French Coconut Pie

Unlike its name, French Coconut Pie did not originate in France but was actually invented in America. Wherever it originated from, it’s one of the easiest pies you’ll ever make and tastes amazing to boot! You can make your own pie crust if you want to. I have a great recipe for homemade pie crust here. Or you could just purchase a ready-made pie shell from the grocery and save yourself some work. Either way, this pie turns out delicious! It’s literally a pie to die for.

FRENCH COCONUT PIE

• 3 large eggs
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 cup butter, melted and cooled
• 1 cup sweetened shredded coconut
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 Tbsp. flour
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 deep-dish 9-inch pie shell, purchased or homemade

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Bake pie crust for 18-25 minutes until lightly golden on the edges.
3. Mix all ingredients together in a medium bowl until well combined.
4. Pour filling into pre-baked pie crust. Crust doesn’t have to be cool for this step.
5. Bake 45-55 minutes or until lightly browned and custard is set.
6. Transfer pie to a wire rack to cool completely, at least 1 hour, before serving.

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Caramel Apple Pie

A friend of mine shared a video with me that he had seen on YouTube for a cinnamon swirl apple pie where they showed you how to make this swirly pie crust. The pie looked like it was topped with flat little cinnamon rolls. So unusual!

Anyway, I had some apples I needed to use up so I decided to make a Caramel Apple Pie for dessert tonight, but I thought why not try using that fun technique for the top crust of my pie? I didn’t bother doing it for the bottom crust since no one would see that anyway. It turned out really cute! It made you feel like you couldn’t wait to take a bite out of the pie! I’m going to post the instructions here for making the cinnamon swirl top crust, but if you don’t want to go through the trouble, feel free to make this recipe with a plain crust on top.

I like to use 2 or 3 varieties of apples whenever I make an apple pie. I always start with 3 Granny Smiths for their tart flavor and firm flesh – perfect for baking. Then I add in some sweet varieties. I always add 3 Honeycrisp apples when Honeycrisps are in season because they’re sweet and juicy and have a firm flesh that doesn’t break down too much when baked. Then I include 2 Braeburns, or Galas, or Fujis, or Jonathans, any of which are great for baking because they’re sweet and hold their shape well throughout cooking. I find that the combination of tart and sweet adds a complexity of flavor that’s delicious in this American comfort food classic.

CARAMEL APPLE PIE

• double pie crust, store bought or homemade
• 8 apples, peeled, cored, and thinly sliced (use a combination of apple varieties)
• ¼ cup flour
• ¼ cup sugar
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• ⅛ tsp. ground nutmeg
• ½ tsp. salt
• melted butter or margarine for spreading on top crust
• cinnamon for sprinkling on top crust
• ½ cup thick caramel ice cream topping or caramel apple dip
• 1 egg beaten with 1 Tbsp. water, for egg wash

Bottom Crust:

1. Fit one pie crust into bottom and up sides of a deep dish pie pan.
2. Place crust in refrigerator to chill until ready to use.

Filling:

1. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt.
2. Add the apple slices and toss to coat well.
3. Set apple filling aside while you prepare the top crust.

Top Crust:

1. Place a sheet of parchment paper on top of your work surface.
2. Place second pie crust onto the parchment.
3. Brush top of crust with melted butter.
4. Sprinkle buttered surface with cinnamon.
5. Roll crust up to form a log.
   
6. Slice the log into disks a little smaller than ½-inch thick.
   
7. Lay the disks on their sides not touching each other.
   
8. Cover the disks with another sheet of parchment paper.
   
9. Using a rolling pin, roll the disks to form a circle large enough to cover the top of your pie.

Assemble Pie:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F.
2. Take pie pan with bottom crust out of refrigerator.
3. Give the apple filling ingredients another good toss.
4. Pour apple filling into prepared pie crust, lightly pressing apples down. It’ll seem like a lot of apples, but just mound them high in the center.
5. Pour the caramel evenly over the apples. If you need to, warm the caramel in the microwave a few seconds to make it easier to pour.
6. Peel the top sheet of parchment off the top crust.
7. Flip the top crust over onto the apples and carefully peel the parchment away.
8. Tuck the edges of the crust under.
9. Brush top crust with the egg wash.
10. Place pie on a cookie sheet to catch any drips and transfer to oven.
11. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until top is golden brown.

