The Six Emotions of Shoo-Fly Pie

This is not intended to be a food blog.  I've never intended it to be anything other than an Elizabeth blog.  But I write about food often because it's important to me, it's universal, and it's easy: the ease of writing about food being a result of the first two reasons.  But under the surface it is more than that.


It has been a difficult week.  We have been negotiating for a house and property we very much want.  It seems that every time we reach an agreement on one issue with the seller, like the heads of Hydra two more issues arise.  And in the midst of that we lost a very dear little fur friend.  He had an important role in the Judge family, and his death has left a hole. 


Henry misses his friend.

Tonight, after dinner, Matthew said, "I would really like some pie."

Suddenly, I was picturing the layers of a shoo fly pie. I haven't made one in seven years, but in my mind I saw the sticky pudding layer and the layer like gingerbread topped with a crumbly, streusel layer. I did a mental check of the pantry.  I had everything I needed - molasses, butter, brown sugar.  I even had a pre-made pie crust in the fridge (don't judge).  I jumped up, grabbed my pink mixing bowls, started to break up butter in sugar and flour until it formed course crumbs. 

I was first introduced to shoo fly pie in Lois Lenski's Shoo Fly Girl.  Strawberry Girl may be the Newbery winner, but for me it couldn't compare to the story of the sincere little Amish girl.  I loved the book so much, I begged my mom to make me a shoo fly pie.  The hands-on mom that she is, she was pulling  one out of the oven not long after that.  I'm not sure what I expected, but it certainly wasn't the dark, mostly unfamiliar flavor of molasses.  Disappointed, I finished just one piece.

It wasn't until years later that I made my own shoo fly pie.  It is one of the first things I remember making all on my own - just because I felt like it  By this point, I loved molasses, and this time it did not disappoint.

When we were in college, lonely and tired of trying to figure out how to be adults, Rebekah quietly said to me, "I would love some shoo fly pie right now." 

My jaw dropped.  First, because I never knew Rebekah loved shoo fly pie, and I thought I knew everything about my little sister.  Second, because with startling clarity, I realized I too wanted that simple, comfortable pie.

Tonight I baked one for Matthew and me.  While the warm scent of it filled the kitchen I listed to Beethoven's Seventh and felt strongly.  Not a simple, easy to pin-point feeling.  But the whole kaleidoscope of feelings that comes from living a full life and baking a pie that has a plethora of memories mixed in with the sugar and cinnamon.

I am sad at the death of a sweet dog.
I am happy as I bake pie and listen to Matthew in the other room busy with his lizards.
I am nervous that we might get this house.  Nervous that we might not.
I am lonely for my family still as far away as they were when I was at college.  Only now Rebekah is further away too.
I am in love with the man in the room with the lizards.
And I am grateful. Grateful for my memories and the rich life I have now.

Not everyone likes molasses.  I get that.  But if you haven't had shoo fly pie, give it a try.  If nothing else, it will make your house smell like the safest place in the world. 

Shoo Fly Pie

1 9" inch pie crust

Crumb topping:
1 cup flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 Tablespoons butter
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ginger
1/8 teaspoon cloves

Filling:
3/4 cup corn syrup
3/4 cup hot water
1 well beaten egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda

Preheat the oven to 400. Line a 9 inch pie pan with crust. Mix all the crumb ingredients together until rough crumbs form. Set aside. Combine corn syrup and hot water, then stir in remaining ingredients. Place a third of the crumbs in the pie crust. Pour half the syrup on top of the crumbs. Layer another third of the crumbs, followed by the remaining syrup. Top evenly with remaining crumbs. Bake at 400 for 20 -25 minutes.

Christmas Ham for Every Occasion

Warning - this post does not contain a recipe.  If you legitimately want a Christmas ham recipe, I suggest you look elsewhere.  This is a about me, Christmas ham and a story that never gets old.

Two years ago, Matthew and I started contributing a ham to the extended-family dinner. Christmas is always extremely busy for Matthew and me between the increased work load at our respective jobs and travelling.  Buying a ham and delivering it to my mother-in-law is practical way for us to contribute to the family celebration.

Honey Baked Ham starts mailing out their coupons right after Halloween.  On glossy pages, impressive hams display ruffled spirals edged in a crystalized sugar glaze.  My mother-in-law gave me two coupons - one for $5 off and one for 10% off.  I took them both with me, just in case Honey Baked Ham would let me use them collectively. 

Now obviously, you can't just walk up to Honey Baked Ham the day before Christmas and walk out with a ham.  You have to call ahead and reserve your ham.  Then you have to go wait in line with twenty people in Christmas sweaters. 

Florida: A Tradition in Mayonnaise

It takes my breath away how a place almost 900 miles from where I grew up can hold such vivid, beautiful and heartbreaking memories.  Maybe it is the regularity of it.  As certainly as spring arrives, we make the trek to northern Florida.  Over sixteen years, our family has grown, we have spread out further and further across the country, and our schedules have diversified; but still, we meet at the Gulf with tenacity.

  

Years ago, I would spend the night before our trip making sandwiches.  The way I remember it is endless rows of rolls that needed to sawed in half, the crumbs going everywhere.  Armed with a large jar of Hellmans and a butter knife, I would slap mayonnaise on the top half of each roll.  Faced with such a mundane task, my imagination ran wild.  As I put mayonnaise on roll after roll after roll, I was struck that, "the mayonnaise quivered expectantly." 

So thrilled was I with this description of making sandwiches, that I put down my knife, ran to my room and wrote it down.  As though there was a chance someone might steal it.  I don't know what I thought the mayonnaise was expecting.  Perhaps the anticipation of sharing its existence with shaved turkey was almost more than it could take?

