Cherry Tart

Remember that time I told you guys I’d post something to the blog within a week, and then waited over a month instead?

Whoops…

In my defense, I’ve been ridiculously busy.  Grad school is craziness!  Don’t believe me?  Here is a sampling of data from a 27 page project/paper I wrote last week.

Difficulty
Very Difficult	3
Somewhat Difficult	11
Somewhat Easy	4
Very Easy	2
Comprehension
Very Difficult	0
Somewhat Difficult	5
Somewhat Easy	14
Very Easy	2
Again?
Yes	10
No	11
Why?
Benefits Reader	2
Benefits Writer	6
Limits Reader	9
Limits Writer	4
"Yes, but…"	1 r 1 w

1) Peer Review	2) Instructor Review	3) Final Draft
1	1	2
2	2	3
1	2	2
1	1	2
2	2	2
2	2	3
1	2	2
1	1	2
2	2	2
2	2	2
1	1	2
2	2	3
2	2	3
1	1	2
2	2	3
1	1	2
2	2	3
2	2	2
1	1	1
2	2	2
2	2	1
2	2	3

Class:	% Less Helpful	% More Helpful	% Most Helpful
AQ	42.6	33.3	24.1
RRE	40.4	40.4	19.2

Remember how I’m in grad school for creative writing?!  Yeah…

This project took me FOREVER to do, including a near-sleepless night grading student papers a particular way, and then wanting to crawl in a hole and die when it came time to teach my two composition classes the next day.  The most challenging part was figuring out what to do with all this data, because it included *gulp* math.  I actually did it correctly, which is impressive for me, considering the countless occasions where it takes me at least 30 seconds to add two single digit numbers together.  I wish I was joking.

Point is, I was busy.  Very very very busy.  But I missed the dear ol’ foodie blog, so I’m going to make an effort to be better about posting on here at least twice a month like I promised. 

Of course, for the month of November, I plan to do another project (like the one I referenced above) for the same class, visit my sister in Michigan, do a public reading of one of my stories, finish revising the third draft of my children’s novel, and write another novel in 30 days for NationalNovel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) this year.  This is on top of teaching my 2 classes and fulfilling the regular course work for my graduate classes that I’m a student in.

I know, I’m insane.  If between now and December 1^st you read in the news that a grad student in California spontaneously combusted, you know it was me.

I’m supposed to be writing a story right now that’s due tomorrow, so I’m not going to let much further ado get in the way of you and the second recipe I picked out from Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome. 

During one of their mealtimes, J says, “We finished up with tea and cherry tart.  Montmorency [the dog] had a fight with the kettle during tea-time, and came off a poor second” (193).

I wanted to try cherry tart, so I did.

There are lots of different kinds of tarts (you can check out my spiel on them on my post for TreacleTart).  I tried to pick a recipe that most befitted common fruit tarts in Britain, particularly in the late 19^th century when this book was written.  I decided to make a cherry custard tart.

My decision to make a cherry tart wasn’t very timely.  Cherries simply aren’t in season in mid September.  So I worked with cherry pie filling.  I think that’s what made this dessert only so-so.  I mean, it was good, but it tasted very store-bought (not a compliment, coming from me).  So if you plan to make this recipe (now that I’ve given it such a rave review), USE FRESH CHERRIES!  You can use any fruit, really.  Just make sure it’s fresh.

Cherry Tart

Shortcrust pastry (This is same recipe I used for Treacle Tart)
Makes 6 oz.

·         125g/4oz (1/2 cup) plain flour

·         pinch of salt

·         55g/2oz (1/4 cup) butter

·         30-45ml/2-3 tbsp cold water

Place cold butter in a medium bowl and add flour and salt.  Using a pastry blender (or 2 forks), cut the butter into the flour/salt until the butter is in small little cubes/chunks.  It will looks crumbly. 

 

Sprinkle water tablespoons at a time, stirring slightly with a knife after each tablespoon (I used about 2 ½ tbsp).  When you can clench the dough in your fist and it stays in a ball, there is enough water. 

Immediately put in freezer for at least 10 minutes.  When you need the dough, take it out of the freezer and put it on a floured piece of wax paper.  Roll out the dough as thin as you can get it without tearing.

