I've used up my leftover components to make three last pies, the same as before: pumpkin pie, quiche (using leftover stuffing, and technically a tart), and turkey pot pie (using leftover turkey). The pumpkin pie recipe was altered slightly: I added 1.5 times more potato starch plus an additional egg. This firmed the texture of the pie up, but I noticed there was a strange and slight loss of sweetness as a result. People without a sweet tooth might welcome such a change, but I found myself slightly disappointed by the result. The quiche came out properly baked except for the bottom crust which, when I ate a slice, had a soggy underside. Solution: pan-fry slices of quiche at the office. This solved the problem nicely. The pumpkin pie and turkey pot pie had no crust problems at all. While I was making the turkey pot pie, I noticed I had all these extra scraps of pie dough left over from the other two pies, so as you see below, I simply layered on the dough scraps, unmindful of any pattern, but just leaving a hole in the center to keep the pie from exploding. I thought I'd have enough pot-pie filling to make two pot pies, but I was able to cram all of the remaining filling into a single pie. So in my fridge, I've got another whole lump of pie crust remaining. I'm giving that to my Korean coworker tomorrow. He now has a whole container of my homemade pie filling plus a lump of pie dough, so it should be hard for him to fuck up whatever pie he makes now. I simply pray he doesn't waste my ingredients by making another thin pie that's all crust and no filling.
The boss didn't even come in today, and my Korean coworker made noises about eating some of the food but didn't eat any. He says he'll eat some tomorrow. I'm beginning to realize it's best never to take him too literally; as with a lot of Koreans, he rarely goes straight from A to B, so if he says he'll do X, you have to wait and see whether he actually does it. He's a good guy, but his stereotypical nonlinearity makes him a bit hard to trust.
The food:
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| top to bottom, counterclockwise: pumpkin pie, quiche, turkey pot pie |
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| turkey pot pie—more thoroughly cooked this time |
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| quiche in a cake pan |
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| pumpkin pie in a Korean jjigae pan |
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| the... trinamic trio |
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| quiche (top) and turkey pot pie (bottom) |
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| pumpkin pie: much-improved texture, slightly diminished taste |
All in all, a good lunch. I just wish the pie were a wee bit sweeter, like last time. Maybe next time, I'll keep the increased potato starch but not add the extra egg. Or vice versa.
Damn you for re-awakening my craving for some pumpkin pie. Everything looks great!
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely delish. Their loss for not finishing up that fantastic feast. I would've eaten my way through all of that in under ten minutes flat!
ReplyDeleteOops, accidentally tried to post something anonymously. (The absolutely delish comment.) Apologies!
ReplyDeleteDan,
ReplyDeleteWell, like a good goalie, you made the save, so I didn't delete anything. Thanks for the comment.
John,
My team ate most of the rest of the pumpkin pie today, then my boss tried to give the remainder of the pie and the quiche to another team... some of those team members may have eaten part of the remaining pumpkin pie, but my boss said that a good bit of it ended up in our office's food-waste bucket. Sad.