NOTE:  If you want to see the cinnamon swirl crust actually being made, click on the link above to watch the video my friend sent me.

Spinach Feta Quiche

I’ve had this recipe for years but hadn’t made it in a long time. One day, my daughter, Tissi, decided she wanted to make herself some quiche. She’s a veggie eater and she loves quiche so I dug up my recipe for her. The problem was when I wrote it out for her, I said it only needed one pie crust. Needless to say, she ended up with a ton of extra filling. It wasn’t until a couple of attempts later that I realized my recipe was actually for TWO pies! Poor Tis. She couldn’t figure out why the recipe wasn’t working for her. LOL! If you want to make just one pie, cut the recipe in half. Otherwise, make sure you have two pie crusts ready.

SPINACH FETA QUICHE

• 2 ready-made frozen pie crust shells (or make your own)
• 4 eggs
• 2 cups half-and-half or whipping cream or milk
• 1/2 tsp. salt, or to taste
• 1/4 tsp. pepper, or to taste
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1 pkg. (10 ozs.) frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
• 6 ozs. (1 cup) crumbled feta cheese

1. Preheat oven to 425°F.
2. Line pie crusts with foil, fill with rice, beans, or pie weights, and bake for 10 mins.
3. Remove foil and pie weights, return crusts to oven, and bake an additional 4-5 minutes or until crusts are set and dry.
4. Remove crusts from oven and set aside until ready to use.
5. Lower oven temperature to 350°F.
6. In a medium bowl, whisk together eggs, half-and-half, salt, and pepper, using a wire whisk.
7. Sprinkle in flour, whisking vigorously back and forth to break up any lumps. If you have a few tiny lumps left, don’t worry about it. They’ll disappear into the quiche.
8. Stir in spinach and feta cheese.
9. Divide mixture evenly between the two crusts.
10. Bake for 35-40 minutes or until a knife inserted in center comes out clean. If necessary, cover edge of crusts with foil to prevent over-browning.
11. Let stand 10 minutes before cutting.

Mini Seafood Potpies

I had to take some appetizers to a party so decided to make mini seafood potpies. I love potpies but we usually make them with chicken. I thought seafood would make a nice change. You could do this with shrimp only or crab only. Or you can add lobster or scallops for more varied seafood. Just make sure your combination of seafood totals half a pound. If you like, you can double the filling recipe to make one deep dish potpie.

MINI SEAFOOD POTPIES

• ¼ cup butter
• ½ small yellow onion, finely diced
• ½ cup sliced mushrooms, chopped
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1 cup milk or cream
• ¼ cup clam juice
• ¼ cup sherry
• ¼ lb. cooked crabmeat (can substitute imitation crabmeat), roughly chopped
• ¼ lb. cooked salad shrimp, roughly chopped
• ¼ cup parsley, chopped
• 1 box (2 sheets) frozen puff pastry, thawed
• 1 egg, beaten with 1 tablespoon water, to brush pastry

1. Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
2. Melt the butter over medium heat.
3. Add the onions and mushrooms and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, 3 to 5 minutes.
4. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
5. Add the flour and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly.
6. Add the milk, clam juice, and sherry.
7. Bring to a boil and cook, stirring, until thickened, about 2 minutes.
8. Stir in the crabmeat, shrimp, and parsley.
9. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.
10. Meanwhile, unfold pastry sheets on lightly floured work surface.
11. Cut out 12 circles a bit larger than the size of the muffin cups you will be using (you may need to roll the pastry out a bit to be able to cut 12 circles).
12. Cut out 12 mini fish shapes from puff pastry scraps to top each pie.
13. Press the pastry circles into the wells of your muffin pans.
14. Make an egg wash by beating the egg with 1 tablespoon water.
15. Brush the pastry crusts with egg wash and bake for 6-8 minutes.
16. Remove from oven.
17. Fill par-baked crusts with seafood filling.
18. Top each with one of the mini puff pastry fish you cut from the scraps.
19. Brush top crust with extra egg wash.
20. Return to oven and bake about 15 minutes or until top pastry is puffed and golden.
21. Serve hot.