Custard

You will need a flan tin about 2.5cm (1 inch) deep, 18cm (7 inches across) with a removable base. (I used my spring form pan)

• 5 oz shortcrust pastry
• 2 large eggs
• ½ cup  milk
• ½ tsp  Almond extract
• 3 tbsp  sugar
• 1/2 can Cherry pie filling (or 3/4 cup fresh cherries, pitted)

1. Roll out the pastry and line the flan tin. Prick it all over with a fork and bake blind at 400F for 10-15 minutes or until it is very slightly colored.
2. Beat the eggs lightly with the sugar. Heat the milk and almond extract until it begins to steam and add the egg mixture to it, whisking everything together.
3. Strain out the liquid from the cherry pie filling and set aside.  Spread cherries on the bottom of the pastry case, evenly.
4. Pour the custard mixture into the pastry case and bake in the centre of the oven at (425F) for ten minutes and then turn down the heat to 180C (350F) and bake for a further 20-25 minutes until the custard is just set.

Pre-bake

Post-bake

I really liked the custard part of this tart.  And the shortcrust pastry was good, like it was for the treacle tart.  I just didn’t let it pre-bake it quite long enough, so it wasn’t quite as flaky as my treacle tart crust.  All in all, it was a good dessert, but… meh.  Not fantastic.

I thought it looked kind of ugly when I pulled it out of the oven (Admit it; you thought so too), with the cherries floating to the surface, but not completely, and the deflated bubbles the reminded me of a really bad sunburn.  I knew it was supposed to look like this, because I googled pictures, but I still didn’t like it, so poured my left-over cherry pie filling liquid onto the top of the tart.  It made it look much more appetizing.  In terms of the flavor… meh. 

Mucho mejor!

I’ve never been a fan of the fake cherry flavor, which is what cherry pie filling tastes like, so that’s probably why I wasn’t over the moon about this dessert.  But I love real cherries.  I think this tart would be really good if you used fresh cherries in the middle, and fresh cherry juice to make a homemade cherry syrup for the top.  Mmmmm…  

Here are some parting words from Mr. Jerome:

“We are but the veriest, sorriest slaves of our stomach.  Reach not after morality and righteousness, my friends; watch vigilantly your stomach, and diet it with care and judgement [sic].  Then virtue and contentment will come and reign within your heart, unsought by any effort of your own” (133).

P.S. From Julie: "Tell blog world I said hello again!  I'm going to try and collect mange (many) Danish recipes. :)"

Green Eggs and Ham

Last night I got a pretty exciting email.  It went like this:

Dear Mary:
Congratulations! I’m pleased to inform you that the creative writing
committee thought very highly of your writing sample and invites you to

enroll in the M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing beginning Fall 2011. 

I stared at the email for a moment with a grin on my face, hardly able to believe it.  When reality sank in, I shouted down the stairs to my mom that I got into grad school and did a little (thankfully private) dance on the landing.  Then I sat back and I tried to figure out what to do now that my year-long hiatus from school was now over.  After much deliberation, I decided to make a fried egg.

This may seem like a pretty random way to celebrate entrance into a higher institute of learning.  Which is true, it was pretty random.  But it was poetic, in a way.  How, you may ask?  Well sit on the rainbow carpet, children, because it’s story time.

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Mary.  Her favorite pastimes were climbing trees, jumping on the trampoline, and blaming her brothers for things they may or may not have done.  One day, Mary’s mother decided that Mary ought to add another pastime to the list.  So she tried to teach Mary how to read.  She would sit her daughter down with a series of flash cards with words like “bat,” “cat” and “sat” on them, and make Mary read them.

This was not Mary’s idea of fun.  She wanted to be outside getting dirty, not sitting on a stool staring at boring flashcards.  So Mary refused to read and tried to run away.  

Mary’s mother said, “But don’t you want to read this story?  It’s called ‘Green Eggs and Ham’ by Dr. Seuss. You like Dr. Seuss.”

“Okay, read it to me,” said Mary excitedly, plopping back down on the stool.  She was not the most polite child in the house.

“No,” said Mary’s mother.  “I won’t read this story to you.  You have to read it.  You have to find out the ending for yourself.”

“No, I don’t want to,” said Mary.  “I’m going to go outside and play.”

