combinations. The most important ingredient in Basque cuisine is the fresh ingredient.

Being a Maritime people (like Nova Scotians), a great deal of Basque cooking involves seafood. But seafood is not the only specialty.

I can sympathize. Many tourists think we just sit around eating lobster and cod all the time. Au contraire, monsieur et madame. The “coast,” although important, is always just a part of what makes a maritime community.

Like us, meat, poultry and game also hold their places of pride in Basque cooking. Cured and preserved meats like hams and sausages are also produced. Bayonne ham is one such famous export. (The recipe calls for it, but you’ll be lucky to find it in Nova Scotia.)

This recipe combines some ingredients you may not think of sticking in the pot all at once. They all go together in a most magical and satisfying way. What goes in is certainly different that what comes out!

Basque Style Chicken and Ham

Prep: 5 min  |  Cook: 1 hour  |  Serves 6

Cook long, low and slow to develop flavours.

vegetable oil

2 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless

1 lg sweet onion

3 garlic cloves

375 g smoked ham, sliced 1/4” thick (like Bayonne, if possible)

5 plum tomatoes

1 small eggplant

1 lg green pepper

3/4 cup cured black olives, whole

1/2 cup white wine

1/2 chicken stock

2 bay leaves

1 star anise

1 tsp thyme

1/2 tsp sage

1/2 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp chilli pepper flakes

salt and pepper

Heat the oil in a Dutch oven or other large pot with a lid.

Brown the chicken and then remove to a plate. Soften the onion and garlic for about 3-4 minutes. 

Chop the tomatoes, eggplant and green pepper into large pieces and then add to the pot. Cut the pork slices into 1” squares.

Cut the chicken breast into bite-sized pieces. Add, with the remaining ingredients, to the pot. Cook, covered for 40 min, and then uncovered for 20 minutes more.

By the end of the last 20 minutes the liquid will have reduced to a delicious, thick sauce.

Taste and adjust salt and pepper.

Serve on top of white rice in soup bowls.

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Weekend Baking: Sourdough Potato Bread

To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, to be given a chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy. – Bette Davis 

A bit of messiness, with a very liquid dough. But manageable and
a great result. Can you smell it?

Let’s get messy! Just remember I have warned you up front. 

This looks like another of my impossible doughs – perhaps the most impossible-looking one yet, but the result speaks for itself.

The potato/flour mixture before kneading and 8 hour rest.

Why make potato bread?

You know, I haven’t really found any aesthetic reason why anyone would add potato to bread. I did find a reference to Peru where at one time it was encouraged because of a spike in the cost of wheat. The scarcity/cost of grain may be a reason.

Of course, you do get whatever heath benefits that are in the potatoes. Depending on where you check that’s a double edged sword: either you get more iron, folate, etc., or you get a slice of bread that heightens your heart attach risk and/or causes you to get fatter than normal bread would cause…

I do know that many nations have their own version of potato/wheat bread, including the United States, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Scotland, Poland and several other European states.

I also know that making potato bread is more work than plain white flour bread. So you sort of will have to want do this. But why...

This is the autolysed potato/flour in the morning.

Oh, right. I just realized why you should make potato bread – it’s delicious.

So what exactly is it?

Potato bread is made from dough in which potato supplements or replaces the regular wheat flour. The ratio of potato to flour varies greatly from recipe to recipe.

The bread can be cooked in several ways, including baking in a hot pan or conventionally in an oven. It may be leavened or unleavened, and may have a variety of other ingredients baked into it. 

Some recipes use "riced" potatoes, while others use dehydrated potato flakes. I would imagine those recipes aren’t great-grandma’s.

A "ricer" is something that you press potatoes through, kind of like a garlic press. It's not a common kitchen device. Potato flakes are quite new, being invented by a Canadian in 1962.

This recipe isn't great-grandma's either. With my newfound confidence in sourdough preferments and autolysed dough I decided to turn a classic recipe on its head.

This is the pre-ferment in the morning.
It looks like bubbly spider webs.

Potato bread is available in some stores in some countries. This potato bread tastes nothing like what you buy in the store – if you even can. It also tastes different than regular bread. You get hints of the starch that’s in it from the potatoes.

The potatoes make this bread have a wonderful small crumb and the interior is very “luxurious.” It took me a while to come up with an appropriate word. That’s pretty close.

The smell while baking can’t be beat either. My spouse came back from the store and the first words I heard were “It sure smells like a bakery in here.” (That’s something I aspire to.)

My original starting point was an old-fashioned classic recipe. Generations have enjoyed its simple, wholesome flavour. This version continues the tradition. I would make it again in a second.

The dough all combined and risen for 2 hours. Very wet.

Sourdough Potato Bread

Inactive: 8 hours, plus 3 hours  |  Bake: 50 minutes  |  Yield: 2 loaves

3 medium white potatoes, whole (russets are a good choice)

2-1/2 cups warm (110°F) potato water

2 tbsp butter, melted

2 tbsp sugar

2 tsp salt

6 cups bread flour

2-1/2 tsp (1 package) active dry yeast

1/4 cup 110°F water

Cook whole potatoes in enough water to cover for 30-35 minutes, until they are easily pierced with a fork. Let the potatoes cool down in the water. Peel and put through a ricer if possible. If not, mash very, very well. (That means NO pieces of potato if possible.)

Let the potato water cool down to 110°F before proceeding. Measure the water and reserve 2-1/2 cups. If you have less, top it up with water.

Believe it or not, you can get it into two "semi" solid pieces.

In a small mixing bowl, mix 1 cup flour, 1/2 tsp yeast and 1 cup of the warm potato water. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let rise overnight. This is your sour pre-ferment.

In a large bowl mix the riced potato, 1-1/2 cups potato water, butter, sugar, salt and 5 cups of flour. Knead until it all comes together. You will have a mass that just barely sticks to your hands. Cover with plastic wrap and a towel and let sit overnight.

In the morning, proof the remaining 2 tsp yeast in the 1/4 cup of water. Combine the pre-ferment, potato mixture and yeast together. Mix with a spoon and then knead until smooth.

“Knead” at this point is a relative term. You will be dealing with a very wet dough. The best way to “knead” it is to run your fingers down the side of the bowl and “lift” the dough up onto itself turning the bowl as you go. Do this for about 5-7 minutes.

The dough, flopped into the buttered pans.

Resist the urge to add more flour. This is NOT your grandmother’s potato bread dough.

Wrap the surface of the bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rise until doubled, about two hours. Generously butter two 9” x 5” x 3” bread pans and set aside.

At the end of the first rise, “pour” the dough out onto a generously floured work surface. Using a dough scraper fold the dough up onto itself until it begins to hold a shape for a short time before relaxing.

Cut the dough into two equal pieces and pus each half into one of the pans. Let rise, uncovered, for one hour.

Preheat the oven to 425°F 1/2 hour before the end of the second rise. Place a pan of water in the oven. 

Lightly dust the top of the loaves with flour. Bake for about 50 minutes. Remove the water pan after the first 10 minutes and continue to bake until well browned and the bottom sounds hollow when tapped.

The end result. Not too shabby.

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