Filipino Buko Pie (Young Coconut Pie)

My Dad’s family hails from a place called Bay, Laguna in the Philippines. Bay (pronounced “Bah-eh” by the locals) is one of the oldest towns in the province of Laguna. Legend has it that the Datu or Tribal Chief of the area had three beautiful daughters. When the Spanish came to convert the natives to Catholicism, the Datu’s three daughters were baptized and renamed Maria Basilisa, Maria Angela and Maria Elena. The first letters of Basilisa, Angela and Elena were put together to form the name “Bae” which over time changed to “Bay.” The district of Santo Domingo in Bay was actually named after my great-grandfather, Domingo Ordoveza, who was a wealthy landowner in the area.

I remember going to Bay as a little girl with my grandparents. We went every year during the town fiesta. There would be a huge party on the plantation with lots of people, tons of food, games, prizes, and fun. We stayed at the family homestead which I remember as a big, white house surrounded by lanzones trees. Lanzones is a small, yellow fruit native to the Philippines. I remember watching the boys climb the trees to pick the fruit for us to eat.

One of the things I also remember eating is Buko Pie. The province of Laguna with all its coconut trees is famous for its buko pie. Buko is the Filipino word for “young coconut.” As a coconut matures, the meat becomes thicker, firmer and whiter; but young coconut meat is thin, soft and almost opaque in color. That’s the coconut we use to make buko pie. The coconut shell is cut in half and the buko is scraped out with a shredding tool that produces thin strips or strings of the meat. It’s absolutely delicious. Where I live in North America, I can’t get fresh buko (or fresh coconuts for that matter) so I have to buy frozen buko from the Asian grocery stores. It’s not as good as fresh, of course, but it works fine when you’re craving a slice of nostalgia in pie form.

FILIPINO BUKO PIE

Crust:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. sugar
• 1 tsp. salt
• ½ cup cold butter, cut into pieces
• ¼ cup cold shortening, cut into pieces
• 5-6 tbsp. cold water
• 1 egg, for egg wash

1. Combine flour, sugar and salt in a bowl.
2. Using a pastry blender or two knives, cut in butter and shortening until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
3. Pinch off a small clump of dough and squeeze it in your hand. If it does not hold together, sprinkle the dough with 1 tablespoon of ice water and blend with a fork. Keep adding ice water, a tablespoon at a time, until mixture just holds together when squeezed in your hand.
4. Divide dough into 2 balls, one slightly bigger than the other, and flatten each ball into a disk.
5. Wrap the disks in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour or up to 2 days.

Filling:

• 3 pkgs. (about 3 cups) frozen shredded buko, thawed and drained
• ⅓ cup cornstarch
• 1 cup buko juice
• 1 cup evaporated milk
• ¾ cup sugar
• ½ tsp. vanilla

1. In a small saucepan, stir cornstarch into buko juice until completely dissolved.
2. Stir in evaporated milk, sugar, vanilla and buko.
3. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until thickened.
4. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

To Assemble Pie:

