I’m back at work this week after a very brief, but very, shall we say, filling, trip to London. My 2.5 days on the ground revolved around sleeping and eating indulgent meals, and walking in between to do things like admire Christmas decorations, wander food halls and pop into cute establishments for a glass of wine. After very memorable meals at Gymkhana, Kiln, and the Palomar, we ended our trip at St. John, one of my favorite restaurants in the WORLD, where we polished off a startling number of appetizers, entrees and desserts, and more wine and after-dinner drinks than I’d recommend anyone imbibe. On Sunday, I got home at 4pm and tore into a gigantic salad.
So now here I am, and it turns out that Christmas is…next week?! This past month has really flown. My family is deep into a group text about Christmas dessert projects, and perhaps you also have a family that is not yet decided on exactly what will grace your dessert table. If that’s the case, may I suggest this pie?
Our family made the pie for Thanksgiving, and it was a big hit. It was also a big hit at my home before Thanksgiving, when I made a test run of the pie. So, I’ve eaten a lot of this pie. I think what I like most is that it’s a familiar format (a fruit pie with a crumb topping) but with a twist. Rather than using apples, it’s made with pears sliced pretty thin, so it’s a similar texture but a more delicate taste, in my opinion. It also has some finely chopped crystallized ginger in the filling as well as ground ginger in the crumb topping. Now, I don’t always love ginger in sweet things, but this is just subtle enough to be interesting but not overpowering. It’s a slightly unusual combination that may not sound intuitive but works really well.
A word on pie- we are very loyal around here to my family’s crust recipe, which you can find on any of the other pie recipes in this blog. But I recently got the Magpie cookbook, and I’ve really fallen in love with their crust, which I’ve used in this recipe. It’s mostly butter, but has a little shortening, and its very flaky and user friendly. Also, if you are still looking for Christmas gifts, this is an absolutely excellent pie book! It has excellent, detailed illustrations of every step of every process and great flavor combinations.
I’ve been on a real cooking streak lately, with lots of successes to share. I’ve got a great Christmas-y cookie that I’ve fallen in love with, which I’ll try to share before the end of the week to give you some time to try it before the holidays!
Ingredients
- 156g / 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 14g / 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
- 3g / 1/2 teaspoon fine salt
- 85g / 1/4 + 1/8 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch cubes and frozen
- 30g / 1/8 cup vegetable shortening, preferably in baking stick form, frozen, cut into 1/4-inch pieces, and put back in the freezer
- 65g / 1/4 cup + 1/2 tablespoon ice-cold water
- 2 1/2 lbs. / 1132g firm, ripe, unpeeled Bartlett pears, cored and sliced 1/8 inch thick
- 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/3 cup / 63g granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 2 tablespoons minced candied ginger
- 1/8 teaspoon fine salt
- 1 cup / 80g rolled oats, divided
- 1/2 cup / 62g all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup / 96g granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon ground or freshly grated nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 5 tablespoons / 71g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
Instructions
- First make the dough. Combine the flour, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor and pulse the machine 3 times to blend. Scatter the frozen butter cubes over the flour mixture. Pulse the machine 5 to 7 times, holding each pulse for 5 full seconds, to cut all o the butter into pea-size pieces. Scatter the pieces of frozen shortening over the flour-and-butter mixture. Pulse the machine 4 more 1-second pulses to blend the shortening with the flour. The mixture will resemble coarse cornmeal, but will be a bit more floury and riddled with pale butter bits (no pure-white shortening should be visible).
- Turn the mixture out into a large mixing bowl and make a small well in the center. If you find a few butter clumps that are closer to marble size than pea size (about 1/4 inch in diameter), carefully pick them out and give them a quick smoosh with your fingers. Pour the cold water into the well. Use a curved bowl scraper to lightly scoop the flour mixture up and over the water, covering the water to help get the absorption started. Continue mixing by scraping up from the sides and bottom of the bowl into the center, rotating the bowl as you mix, and occasionally pausing to clean off the scraper with your finger or the side of the bowl, until the mixture begins to gather into clumps but it is still very crumbly. (If you are working in very dry conditions and the ingredients remain very floury and refuse to clump together at this stage, add another tablespoon of ice-cold water.)
- Lightly gather the clumps with your fingers and use your palm to fold over and press the dough a few times, until it just begins to come together into a single large mass. It will be a raggedy wad, moist but not damp, that barely holds together; this is exactly as it should be. Wrap tightly with plastic wrap. and refrigerate overnight, or for at least 8 hours.
- Lightly flour a smooth work surface and a rolling pin.
- Take the chilled dish of dough out of the fridge. Give it a couple of firm squeezes, then unwrap and set it on the floured work surface.
- Set the pin crosswise on the dough and press down firmly, making a nice deep channel across the full width of the disk. Turn the disk 180 degrees and repeat, making a second indentation, forming a plus sign.
- Use your rolling pin to press down each of the wedges, turning the dough 45 degrees each time. This will give you the beginnings of a thick circle.
- Now, rolling from the center outward and rotating the dough a quarter turn to maintain a circular shape, roll the dough out to a 13-inch circle with an even thickness of 1/4 inch.
- Set your 9-inch pie pan alongside the circle of dough. Brush off any loose flour, carefully fold the dough circle in half, transfer to the pan and unfold.
- Without stretching the dough, set the dough down into the pan so that it is flush up against the sides and bottom. Flute the edge, folding the overhang under to form a 1-inch wall that rests on the lip of the pan with the seam slightly below the pan's top edge. Flute the edge of the crust at about 1-inch intervals. Transfer the crust to the refrigerator to chill while you make your filling.
- To make the oatmeal crumb, use a food processor to grind 3/4 cup of the oats, pulsing the machine until the oats resemble coarse cornmeal. Add the flour, sugar, ginger, nutmeg and salt and pulse 5 times to combine. Transfer the mixture to a bowl and whisk in the remaining 1/4 cup whole oats.
- Add the melted butter and blend wit ha fork or your fingers until the butter is incorporated and the mixture gathers into small clumps. Set the bowl in the refrigerator and chill the crumb for 15 minutes before topping your pie.
- Preheat the oven to 375°F with a rack in the center. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, toss the pears with the lemon juice and vanilla.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the sugar, cornstarch, candied ginger and salt. Sprinkle the sugar mixture over the pears and toss to coat the fruit and moisten the sugar and cornstarch so that no dry white streaks remain.
- Retrieve the prepared pie shell from the refrigerator and set the pan on the parchment-lined baking sheet. Scoop the filling into the shell and top with the oatmeal crumb, spreading evenly and completely covering the fruit.
- Transfer the baking sheet to the oven and bake the pie 25 minutes, then rotate the baking sheet, lower the oven temperature to 350°F and bake 25 to 30 minutes more, or until the topping is golden and the juices bubble up through the crumb. Tent the top with foil if it starts to over-brown.
- Set the baking sheet on a wire rack and let the pie cool and set, uncovered, at room temperature, overnight before slicing and serving.
Notes
From Magpie
