Fresh Raspberry Pie

I have these wonderful raspberries, which ripen rather late (October) and there are plenty, so I made this luxury pie.

Fresh raspberry pie

(Serves 8)

Crust

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (350 g)

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup butter (150 g)

1/2 cup cool water (1 1/4 dl)

Filling:

4 cups fresh raspberries (600 g)

1/2 cup sugar (100 g)

1/2 cup flour (75 g)

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg, vanilla, cinnamon or ginger

1 TBSP lemon juice

1 Tablespoon milk or cream for brushing the top

1 Tablespoon sugar for dusting

Combine flour and salt in a bowl. Cut in the butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in water until mixture forms a ball. Do NOT knead the dough as in bread making. Divide dough in half, and shape into discs. Cover the dough and refrigerate it for later, or use now.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 C).

Roll out 1 disc of dough and place it in a pie pan.

Toss raspberries, sugar, flour, nutmeg and lemon juice gently in a large bowl. Fill into prepared pie crust.

Use the other dough disc for a double crust or lattice crust. Brush with milk or cream and dust with sugar. Bake for 45-60 minutes or until crust is golden brown and juices are bubbling. Remove to cool on a rack for 30-60 minutes.

Serve the Raspberry Pie with ice cream, whipped cream or sour cream (crème fraiche).

No Knead bread

Jim Lahey of the Sullivan Street Bakery has made the recipe for No knead bread, which was published in New York Times in 2006. Ever since food-bloggers all over the world have posted the recipe and their results on the internet.
Read the original recipe here: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/08/dining/081mrex.html

Now it is my turn. I have used the recipe for an article in Hjemmet and tried it out with various kinds of flour, different lengths of rest and in pots of cast iron, Pyrex and clay.

My conclusions are:
1. Use whatever flour you like. If you use strong wheat flour you will get very beautiful domed bread with a crispy crust and a great crumb. If you use whole wheat flour the bread may be more flat, but the taste will be very good – and as you know: looks are not everything!
2. I have let the dough rest in the bowl for 8, 10, 12 and 18 hours – and the only difference is that a longer rest makes the taste of “sourdough” stronger. The crust and the bread itself are wonderful even by 8 hours rest.
3. I did omit the 15 minute rest on the table and have also cut the second rest with 1 1/2 hours – with perfect results.
4. Use a cast iron pot – you can use Pyrex or ceramic – but the bread will not be as good as baked in the cast iron – sorry guys. I actually went out and bought a new 4 liter Le Creuset pot just for this project – and it was worth it!
5. I use a warmer oven then in the original recipe: 480 degrees F/250 degrees C.

My recipe in European measures:

500 g flour (after your choice)
5 g fresh yeast (we don’t use instant yeast in Denmark)
2 tsp salt (I like the taste of salt to be more prevalent – is that the correct word?)
4 dl water (+ 3-4 TBSP extra if using whole wheat flour)

I just crumble the yeast into the flour, add salt and water and stir the dough together – just until there is no more dry flour – this will take less than 1 minute.
Cover the bowl and let it rest on the kitchen table for as long as you can wait – 8-18 hours.
Let the dough “fall” out of the bowl on to a lightly floured table. Fold the dough over on itself 3 or 4 times, turn it seam side down and place it on a floured cloth. Dust a little more flour over the dough, fold the cloth loosely over and let it rest while the oven and pot reaches 480 degrees F/250 degrees C – about 20-30 minutes.
Flip the dough into the hot pot, put the lid on and put it in the oven 30 minutes. Remove the lid and bake the bread 15-20 minutes more. Let in cool on a rack at least 30 minutes.




The dough has rested in the cloth


The dough in the very hot pot


The bread is finished

Fingers off - it is cooling on the rack

Left-over pizza

We had left-over’s Sunday; 1 fried pork chop and some potato salad containing chick-peas, tomatoes, feta cheese and olives.

I made a pizza dough and let it rise for about 4 hours. Rolled the dough out thin and spreaded a couple of tablespoons pesto on the dough, Then I scattered very thin slices of the pork chop over it and added the potato salad. I grated some parmesan over that and put the pizza in a very hot oven (250 degrees C/485 degrees F) for about 15 minutes.
It was delicious – and my daughter: Mathilde loved it.
So that is how you feed 3 people with 1 pork chop!

Here is the pizza dough recipe:

10 g/2 tsp yeast
3 1/2 dl/1 1/2 cup tepid water
500 g/3 1/2 cup strong wheat flour
2 TBSP olive oil
2 tsp salt

Mix everything together and knead the dough in a machine for about 5 minutes. Add more flour if needed. Put the dough in a bowl brushed with olive oil, cover it and let it sit on the kitchen table for as long as you can wait.
Put the dough on a table sprinkled with flour and roll it to the thickness you like. Put the dough on a baking sheet and spread some pesto or tomato sauce on it. Ad your favorite left-over’s and bake it in a very hot oven for about 15 minutes.