adrian_turtle

Last week was difficult, as everyone knows.

So then Monday morning I went into the dentist's office for some minor oral surgery I had been very carefully not thinking about because otherwise I would panic. And the dentist said it went well and I am taking it on faith that it went well and my feeling that something is terribly, terribly, wrong is all in my head only in the sense that my jaw is in my head and has not healed yet.

And I tried to make applesauce Monday afternoon. I have a peculiar sort of plastic bandage inside my mouth on one side, and instructions to eat on the other side. And not to eat anything hard or crunchy. We had plenty of apples from the farmers' market in the refrigerator, but I didn't want to take expensive apples with delicate flavor and good texture and cook them down to mush, so I got some from the store. They had quinces next to the apples, and I thought it might be a good idea to throw one into the applesauce. I had one of those steel things that cuts the core out of an apple or pear and divides the fruit into 8 pieces with a satisfying ker-THUNK. I took it home when we were cleaning out the synagogue attic last year, and enjoyed using it. Alas, the quince was stronger than the kerthunker! The outer ring tore away as I pushed it down, so the jagged ends of the spokes cut me. It wasn't bad enough to need stitches but it was still very upsetting.

A local friend keeps recommending cooking videos. I like the ones where the spatulas and so forth are slightly anthropomorphized, but not fully so. And where things look like they should be fairly simple and easy because there aren't a lot of tools or space involved (even if they don't happen to be quite the tools or space I have.)

This is a recipe for a cabbage pancake impersonating pizza.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVSLEnBuqK8
As I don't eat cheese, I'm never going to make it. But I do like cabbage, and I have never been able to produce shredded cabbage anything like that easily. With a vegetable peeler? Really? Is it the vegetable peeler that's magic, or did they speed up the video or is it just one of those things that only looks easy if you've done it ten million times?

They also rinse the shredded cabbage in several changes of water, and dry it before sauteeing. Do any of you know if this is to remove bugs? Dirt? Salmonella? I thought it was sufficient to wash the outer leaves, but I may be living dangerously in these parlous times. Does it improve the texture?

I don't usually make pie. I make apple crisp instead, or perhaps cookies. Pie crust doesn't seem worth the trouble, especially for a fruit pie. When I used to eat pie somebody else baked, I would often just eat the filling. (ETA: Except Fairion's pies. It turns out she bakes with coconut oil.)

Then I found a recipe for a pecan pie that tempted me. Next time I say the New York Times has become entirely worthless, feel free to remind me they published this excellent recipe. Lucky for us, my housemate occasionally brings home a paper newspaper, and he happened to bring home a NYT full of Thanksgiving recipes (even though neither of us would be home for Thanksgiving.) The pecan pie was tempting enough that I wanted to try taking out the dairy and the alcohol.

Redbird, Cattitude, and I set out to experiment, despite the fact that none of us have much experience making piecrust. We had difficulty with the oil being like melted butter at room temperature, and freezing very inconveniently solid in the refrigerator. (Admittedly, the room was unusually warm and the refrigerator unusually cold.) Still, very awkward to chill the ball of dough, take it out of the refrigerator and have to warm it up before being able to make a dent in it. We eventually pressed it into the pan like a tart crust, getting very irregular coverage. Advice would be very welcome indeed.

I want to make this pie again, because the filling was amazing. Usually, pecan pie is too sweet and not complicated enough, but this wasn't.
6 tablespoons coconut oil
2 ounces bittersweet chocolate chips
4 eggs
0.75 cup dark corn syrup
0.5 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 tablespoon orange juice
1 tablespoon vanilla
large pinch salt
1.5 cups pecan halves (toasted, not salted)

Melt chocolate chips together with oil. Cool, then add to beaten eggs with corn syrup. Everything except the nuts goes into the pre-baked crust, then put the nuts on top of the liquid custard and bake 40 minutes at 350F.

Cattitude wants to put the filling in some other vegan piecrust, which would be a reasonable option. But I would like to make an actual coconut-oil piecrust, if it's possible to make one with sufficient integrity...it was rich and flaky and it tasted better than I expect piecrust to taste.