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So our thoughts have turned to pie, as thoughts are wont to do.
Let’s be honest, we’re mainly thinking about eating it. A scoop of vanilla ice cream on hot apple pie fresh from the oven, chocolate cream pie heaped with whipped cream and chocolate shavings, warm Maine blueberry pie with a delicate brown sugar crumb crust.
We’ll pause while you reach for your coffee and Triscuits and pretend they’re even a quarter as good.
Bag Lady can make a mean apple and chocolate cream, as well as pumpkin and peanut butter cheesecakes, owing largely to their nearly fool-proof nature.
Shopping Siren intended to make a pie. Once.
So it’s with that pie-baking baseline that we dive into ingredient shopping for the easiest, but slightly-comfort-zone-pushing pies we can find on the web to celebrate a truncated Thanksgiving next week.
There may not be people, but there will be pies!*
* Said as Mel Gibson in “Braveheart.” Hey, we’re pie passionate.
• Nestle baking chocolate morsels, 9-12 oz., Shaw’s, $2.99
These are your basic building blocks for TheFoodCharlatan.com’s The Chocolate Chip Pie. Pull it from the oven at just the right moment and the whole thing stays center-of-a-cookie gooey, according to the site. This pie also demands to be served with vanilla ice cream, which, OK, if we must.
• Grissom’s refrigerated pie crust, two-pack, Save-A-Lot, $1.99
A fine base for pumpkin or lemon meringue. Nothing drives Bag Lady into fits of rage faster than attempting a homemade pie crust. Parts are thick. Parts are thin. It’s not wide enough. It’s sticking to the counter. There’s flour everywhere. Hate is radiating off her rolling pin. It’s A Scene. For less than $2, this pre-made crust is an immediate no-brainer.
That said . . .
• Good & Gather all purpose flour, 5 lbs., Target, $1.39
If you want to make a crust, like really want to, a site called Natasha’s Kitchen has a recipe they call “easy” and yet “will make you feel like Martha Stewart.” There’s also a video there in case you get lost between measuring flour correctly and rolling the dough.
True story: Shopping Siren once picked several pounds of apples intending to make an apple pie, but then got so confounded by the pie crust recipes out there that she put it off until the apples were about five minutes from going bad. So she made apple bread instead. It was good apple bread, to be fair, but it was no pie.
We’re all about cautionary tales here at Bliss. Don’t let this pie-tastrophy happen to you.
• Cap’n Crunch original cereal, 14 oz., Hannaford, $3.49
This no-bake Easy Crunch Berry Pie recipe on TasteOfHome.com calls for a crushed Cap’n Crunch crust and our minds are *officially* blown. Also, the filling has actual has berries, so healthy-ish? Like, for pie?
• Nutella chocolate hazelnut spread, 26.5 oz., Walmart, $6.42
TasteOfHome.com’s Creamy Hazelnut Pie recipe has only four ingredients, plus the crust, and two are Nutella and cream cheese. We know what you’re thinking, and yes, it’s perfectly OK not to share.
• Haagen-Dazs strawberry ice cream, 14 oz., Target, $4.29
What if we told you that there’s a recipe out there for strawberry ice cream pie with a pretzel crust and it only has four steps? You would tell us we’re crazy and need to lay off the caffeine. You would be right about the caffeine, but totally wrong about being crazy because such a recipe exists. It’s on MyRecipes.com and sounds amazing. Use Haagen-Dazs for that extra special amazing. We’ll just be over here sipping our double large chai and waiting for the pie to be done.
Best find: HEIWA organic tofu, 1 lb., Little Ridge Farm, $5.75
No really, stay with us: HEIWA Tofu in Rockland just happens to have a killer-looking chocolate dessert recipe on its website and Little Ridge Farm in Lisbon Falls just happens to sell the HEIWA tofu used in said recipe. And you just happen to live in Maine. All local for the win!
Now, granted, HEIWA calls this a torte, but it’s really a crust-less pie. It requires just three ingredients, none of which has gluten, eggs or dairy. And there’s no baking. We know, that doesn’t sound like any pie you’ve ever heard of, but taste it and tell us it isn’t amazing. Or just make one and send it to us for fair and multiple-slice judging.
Think twice: Clearly, about skipping the pie next week.
It’s been a year. Have some pie.
Bag Lady and Shopping Siren’s true identities are protected by a pair of stylish, sweater-wearing Doberman pinschers (who will kindly eat any crust you don’t want) and the Customer Service counter at the Sun Journal. You can reach them at baglady@sunjournal.com and shoppingsiren@sunjournal.com.
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