1. Preheat oven to 375ºF.
2. Sprinkle flour on work surface and roll out the larger of the two disks into a 12-inch circle. When rolling, work from the center to the outer edges, spinning the dough occasionally to get an even round shape.
3. Transfer the dough to a 9-inch pie plate, pressing into the bottom and up the sides.
4. Trim off any excess dough.
5. Place bottom crust in refrigerator while you work on second disk of dough.
6. Roll out second disk on lightly floured work surface, spinning occasionally to get an even circle large enough to cover the pie.
7. Take bottom crust from the refrigerator and pour filling into it spreading evenly.
8. Place top crust over pie.
9. Roll the edge of the top crust just underneath the edge of the bottom crust and flute the edges together all around the pie.
10. Make an egg wash by beating 1 egg and 1 tablespoon cold water together.
11. Brush egg wash all over top crust.
12. Prick holes on the top crust with a fork to allow steam to escape the pie while baking. You could also cut 6 or 8 vent holes with a sharp paring knife, or cut out decorative designs with a pie crust cutter.
13. Bake pie in oven for 35-40 minutes or until crust is golden brown.
14. Cool on a wire rack before slicing.

NOTE:  If you have a food processor, use it to make the pie crust. It makes it so much easier and quicker. Besides, the less you handle the dough, the more tender and flaky your crust will turn out. Just follow the directions as listed, but instead of using a pastry blender or a fork, pulse the ingredients together in the food processor.

Frozen buko comes in plastic bags like this:

Browned Butter Toffee Tartlets

I’ve had this recipe a long time. I don’t remember where I got it. It’s probably from one of my old cookbooks, though I don’t remember which one. I made it once years ago and then never made it again. For the life of me, I don’t know why. They were a hit when I made them all those years go. These tartlets are not only yummy, but they’re super-duper easy to make. The recipe makes a lot, too, which is perfect for a party or get-together.

BROWNED BUTTER TOFFEE TARTLETS

• 3 pkgs. (15 pcs. each) baked miniature phyllo dough shells
• ½ cup butter
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• ½ cup sugar
• ⅓ cup all-purpose flour
• 1½ tsps. vanilla
• ¼ tsp. salt
• ¾ cup toffee pieces
• 2 ozs. bittersweet chocolate, chopped or bittersweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF.
2. Place phyllo dough shells on a cookie sheet.
3. In a small saucepan, melt butter over medium heat; then reduce heat to medium-low.
4. Continue to cook, without stirring, for 5 to 6 minutes or until butter becomes brown and fragrant.
5. Remove from heat and cool slightly.
6. In a medium bowl, combine eggs, sugar, flour, vanilla and salt. Whisk vigorously to combine.
7. Whisk browned butter into egg mixture.
8. Stir in toffee pieces.
9. Spoon filling into tartlet shells.
10. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until tops are light brown.
11. Transfer carefully to wire rack and allow to cool completely.
12. Melt chocolate in microwave in 30-second increments, stirring until smooth.
13. Drizzle melted chocolate on top of cooled tartlets in any design you want.
14. Let stand until set.

NOTE:

• You should get at least 40 tartlets (if not more) from this recipe, depending on how full you fill the shells.
• If you can’t get toffee pieces, you can substitute chocolate-covered toffee candybars, like Skor, Heath or Daim, and chop them up.
• To store, layer tartets between sheets of waxed paper in an airtight container. Cover and store in refrigerator for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months. If frozen, thaw tartlets at room temperature for 1 hour before serving.

Pinky’s Mango Fruit Tart

I love fruit tarts. The crisp crust encasing a creamy custard filling topped with sweet fruit. Yummm! It’s one of my all-time favorite desserts! This tart is nice because it’s so versatile. Once you fill your crust with the custard, you can top it with any fruit you like. I’ve made it with peaches, strawberries, bananas, mandarin oranges, a combination of strawberries and blueberries, etc.

I had some really nice mangoes so decided to use them for a fruit tart. Then I decided to take on the ambitious task of arranging the mango slices to look like a flower. It was a lot of work, but also a lot of fun. If you want to do the same, just peel your mango, slice the two sides away from the seed, then cut each side into thin slices. Arrange the mango slices starting with a small circle in the center and going around and around till you reach the outer crust. The number of mangoes you need depends on how big they are and how tightly you arrange your mango “petals.”

