The Perfect Pie

Ok, I'll admit it...I have a very large sweet tooth!  I try to limit the sugar, but sometimes I just can't help myself.

Enter the perfect pie! Making a good pie can be a challenge. I figured there had to be some secret that I just didn't know about.  Determined to figure it out, I went straight to my favourite recipe site allrecipes.com to find out what the secret was.  What I found was there's actually more than one secret to the perfect pie and you can find them all right here.  One of the most important secrets is to "handle" the dough as little as possible and keep everything chilled...cold utensils, cold ingredients etc. 


With rhubard growing in the garden, I decided to go for it.  I decided to attempt to make the perfect pie.  I used this recipe for the crust but used half butter and half shortening instead of just shortening.  For the filling I used a mixture of rhubarb and apple. 

This was the best pie I've ever made!  My family agreed.  They licked their plates clean, literally and even ate their crust, a sure sign of a winner!   

Homemade Yogurt Tutorial

I love yogurt!  I mean, I really love yogurt!!  I love yogurt with toast for breakfast.  I love it topped with fresh fruit for a snack.  I love adding frozen fruit and whirling it in the blender for a nice thick smoothie.  Did I mention that I loved yogurt?

I've eyed up those yogurt makers that you can buy, secretly wanting to get myself one.  Imagine my delight one day casually reading blogs when I came across a recipe for making yogurt in your crock pot!  Who knew?!  Another that caught my eye was this recipe.  There are plenty of tutorials online.  That got me looking for more recipes to make my own yogurt.

I tried a couple of the tutorials that I found, but none I made turned out thick enough.  While runny yogurt is great for smoothies, I wanted something I could eat with a spoon.  I read all the comments and different ideas and took what I thought were the most useful to make my own version.  What I came up with is thicker than the others as well as nice and creamy.

  

Homemade Yogurt 

-1 litre (quart) 1% milk

-1 litre (quart) cream, (I usually use 5% or 10%)

-1/2 cup non instant powdered milk, (available at Bulk Barn)

-1/2 cup of plain, room temperature, unflavoured yogurt containing only milk ingredients and live cultures, nothing else added (such as Organic Meadows or Astro),  

Utensils:

-5-500 ml (2 cup) Mason jars 

-large pot

-oval Crock pot, large enough for the jars to sit in

- thermometer (check that it will read the temperatures needed)

Step 1:

Put clean jars and crock pot on a cookie sheet in the oven at 200F (100C) degrees for abt. 5 minutes.  Then turn off oven leaving the light on.  If oven has digital control, set to abt. 108F (43C) degrees and turn on the oven light.  Leaving the light on helps to keep the oven warm enough.
 

Step 2:

Measure out the ½ cup yogurt “starter” and set aside so it can come to room temperature.

Step 3:

Pour milk and cream into large pot, stir gently and cover with lid.  Heat on med/low temperature until temperature reaches abt. 140F (60C) degrees, no higher than 145, stirring occasionally (takes about ½ hour). DO NOT LET IT BOIL!! 

Step 4:

Gently stir in the powdered milk until dissolved.  You want to stir gently because if you add too much air to the milk it will slow down the incubation time. 

Step 5:

Remove crock pot and jars from oven.  Fill kitchen sink about ¼ full with cold water.  Immerse pot of hot milk in the cold water making sure not to splash the water into the milk.  Stir constantly (but gently) until milk temperature drops to about 110-112 F (43-45C) degrees.  Remove from sink.    

Step 6:

Add the ½ cup of room temperature yogurt to the milk mixture, stirring gently, but thoroughly. 

Step 7:

Carefully ladle/pour warm milk into the warm jars (a funnel is helpful).  Set jars into crock pot, then, put crock pot on cookie sheet in oven and place near oven light.  Your oven should still be warm from preheating the jars.  If not, turn it on as low as it will go to produce a small amount of heat, then shut it off again. 

Leave jars undisturbed for 6 to 7 hours in oven with light left on.  The oven light will help retain the heat.  Do not open oven door at all during the incubation time.  When the time is up you will notice that your yogurt is thicker, but it’s not quite ready yet.

Step 8:

Loosely put lids on jars and refrigerate until completely chilled, at which time it will have finished thickening. Tighten lids.  DO NOT STIR YOGURT until you are ready to use it, adding the flavourings to sweeten by gently folding it in.

(Homemade yogurt topped with rhubard sauce and blueberries)

Some of my favourite flavours to add to my yogurt are; maple syrup, strawberry jam, cinnamon, vanilla, rhubarb sauce, blueberries or bananas. Flavour individual servings as needed.

You can use the yogurt plain like sour cream in baking recipes.  If you want it thicker, line a small strainer with a coffee filter and sit it over a bowl to drain the whey (the liquid that usually separates when the yogurt sits).  Add desired amount of yogurt and let the whey drain until it’s as thick as you want it.  The longer you let the whey drain off the thicker it will become. If you want to use it for cream cheese, let it drain for a couple days, then add seasonings if desired. 

The whey that drains off is just as nutritional as the rest of the yogurt.  You can use it in baked goods to replace milk, water or sour cream in baked recipes.   

Nice To See You!

It's been awhile since I've checked in and I've been busy.  Not one post all winter!  Shame on me.  I love to see what everyone else is up to on their blogs, but mine gets forgotten.  I have been busy though and I've done a little sewing, a little cooking among other things and thought today would be as good as any to post some updates.

My garden is all nicely tilled up and waiting to start again.  I have it all planned out and now just need to get planting.

Gardener's Delight!

We've tilled the earth, picked the stones and pulled the weeds. We've planted the seeds and watered and fed the delicate seedlings, lovingly tending to their needs. Each day We've watched in anticipation as the seedlings grew and blossomed into strong healthy plants.

After much patience and a little luck (if the weather co-operates and the insects don't get too carried away), our efforts will pay off. Our gardens overflow with a beautiful show of luscious, tender fruits and vegetables in thanks. The fruits of our labour...

Pink Tulle Skirt

Well, I won the battle with the tulle but my attempt definitely has room for improvement. The tulle was a little annoying to work with. It would not gather with the sewing machine no matter how I adjusted the tension and stitch length. After sewing a line of stitches along the length of the tulle strips, I had to hand gather it before attaching them to the skirt. This took much longer than I thought it would.

After sewing on a couple of the strips, I had a look at the skirts on the sites I got the idea from (shown here and here). It appears that they were much more generous when gathering the tulle than I was. On my next attempt I'll be sure to be more generous. Click on the picture for a closer look.

Tulle Striped Skirt

I love the idea of this little skirt with strips of tulle sewn on the outside to make it look all girly. There is another version of it here. The tulle gives it a fluffy look that's just perfect for play time in fairy tale land.

I've decided to try my luck at putting one together myself. I chose to use pastel pink cotton broadcloth for the base of the skirt with purplish pink tulle strips. You could have a lot of fun with the colour combinations since tulle comes in so many different colours.

It seems to me that there must be a secret to getting the tulle to gather while sewing it on, as it refused to do so for me when I was experimenting with my practice piece. If I can't figure it out after a couple of tries, I'll just pre-gather it by hand before sewing it on. Either way, I'll post a picture of my results...

Shirred Dress

In my first post I said I was working on some shirred tops. Although I have made a couple of them now, I thought I would show you the first one I made. This one is actually a dress and bloomer set that I made for my niece. Other than the length, it is exactly the same as the tops.

For those of you contemplating trying to do some shirring, rest assured it is much easier to do than you would think. Give it a try and let me know how you made out.

Click on the picture for a closer look...