Chocolate Strawberry Ice Box Pie

This past week I was able to spend a week at a beach house for the 4th of July with Geoff,his Son and a family friend. It was a much needed time away from the world.  While planning our big 4th of July dinner I wanted to make a special dessert, like I always do when there is any kind of party or gathering.

 I had a limited supply of baking pans. I found a glass pie pan and decided I could modify it and still make it a very good dessert we could enjoy after our meal and while we watch the fireworks.

Here are the ingredients I used. If I was home making this I would have made real whip cream but the store bought whipped topping turned out to be very good. This is a great Semi-homemade recipe if you are having your own summer gathering.One note:Ignore the baked beans in the picture, they aren't part of the recipe, unless you WANT to be adventurous. NOT!!! Ha Ha!!

Chocolate Strawberry Ice Box Pie

2 1lb Packages of Strawberries
1 box of Famous Nabisco Chocolate Wafers
2 Tubs of Extra Creamy Whip cream
A Glass or metal pie pan

1.Wash and chop one of the containers of strawberries
2.Mix one tub of whip cream with the chopped strawberries and set aside
3.Line the pie plate with chocolate wafers using extra to cover any holes
4.Carefully spread the whip cream,strawberry mixture onto the wafers.
5.add another layer of chocolate layers over the top and spread the other tub of whipped topping over the wafers.
6.Slice a few more strawberries and decorate as desired
7.I crushed 4 or 5 left over wafers and sprinkled the crumbs over the top.

Chill in the refrigerator 4 hours or overnight.

Enjoy,
The Pastry Diva

Wordless Wednesday's

Brioche

I have never been one to shy away from a challenge, so when I came across a recipe for brioche bread I decided I would give it a try. I have experience baking bread although I haven't really made any in a long time. King Arthur flour is a great site recourse for a wealth of baking information and if you leave a message or comment on any of their recipes and you had trouble with a recipe coming out right, they will respond with helpful suggestions on how to make the recipe better.

This recipe for Brioche look like it was going to be the one I wanted to try and after reading the reviews and comments it looked pretty good.

If you notice the picture of the dough rising the braided loaf didn't really retain its shape and turned out more like bread sticks then a loaf of bread. Oh well, you live and learn. I think that my kitchen wasn't warm enough to sufficiently let the dough rise enough. The braided loaf in the bread pan didn't raise enough but baked well and had a beautiful brown top. I am happy with the results but I guess next time I may let it rise in a warmer place longer? Since it baked well and the taste was very good I decided to use it to make French toast for dinner the next night.
The Kids loved it and I even made home made syrup.

I know even if it turn out "picture perfect" it did taste amazing for dinner the next night.

Enjoy,
The Pastry Diva

Wordless Wednesday's

Blackberry Blueberry Pie

Pie is something I grew up making. Weather it was a cream pie, fruit, or a savory chicken pot pie. The crust always intimidated me, I always thought it was a chore and i would just decide to use the boxed version which was loaded with ingredients that I couldn't pronounce and didn't really have any flavor. You just add water, it was very bland. So for this pie, I decided to search for a more flavorful and flaky crust recipe to compliment this fruit pie recipe. I found a recipe for pie crust that was very simple and included butter which, as everyone knows, butter always makes everything taste better. The trick to this crust is to make sure your ingredients are cold. I recommend measuring out all the dry ingredients into a blown, add the butter pieces and place in the refrigerator. That is the secret to an extra flaky crust.

Martha Stewart's Easy pie crust. It's very easy and if you have a food processor it takes seconds to whip extra to keep in your freezer for the next time you go to the farmers market and pick up some amazing Summer fruit available right now.

This was a very easy pie to make and I had a lot of fun making it. Oh, and it taste pretty good too. I followed the recipe I found on the Martha Stewart website but it was for a blueberry but knowing it was a berry pie,mixing it up with two cups of blackberries it would have the same outcome. One thing I learned about berry pie sit that if you aren't careful or add the right amount of thickeners ie: Flour,cornstarch. One or the other but I found the right combination in this recipe to come out with a pie that wasn't soupy. I found a great secret that helps in avoiding the soupy mess with the pie filling. The recipe calls for adding the sugar to the fruit. If you wait about 30min you will see that the fruit has become soupy, drain the extra juice off and continue with your recipe. Pretty simple.You may at this point want to add a little more sugar but only about 2 tablespoons of so. My filling was a little on the "not so sweet side" which had more of the natural fruit flavor then it being really set like some pis fillings can be.

Here are the only changes I made to this recipe:
*3 cups of frozen Blackberries
*2 cups of fresh Blueberries

Blueberry pie from Martha Stewart

With the combination of this very tasty,buttery crust and fruit filling, your family and you will be very happy with the outcome and the taste of this pie.

Enjoy
The Pastry Diva

So much sugar, so little time

Well here we go. I know it has been almost forever since I have posted here and I do apologise that i haven't kept up with the going's on around my kitchen here and around the "baking" world. I have been really busy baking,organizing and allot of other things that go into starting a baking business. Allot of which I have no knowledge about, so I have been reading,asking and trying to figure things out while I also  being busy with baking, writing and test recipes. I have had a really fun time coming up with new and tasty recipes to share with everyone and to hopefully add to my baking business.

I thought I would share with you a few things I have been baking up in my kitchen.

Cookies and cream cupcakes, Vanilla Bean with Pink White chocolate buttercream.

This is a sweet Jon Deere theme cupcakes with a Fondant cake I made with handmade fondant animals. Too cute!!

Vanilla Bean Bisotti and an all butter lemon Pound cake. Which I think would make a great cupcake, frosted with lemon butter cream? Yummy!

I found this recipe for the Pound Cake on the Martha Stewart web site and it turned out so good. I would definitely make it again.
There is a recipe link to the galze but I just mixed about 1 cup of Powered sugar and some lemon juice to the right consistency then I poked holes in the warm, not hot, cake and poured on the glaze and let it seep into the holes.

Enjoy,
The Pastry Diva

Easy Homemade Ice Cream without a Machine!

Now that summer is almost here, but living in the Seattle area you wouldn't know it by the recent fall-like weather we have been having. I am very hopeful that we WILL have a summer with sun and a little heat. If we make it there or not, you can enjoy this very simple recipe for ice cream that I  make on a regular basis now. It is really good and the best idea for ice cream I found from one of my favorite blogs from Kevin&Amanda's amazing blog!!

I have made this a few times, tweaking the flavors and coming up with combinations that are too good for words!! If you check out the blog link above they have some amazing flavors like "cinnamon bun" and "crispy cream doughnut" YES!!! I know, YUMMY!!!!!! Try out some of your favorites, maybe take a day when the kids are home and have them come up with a few combinations of their own. Key lime pie, vanilla birthday cake...so many!!

For this batch I decided to raid my pantry and come up with a "trail mix" inspired flavor, I also added some vanilla bean extract too. I chopped it all up and added to the ice cream mix.

*Salted peanuts
*sweetened coconut
*raisins
All measurements were just a small handful. You want enough to equal about 1 1/2 cups total.

Freeze as directed on the original directions.

I will do some flavors next time with fresh fruit, although it will not make it very health but it will sure taste good!! Blueberries w Graham crackers to simulate Blueberry pie, or blackberries with a drop biscuit pieces for a cobble flavor. The possibilities are just limited to your imagination.

Enjoy
The Pastry Diva