PINKY’S MANGO FRUIT TART

• 1 sweet tart dough (click here for recipe)
• mangoes (or any fruit of your choice like strawberries, peaches, blueberries, etc.)
• 2 cups (1 pint) whipping cream
• 1 can condensed milk
• 1/3 cup flour
• 2 eggs
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 1 jar apricot jelly (optional)

1. Make a sweet tart dough and pre-bake it in a 9-inch tart pan; set aside.
   You could also purchase a ready-made tart or pie crust if you don’t have time to make your own.
2. In a small saucepan, mix the cream, condensed milk, flour, and eggs together with a wire whisk.
3. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly until thick.
4. Remove from heat and stir in the butter until thoroughly incorporated.
5. Pour into the prepared crust and let cool completely.
6. Top with fruit of your choice. Arrange the fruit so it looks attractive.
7. If desired, you could make a glaze by melting a little apricot jelly in a small bowl in the microwave and brushing it over the fruit so it looks nice and shiny.
8. Chill the tart in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
9. Cut and serve.

Frangipane Tartlets (Almond Tartlets)

I always wanted to taste a Frangipane Tart. I’d read about them but never tried one. All I knew was that the filling is made from finely ground almonds and is used in pies, cakes, and pastries. It does sound very similar to, if not the same as, the filling in a pithivier which I absolutely love! Frangipane tarts often have some fruit, like raspberries, added to the filling.

Anyway, I needed a dessert to take to dinner at my sister, Helen’s house and I remembered that my Mini Pies cookbook had a recipe for frangipane tarts that I had bookmarked to try someday, so I decided today would be as good a day as any. I do own an electric pie maker (the book was written for use with an electric pie maker) but opted not to use it. Instead, I made little tartlets in a mini-muffin pan and was able to get 24 tartlets out of the recipe.

FRANGIPANE TARTLETS (ALMOND TARTLETS)

• 1 box ready-made refrigerated pie dough
• 1 cup sliced almonds, toasted
• ½ cup sugar
• 5 tbsp. unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 large egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• ¼ tsp. almond extract, optional
• confectioners’ sugar for dusting on top of tartlets
• fresh raspberries and/or extra sliced almonds for garnish, optional

1. Cut out 2½-inch circles of pie dough or size needed to line your mini-muffin pans.
2. Press dough circles into wells of each of the muffin cups. A tart tamper makes this easy to do.
3. In a food processor, combine toasted almonds and sugar.
4. Process until mixture is finely ground.
5. Add the butter, egg, egg yolk, vanilla, and almond extract, if using.
6. Process until well-blended and smooth.
7. Fill each crust two-thirds full with the filling mixture.
8. Bake at 350ºF for 12 minutes or until filling is puffed and slightly cracked.
9. Allow to cool completely, then dust with confectioners’ sugar.
10. You could decorate the tops of the tartlets with fresh raspberries or additional almond slices, if desired.

NOTE:  If you want, you can make one large tart. Just fit the crust into a 9-inch fluted tart pan. Place in the freezer and freeze for 20 minutes. Remove crust from freezer, line with parchment paper and fill with pie weights or beans. Bake crust at 350ºF for 20-22 minutes. Remove pie weights and fill pre-baked crust with filling mixture. Bake an additional 35-40 minutes or until top is set.

Pear Pie

In the movie “City of Angels,” when Seth (Nicholas Cage) asks Maggie (Meg Ryan) to describe to him what a pear tastes like, she says, “Sweet, juicy, soft on your tongue, grainy like sugary sand that dissolves in your mouth.” It’s the perfect description for this unpretentious little fruit.

We don’t have pears in the Philippines so I’d never tasted them before coming to America. My mother-in-law (who was Dutch) loved them, though, so I always made sure to buy some whenever she came to visit. I learned to love them because of her. This recipe is actually one of the very first pies I learned to make when I arrived in the United States as a teenager. It’s an easy recipe and has long been one of our family’s treasured favorites.

