Okay, so I'm a sucker for food photography. Our Fresh Fields/Whole Foods Market started a food magazine with a very tempting cover shot and put lots of copies around the store. And of course waiting at the checkout is the most vulnerable time for recipe mag addicts like the bobmeister. A quick leaf through didn't reveal that many ideas which would have a realistic chance of seeing action in our kitchen except for one, but one is all it takes to sink the hook: pumpkin pumpkin pie. Since the usual guests at the annual T-day event had long ago nixed the elegant pumpkin cheesecake in favor of ordinary pumpkin pie, much to bob's chagrin, this seemed to be a way to improve the usual bland delivery of the mandatory dish. Pumpkin pies are pretty much all the same, whether you buy them at the supermarket or slave over every detail at home. But adding a second level to the usual single strata classic offered promisea pumpkin mousse to contrast the pumpkin pie, also eliminating the need for slapping vanilla icecream on each serving. The bigger than life size photo was a strong motivator.
The pumpkin pie layer, though hyped as a dense spicy custard...
"Pumpkin Pumpkin Pie. Created by former team member Ann Clark, this dramatic-looking pie is composed of two layersa dense, spicy custard on the bottom with a light, silken mousse on top. It tastes even better than it looks! "
turned out to be the standard recipe on the back of nearly every can of canned pumpkin pulp except somehow they got the evaporated milk can size wrong (13oz in a country whose hotels never have 13th floors?it's 12oz across all brands). Rather than labor over a real pie crust that wouldn't be noticed anyway, we use a Pillsbury frozen pie crust circle to get the job done without stooping to a store bought pie shell which seems kind of cheesy. The pie layer is a no brainermix the glop and dump it in, jam it into the oven, bake and cool. And the second layer is a no-bake add-on you can do the next day in a snap, making the whole package pretty painless to produce. So little effort, such a big improvement.
After shelling out hard cash for the magazine, ironically the pumpkin pumpkin pie recipe arrived free by e-mail as part of their new electronic food hype program.