An Employee Engaged

If I could, I would blog about my job.  When people hear what I do, they usually make some kind of polite, sick face that implies, "Poor you."  But to tell the truth, I absolutely love my job.  I am one of those obnoxious people that look forward to Monday mornings.  I regal Matt with work stories at night while he is wearily removing his tie.  I make a point of eating in the lunch room - not just to save money but because I enjoy conversing with my co-workers.  And even on the most trying of days, people never fail to be people and give me a reason to smile. 

Rebekah's Brownie Pillow Cookies

In addition to being a busy tax accountant, my sister Rebekah is also a wonderful baker.  She kindly agreed to do a guest post on how to make her brownie pillow cookies.  Bake carefully; I can verify what she says - they are addicting!

During my junior year of university, I moved into a house not far from campus with my sister, Elizabeth, and our friend, Beth.  After two years of the exuberance of the dormitories, it was nice to have a little space to spread out and study in peace. Plus, we had a whole big kitchen all to ourselves!

It became a weekly tradition for my wonderful and adorable friends, Bekah and Rachel, to come over on Sunday afternoons for lunch and to study.  With The Corrs crooning in the background, we always lunched on the same thing, procured from the Fresh Market down the street--hot shaved ham, drizzled with honey, on Ciabatta rolls and sliced Munster cheese. For dessert, we would get brownie pillow cookies--a moist brownie center enveloped in a smooth butter cookie. They were pretty much heaven on earth.

After I graduated, I moved on to the wonderful world of tax accounting in Atlanta, rarely eating shaved ham for Sunday lunch, and (as impossible as this sounds) quite forgetting about the glories of brownie pillow cookies.

Until one day in December. 

A friend from work had suggested a pre-Christmas cookie bake.  We invited several other mutual friends and each submitted a recipe for the group to make.  To my chagrin, none of the recipes submitted were of a chocolate variety. Not having chocolate at a cookie bake being paramount to criminal activity, I planned to rectify the problem by submitting a chocolate cookie as my recipe.

And with that decision, the brownie pillow cookies popped out of some buried subconscious and into my brain.

I had always figured they were made by magic, since how else were you supposed to get a brownie inside of a cookie!  But since I had to have them (and I couldn’t very well bring else-where baked cookies to a cookie bake), I decided to see if my dear friend Google could help me out.  And, lo and behold, someone else had also experienced the wonder of Fresh Market’s brownie pillow cookies; and--like a scene from one of those antiques shows where someone finds they are holding a priceless treasure long-buried in a distant relative’s basement, attic or, in this case, recipe book--she had found a recipe.

I did make the cookies.  And I took them to work so I wouldn’t eat them all.  My co-workers now also dream in brownie pillow cookies.

Since the recipe Bakerella posted made pillow cookies big enough to dress a bed, I modified it some to make a more bite-sized variety. The recipe also contains chocolate chips in the cookie dough, which she and I both think adds something, but which can be eliminated for a cookie closer to those from Fresh Market.

Tomorrow, I am attending a get-together with several of the ladies in my neighborhood.  We are supposed to bring a snack and a beverage. Since these are the people who keep an eye on my house for me when I am out of town, I figured I’d better make them like me.  So I am taking brownie pillow cookies.  Because, after all, it is a brownie inside of a cookie.  What is there not to love??

Brownie Pillow Cookies

For the brownies

1 package brownie mix for an 8x8 pan (you can make brownies from scratch as well, but since I’m eating, sleeping and breathing taxes at the moment, that’s really not an option for me, no matter how much I love my neighbors).

Make sure the brownie package is for a small square pan (8x8 or 9x9).  Prepare brownies batter according to package directions (I also like to add chopped pecans to my brownies, just make sure to chop up anything added to be very small so you do not wind up with large chunks on your brownies) or your favorite recipe.  Pour into a 9x13 pan.  It will create a thin layer, so you will need to spread out to the corners and smooth.  Bake just until set (about 7 minutes).  Cool to room temperature and then put in the freezer.

For the chocolate chip cookie dough

This amount of cookie dough will make about three dozen small (1.5”) cookies and will use up half the pan of brownies.

1 cup butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
2 large eggs, plus 1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
12 oz. bag miniature semi-sweet chocolate chips

Beat butter with a mixer until creamy. Add brown sugar and beat until smooth. Add eggs, yolk and vanilla. Beat until smooth.

Combine flour, baking powder, soda and salt in a medium bowl and stir together with a wire whisk.

Add flour mixture to butter mixture and beat until combined. Stir in mini chips. Let dough chill covered in the refrigerator for at least an hour. This will make it easier to handle when you’re wrapping the brownies.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Remove the pan of brownies from freezer and cut into small squares (about a half-inch square).  I do cut away the very edges first so as to not wind up with any harder bits in my cookies. I was worried about the edges going to waste, but somehow they manage to disappear, so I stopped worrying about it.

Cover each brownie square with a thin layer of chocolate chip cookie dough.  I do this by rolling a small ball of dough (1+ tsp) and then creating an indent with my thumb into which I put the brownie piece.  I then work the dough around the rest of the brownie piece and form it back into a ball. If I’ve done it right, I won’t be able to see the brownie at all (See! It is magic!).

Place the cookie dough balls on a baking sheet (I line mine with parchment paper) and smoosh them down (they do not spread much).  Place in preheated 350 degree oven and bake until light brown (about 7 minutes). 

Cool on cooling rack.

Try to refrain from eating them all in one sitting.