Summer in the Kitchen

It’s finally been sunny here in Seattle and I am trying to just soak it all up. Since my sewing space is downstairs in a daylight basement (light on the daylight, heavy on the basement), I haven’t felt like closeting myself away from the sun for the last few days. So instead, I’ve spent time in the kitchen being productive.

Summer is berry time here in the Pacific Northwest and we have lots of them! Raspberries and blackberries are in full swing here right now and we even have some late strawberries making an appearance here and there. They are always such a welcome treat after the gloom of spring and early summers, like little sweet jewels waiting to be gobbled up or turned into something even more awesome. So this past Sunday, I took a trip to my local farmer’s market and bought a flat of each.

We use a lot of jam around here and I have canned before, but didn’t feel like heating the kitchen up with all the boiling, so I went the easy route and made freezer jams.

Mash fruit and add some sugar. Add a bit of water and pectin. Fill your jars. Freeze.Voila! I made raspberry, blackberry, strawberry and one jar of mixed berry with the remains of all three. Delicious!

Then on Thursday I decided to make a pie. I love pie. While I find it impossible to choose only one favorite dessert, pie, in almost any form, is right up there near the top. And what a choice it was, with all the fruit finally in season here!

After much drooling while perusing recipes, I decided to use up the remaining strawberries and make a Strawberry Sour Cream Pie from this book. Yum!

It turned out well, including my crust, which I make myself. Whenever I make pie crust for the first time in a while, I tend to not use enough water. It takes a bit of practice to really know just the right amount to give you dough that rolls out easily without much cracking, but not be super sticky and inhibit flakiness. Luckily, I made quiche earlier in the week and made another crust to practice. Predictably, I didn’t add quite enough water and had a bit of cracking while rolling out, but it meant that my pie had perfect crust!

The first slice of this pie didn’t really send me anywhere. I had it warm a few hours after I pulled it out of the oven. It wasn’t bad, but it just wasn’t special. I had another piece a couple days later, cold from the fridge, and I liked it a lot more! Since then, I’ve been devouring this pie, piece by piece all alone because my husband has been distracted by ice cream. (Pfft! Whatever.) I really think it’s better cold, after the flavors have had a chance to blend.  I’ll definitely make this one again, perhaps with different berries since strawberries are getting pretty hard to find.

In any case, hooray for baking!