Thursday's Treat: Blackberry Mini Pies & The Darling

Growing up in the Pacific Northwest meant heaping bounties of blackberries in the summer months. While the Himalayan Blackberry is actually an invasive plant, which can grow to be bigger than a house, it does provide some pretty tasty treats.

I shelled out for a bunch of fancy Whole Food berries when Christine came into town, but I has a tiny pint leftover. Too little to make a real pie, but too many to justify eating with whip-cream and sugar (don't judge). So I made this:

Blackberry Mini Pies

This is all you need:

• 1/8 cups white sugar
• Single pie crust (from here), or get lazy and buy a frozen pie crust (the rolled up kind - not the already in a pan kind)
• 6 ounces of fresh blackberries
• Butter (just a sliver, and don't try to subsitute this for anything else, just leave it out if you need to)
• Tart pans (I use these) or a muffin pan



Hedgehog measuring cups help out the process a lot.

Steps:
1) Wash the berries and let them air dry while you create/defrost (frozen) dough.
2) Mix the berries with the sugar and leave to mix together
3) Roll the dough out, and create mini pie crusts by tracing around the edge of the tart pan + 1 inch.

3) Press the dough gently into the tart pans, and trim the excess off. Chill in the fridge for 2 - 3 minutes
4) Roll the edge of the dough over, tucking into the tart pan to make things pretty

5) Butter the bottom of the crust
6) Dump in some sugared blackberries
                              

7) Top the mini pies with the extra dough in a lattice work pattern
8) Bake at 350F for 10 minutes, or until the lattice work looks almost brown. Kill the heat and let sit in the oven for another 10-15 minutes.

9) Enjoy with ice cream, whipped cream, or a trashy magazine.

According to Caroline, I can't be a true yuppie because I don't have a cake stand.

P.S. Christine got me this Cupcake Royale plate for Christmas!

The Darling

I've been spending a lot of down time on porches and balconies lately, grilling, drinking, and people watching....

and last weekend Grant created this concotion:

1.5 ounces of Bourbon (he uses a bottle from Breckenridge Distillery)
1-2 ounce Schweppes Bitter Lemon soda
and 2-3 wedges of clementine

1) Muddle the clementine at the bottom of the glass
2) Pour in the bourbon, followed by the soda to taste
3) Mix and enjoy!

P.S. I totally helped him name it, that counts, right?! I thought of the song my Grandpa used to sing Oh My Darling, Clementine....which is actually a really sad song.

xxCharlotte

Thursday's Treat: Banana Bread

I grew up in a household where bunches of bananas were bought...and then left untouched. Let's just say we had a lot of over-ripe banana treats growing up. Besides Banana Frosties (I will have to dig out the recipe for that one another day) the house favorite was Banana Bread.

I'm not sure what recipe my mom used....mostly because I've been too lazy to ever ask her... but she always ruined the bread dropping in my nemeses: walnuts. Ugh-  it's the worst thing you can do to a treat - make it all healthy and stuff.

Bananana Bread. 

I made this a long time ago based on this All Recipes one.

 Ingredients:

2 cups flour (all purpose)
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 stick of butter (1/2 cup) - softened
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 eggs, beaten
6 (yes, 6) large over ripe bananas

First off, if you don't want to wait until you have an abundance of over-ripe bananas floating around the house, I have a trick for you. Buy a bunch, put them in a brown paper bag for 2-3 days, and roll the end up and secure it. You will have ugly over-ripe bananas. OR you can go to your local 7-11 (many of them sell bananas) and I've had good luck finding a bunch when my local grocery store only had the green ones.

Seriously, you need a lot of these.

Steps:

1) Is your butter softened? Proceed to step 3. No? You are failing at this already- go to Step 2.
2) Let you butter sit out for an hour or two at room temperature. Do NOT microwave it. You will ruin everything. Softened? Go to step 3.
3) Turn your oven on, and to 350F.
4) Mash all the ripe bananas together in a bowl or glass measuring cup. I have good luck using a fork. Do NOT blend them it will be too smooth and not very rustic. You should have over 2 cups of banana mush.

Mutilated bananas.

5) Combine flour, salt, and baking soda in a large bowl. Sift together.
6) In bowl #2, mix together soft butter and brown sugar, until it is almost a paste..a delicious paste.

Delicious paste!

7) Crack those eggs in a tiny bowl and beat them if you haven't already. Slowly pour the egg mixture into bowl #2, and mix together.

Egg waterfall!

8) Pour the banana mush (slowly) into bowl #2 and incorporate it with the butter/sugar/egg mixture.
9) Grab bowl #1 (I'm sure he has been lonely) and slowly pour about a quarter of the banana/butter/egg/sugar mixture into the flour mixture. Mix and add more of the banana mixture. Repeat until the flour mixture is just moist.

Almost done!

10) Grease/butter/spray a loaf pan.
11) Pour the mixture into the loaf pan - it will be okay if the mixture almost reaches the top. I use a 9x5 clear Pyrex/Anchor loaf pan.
12) Bake for 60- 65 minutes.

It's a miracle!

13) Check the bread by inserting a toothpick into the center. If it's clean you are good to go. If the toothpick has batter goop on it, you want to up the oven temperature to 400F, and bake for another 5-7 minutes.

Just hanging out in the oven..

14) Once done, pull out of the oven and let cool. 
15) Eat, enjoy, pretend you are a monkey.

Additions/Alternatives:

• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/2 cinnamon
• Chocolate chips (thanks, Rae)
• Walnuts (just don't tell me about it)

Muffins: Pour into a prepared muffin tray and bake at 350F for about 20-25 minutes.

Words of wisdom: don't pull a Sylvia Plath and stick your head in the oven.

Enjoy!

Charlotte