A Resolution and a Shitty Pie
Over the holidays in 2017, I made two apple pies. The first one was okay. Homemade shortcrust pastry elevated what was otherwise a pretty uninspired combination of granny smith apples, cinnamon, sugar, butter, nutmeg, a little lemon juice to keep the apples bright after being baked into melty submission. It was fine - the major saving grace was working on it with one of my little sisters, and seeing how excited she was when it came out of the oven.
The No Good, Very Bad Pie (seriously it was bad)
The second was plain awful. I had forgotten about it until the day before Christmas, and upon being reminded that I was on pie duty, asked my mom to pick up the above mentioned ingredients, plus two pre-made roll out crusts. They would be perfectly fine, I told myself. It’s not like I hadn’t used them before, and everyone was expecting this pie anyways. I rushed through the peeling, seasoning, and crust pre-bake, deciding last minute to just throw the top crust on whole, rather than lattice-style as I had always done. What would it matter anyways? The pie was safe. Always the same - no big deal.
Wrong. It was a disaster.
The holes I quickly cut into the top didn’t give the steam enough opportunity to escape, and so it created a sauna - turning my usual golden beauty into what was essentially applesauce between two pale crusts. I served it up with a sheepish apology about experimentation not always working out. I was asked by my partner, spending our first Thanksgiving dinner together, if I wanted a slice and gave my usual response, “No, I don’t really like to eat my own bakes.” Typically this gets sort of shrugged off and ignored - a diet thing, maybe. This time, no. “Why? Shouldn’t you taste what you’re serving?” My excuse was that I knew the pie - it was the same. Just apples. Not a big deal. But this time I was pushed to think about it. Why not? What does it say about you (or your pie) that you don’t want to eat it? It was an hour long conversation/bicker session. And he was right.
Until then, I’d been making the same pie every holiday season for 14 years. The same combination of ingredients. The same result - a decent apple pie, helped along by a dollop of whipped cream or a scoop of cool vanilla ice cream. I’d read new recipes of all types - excitedly flipping through Bon Appetit magazines when they arrived in my mailbox, counting the days until a new cookbook came out from my favorite chefs - but never trying anything different. My family asked for “the pie,” and I delivered; a sorry excuse, I know they would have welcomed anything new I wanted to try.
It started to creep into my regular eating habits.
Claiming a lack of time for cooking and a desire for convenience, I’d settle for delivery services - whomever could get my food to me faster. Sometimes the grocery store hot bar while going from place to place. I had moved to the city, finished grad school, my career picked up, and the kitchen was the first thing to be pushed aside. For months my oven lie dormant. Baking sheets untouched, saucepans empty. When I did cook, it was uninteresting - for nutrition, not fulfillment. While most things I was spending my time on were still worthy, I hadn’t carved out time for cooking. Something that had always excited me - spending my days as a teen watching the Food Network religiously, fueling my desire to work in the food and beverage industry - was now on the backburner. Where was the excitement and sense of exploration? Why had I forgotten how much I loved baking? The subpar pies were a reminder.
I spent the last week of 2017 deciding on a few goals for the new year (generally, I hate “resolutions” -- not nearly enough room or forgiveness for trial and error). I wanted to retry all of the foods I claimed to dislike to see if I was right, or just holding onto an outdated opinion based on a bad experience. I wanted to cook and bake and try new recipes alone and with friends, turning my kitchen back into my happy place. I wanted to make culinary exploration my reason for travel and experience food everywhere.
And I wanted to stop making that fucking pie.