Rediscovering Apple Pie
This blog started with a quest for the perfect apple pie. It took a month to put it all together: hand-picking the apples on a Hudson Valley farm, scouring the Upper West Side for lard, starting from scratch after my early attempts failed for want of preparation or perseverance.
Want of preparation or perseverance. Maybe that's why I don't post like I used to. But now I have a few weeks worth of material stored up, so I suppose I really ought to get back to writing for you all. I'll begin where I began before. With apple pie.
When I started this blog, I didn't have a digital camera or a web hosting account, so I relied on words and stolen clip art to record my exploits in the kitchen. I wonder, has photography made me lazy? I've always tried to make my food blogging about more than just food, but starting each post with a picture of something I've made or eaten has made that difficult. And I'm the kind of person who would just as soon never start something he doesn't know how to finish.
Right now I'm not quite sure what to say about my New Year's apple pie that will take you beyond the photo above. I used lard and granny smith apples; I bought a pyrex pie plate just for the occasion; I held the pie, still warm, on my lap during my first trip to Staten Island, where Lisa and I spent New Year's with her friends from college. One of Lisa's friends is a vegetarian; we tried to loose the apples from their swine-tainted shell so she could share with us.
This isn't to say that the story of my apple pie has some hidden meaning; it's only to say that these are things that happen. We cook, we eat, sometimes we share. There are surely reasons we do these things. Me... I write about it afterwards.
Sometimes.
When I can think of a reason.
Comments
I just posted this in your cilnatro entry, but just so that you get it, ya know, because that other one was kinda way back in May, here it is again.
Well, I saw this guy the other day at Taco Cabana, and he was eating crazy mass amounts of cilantro just plain. After he finished his food, he filled up his tray from the condiment counter and just started shoveling it into his mouth, somtimes putting it in one of those tiny ketchup cups and doing cilantro "shots", other times just with his hands. It was totally wack. Then he returned like 2 more times to the counter to get more cilantro. He emptied the whole thing. Really, I think the only logical explanation is that he is an alien and the aliens' weakness is salmonella. Don't you think so too? We really need to remember this when they're killing us all. Your blog has been so helpful. Thank you for doing your best to fight aliens with me. They don't stand a chance.
Posted by: Emmanuel | January 11, 2005 04:02 PM
Hmm, Cilantro & Aliens. I never made that connection.
Photographing food making you lazy? That just can't be. But then taking pictures of my meals/meat/food is what got me started on Meathenge in the first place. I really enjoy seeing what people are up to. Not only do you get to see what the food started out looking like, but hopefully you get to see the finished product (along with their cooking utensils, stove & furniture). You gotta have the pictures mang, that's just all there is to it.
Biggles
Posted by: Dr. Biggles | January 12, 2005 07:04 PM
The first crusted pie I ever baked was a two-crusted applie pie. I'm not quite sure why that's significant--I only know that I had a friend over for that pie, and she was an infamous baker, and when I told her that I'd never made a pie outside of pumpkin pie and that this was the second kind of pie I'd ever made, she was very surprised that I'd done a two-crusted apple pie. This made me very proud.
Your pie looks much better than mine. You should be very proud. =)
Posted by: JACE | January 12, 2005 11:41 PM
Where is your recipe? Your pie looks a bit overdone - did you use a wash of some kind that carmelized and went too dark?
Were you satisifed that is was the perfect apple pie?
Posted by: Dave | January 28, 2005 03:41 PM