PEAR PIE

• 1 unbaked, 9-inch, deep dish pie crust (store-bought frozen, or make your own)
• 2 pears (Anjou, Bartlett, or Bosc pears are good for baking)
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup white sugar
• ⅓ cup flour
• ¼ cup melted butter
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 400ºF.
2. Line pie crust with parchment paper or foil and fill bottom with pie weights or dried beans.
3. Bake pie crust for 8 minutes, then remove parchment paper and pie weights, and continue to bake another 3-5 minutes until light brown.
4. Remove crust from oven and set aside.
5. Lower oven temperature to 350ºF.
6. Peel, core, and slice each pear into 8 wedges for a total of 16 wedges.
7. Arrange pear slices in pie crust like spokes of a wheel with narrow ends toward center and overlapping. You can slice portions of the narrow ends off to make them thinner and easier to overlap and fit in the crust. I usually take one of the pear slices, cut the thicker end off and lay it over the center to cover the overlapping ends. Also, you may not need all the pear slices depending on how big your pears are.
   
8. In a medium bowl, beat eggs and sugar together.
9. Add flour, melted butter, and vanilla and beat until well combined.
10. Pour custard over pear slices.
11. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until custard jiggles slightly in the center when shaken.
12. Cool completely before slicing and serving.

Real Man Quiche

I call this quiche “Real Man Quiche” in homage to the book “Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche” that was published in the early 80’s. Well, in my family, the men are as real as they come and they do eat quiche – specially when the quiche is a giant, meaty one like this one. Number 1 likes this deep-dish quiche because he feels it doesn’t leave him hungry like a wedge of regular-size quiche does. It’s basically the same as a normal quiche only with more meat and double the base ingredients. A springform pan makes it easy to unmold the big, heavy pie. Serve it with a salad or a nice bowl of soup and you have a filling, man-satisfying meal.

REAL MAN QUICHE

Crust:

• 2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 lb. cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 egg yolk
• 5-8 tbsp. ice cold water

1. Combine flour and salt in a large bowl.
2. Cut in butter with a pastry blender or your fingers until mixture resembles cornmeal.
3. In a small bowl, beat egg yolk with 5 tablespoons ice water.
4. Add egg yolk mixture to dough and work in with your fingers until dough comes together when squeezed in your hand. If it is too crumbly, add more ice water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until dough holds together.
5. Shape dough into a disk, wrap with plastic wrap, and chill until firm, about 30 minutes.
6. Sandwich dough between two pieces of parchment paper.
7. With a rolling pin, roll out dough into a 13-inch circle.
8. Lay dough inside a 10-inch springform pan, fitting dough into the bottom and up the sides of the pan.
9. Trim off any excess dough. Freeze scraps for future use.
10. Place in refrigerator until ready to use.

Filling:

• 1 lb. bacon
• ½ large onion, diced
• 8 large eggs
• 1 quart milk or half-and-half
• ½ tsp. salt or to taste
• ½ tsp. pepper
• ½ lb. smoked ham, cubed
• 1 (10-oz. pkg.) frozen chopped spinach, thawed and water squeezed out well
• 2 cups shredded swiss cheese
• 4 tbsp. flour

1. In a skillet over medium heat, fry bacon until crisp, remove from grease and drain on paper towels; then crumble into pieces.
2. Remove all but 2 tablespoons of bacon grease from skillet, add the onions and cook until opaque.
3. Preheat oven to 375ºF.
4. In a bowl, beat the eggs together, then whisk in the milk or half-and-half.
5. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Stir in the crumbled bacon, cooked onion, ham, spinach, cheese and flour.
7. Pour filling into prepared crust.
8. Cover loosely with foil and bake 1 hour. and 30 minutes
9. Remove foil and continue to bake until set and center jiggles slightly, about 15 minutes more.
10. Cool about 45 minutes to an hour.
11. Remove ring from springform pan, transfer quiche to a plate and slice into wedges.
12. Serve warm or at room temperature.