As Mary started to leave, her mother tried again.  “But Mary, you’ll really like ‘Green Eggs and Ham.’  I promise.”

“No!” Mary said, impatient to go play Power Rangers with her little brother.  “I don’t want to read it!  I don’t like ‘Green Eggs and Ham’!”

Mary’s mother laughed heartily at Mary’s response, which made Mary feel angry and hurt.  “I don’t like it, Mommy!  I don’t like ‘Green Eggs and Ham’!”

“But you’ve never read it,” said Mary’s mother, still laughing. "Just try it."

“I won't try it!  I don’t like it!” Mary insisted, and she ran out the door.

Mary’s mother tried for many days afterward to get Mary to read the story, always bothering her about it.  Her mother’s constant insistence that Mary try ‘Green Eggs and Ham’ began to wear on Mary, and finally she said “Fine!  I’ll try it!” 

So Mary sat down and, with her mother’s help, started to read the book.  At first it was hard, because she didn’t know a lot of words.  But soon the story had her hooked, and she laughed as she read the funny words and looked at the funny pictures.  She liked Sam, especially, and the way he would offer green eggs and ham everywhere he went.

When she got to the end of the book and read, “I do so like green eggs and ham! Thank you! Thank you, Sam-I-am!” she smiled.  Looking up at her mother, she said, “I like ‘Green Eggs and Ham’!  I want to read it again!”

I do so like irony.  And yes, this story is true.  Green Eggs and Ham became the first book I ever read by myself, and I’ve always been partial to it over all other Dr. Seuss books.  Thank goodness for Sam-I-am’s (or Mom-I-am, in this case) persistence.  I would have missed out on a great story, and the beginning of a love for all great stories.

So to celebrate three more years of stories (both reading and writing), I made green eggs and ham.  Well, just the green eggs, actually.  I didn’t have any ham.

I had been wanting to make green eggs and ham for a while, and I was puzzling over how to do it accurately.  See, the green eggs in the book are fried eggs, and only the yolk is green.    I didn’t know how to pull off just dying the yolks.  I finally got this brilliant idea that I could get a syringe and needle from my dad’s office (he’s a surgeon) and inject green food coloring into the yolk.  Without damaging the sac containing the yolk (a.k.a. the vitelline membrane) so irreparably that the yolk all spilled out.

So I tried the injection thing.  First I withdrew some yolk with the syringe, and then mixed it up with food coloring.  Then I filled up the syringe with the green yolk mixture and prepared to inject it back into the yolk.

But first I had to have a little fun.  If you’re scared of needles, look away!

I imagined for a brief moment that I was the Hulk, which was entertaining, and then I moved on with my little experiment.

Unfortunately the whole injection thing totally failed.  Egg yolk is too thick.  It jammed up the biggest needle I had, so all I did was create an unexciting vacuum in the tube.  I decided to make that egg scrambled, put away the needles, and try a different tactic.

I separated the yolk from the white and held the yolk carefully in my hand.  Then I dropped a drop of food coloring on the yolk and very gently spread it all over the surface of the yolk.  And it worked!

Then I put a tablespoon of butter into a small frying pan and melted it.  I dumped the whites into the pan and then gently coaxed the green yolk from my hand into the pan.

The first time didn’t work out so well.  I think it’s because my hands were dry, so the delicate yolk membrane caught on my hand and ripped.  The second time I made sure there was a little egg white residue on my hand before dumping it in the pan, and it worked!

I salted the egg, covered it, and cooked it on low until I could gently prod the yolk and it felt firm (10-15 minutes).  Meanwhile I cooked my green scrambled eggs in another pan and snacked on them while I waited for the fried egg to cook completely (I generally try to avoid runny eggs. Salmonella isn’t worth it).  When it was done, it was delicious!  The food coloring did run a tad, but I still consider it a success.

Yummy tip for frying eggs, green or otherwise: if you’re a bacon lover (like pretty much everyone but me), cook your bacon and then fry your eggs in the bacon grease.  That way the eggs cook quickly and have great flavor.  I like cooking my eggs that way, and I don’t even like bacon. 

If you are revolted by the idea of saturating your breakfast in grease (from bacon or butter), fried eggs are not for you.  I would recommend fish instead.  "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish" is pretty good.