Mixed Berry Pie Recipe

After a few years of not making a pie completely from scratch, I finally made a mixed berry pie the other day. For anyone who’s ever made a pie and. more specifically, made the crust themselves, the task can appear quite daunting. As I couldn’t remember the original recipe I had used for a pie crust a while back, I went online and looked for a new one. A key ingredient in many of the recipes that I don’t recall using at all last time was chilled water.

What I was primarily interested in this time was a flaky crust. The perfect flaky crust can be difficult to achieve if you don’t have the right flour to butter ratio, it seems. I don’t normally use real butter for baking because, well, it’s pricier than margarine or any other kind of spread. However, I decided to splurge a little this time and bought a box of butter from Target. I came across this recipe for a buttery flaky crust on Allrecipes.com:

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup butter, chilled and diced
• 1/4 cup ice water

The original recipe can be found here: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/butter-flaky-pie-crust/. It’s important to note that this particular recipe is tailored for a single pie crust. I doubled the recipe but in separate batches, so I did the same thing twice. You start by combining the flour and the salt in a bowl, after which you combine the butter with dry ingredients. The recipe states that you should “cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs.” I have to admit that this was taking quite a while for me, so I thought that I must’ve been doing something wrong. I really think you just have to be patient with it. Since you’re using chilled butter, as opposed to softened butter, it can be rather tricky. I used a mixer for this, not on high.

After combining the flour with the butter, you stir in the iced water, little by little. Note that it says ice water, but that doesn’t mean the ice goes into the flour, just the water. My guess is that it has to be iced water, as opposed to room temperature, because it makes the flour/salt/butter combination stick together better. After a few minutes, you will be able to form a ball out of this mixture. Don’t worry if it seems to crumble a little. You wrap the ball in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for about 4 hours or overnight. I myself left the wrapped dough in fridge overnight.

The next day, I rolled out the dough and greased up the pie pan. For the bottom crust, I flattened it as much as possible and pressed it in the pan as evenly as possible. It was then that I realized that I probably could’ve used a little more dough, and this is why I would modify the recipe a little next time, as the dough didn’t completely go over the edge of the pan. I like my pies to a have the crust go over the rim of the pan quite a bit, and for the crust to be a bit thicker. For next time, my recipe will probably resemble something like this:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup butter, chilled and diced
• 1/4 cup ice water

For the top crust, I wanted to do the lattice-top technique, which basically means you weave strips of the dough over one another. Feeling a bit lazy, I only cut it into 6 strips, but it can look quite pretty if you cut it into narrower strips and hence, more strips. I would do about 10. I’ve done the lattice-top crust once before, so I didn’t resort to any guide, but for those of you who would like a great step-by-step guide on how to do it, here’s a great link: http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/how_to_make_a_lattice_top_for_a_pie_crust/.

Now for the filling. Normally I’d prefer using fresh berries, but I opted for a frozen mix of blackberries, blueberries, and raspberries from Trader Joe’s this time (have you seen the prices of unfrozen berries here in San Francisco recently?). I left them out to defrost for about half an hour, just so they’re not too frozen when placing them in the pie pan. Then I placed them in a bowl to combine them with a few other ingredients. The following is my recipe:

• 3-4 cups berries of your choice
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon flour
• 1/2 cup sugar, white or brown
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• Butter to dot the top of filling

Some people also like to use lemon zest along with lemon juice, so you may if you’d like. I personally didn’t feel the need to, and I almost didn’t want to put that much lemon juice because I knew the berries would be a bit tart to begin with. After combining all the ingredients, I poured them into the pan and I proceeded to start weaving the crust on top. Once this was done, I used an egg wash for the crust. An egg wash really helps for adequate browning of the crust. All I used was an egg and a tablespoon of milk.

I then placed the pie into a 425°F oven for 20 mins. I decreased the temperature to 350°F after those first 20 mins. and let it bake for another 30 mins. And then, ta-da! I had my pie.

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People Who Matter: Anna Karina

I know I said a while back that I would try to do at least a monthly post on a person that I admire or find inspiring, and I haven’t been keeping my word. I last wrote about Lee Miller, whose exhibit I saw at the Legion of Honor here in San Francisco last year actually. It was a truly amazing experience, and I hope that some of you were able to make it to the exhibit. It was actually an exhibit highlighting Miller’s and Man Ray’s relationship.

This month’s all about Anna Karina, the Danish-French actress. Anyone who knows about my love for French New Wave film knows that I adore her. Known as an actress, a great beauty, and somewhat of a style icon, she has also written a few books and directed a couple films. Unfortunately, I’ve found it somewhat difficult to find some of her post-Godard movies, for some reason, but I enjoy her in all of the films she made with her first husband. Anna Karina was born Hanne Karen Blarke Bayer in Copenhagen, Denmark on September 22, 1940. The daughter of a dress shop owner and a ship captain, she was in and out of foster care for much of her childhood. She grew up learning dance and painting, so she was certainly an artistic young woman. When she finally went back to living with her mother, their relationship became rocky. After years of not getting along with one another, Anna stopped living with her mother and hitchhiked her way to Paris at the age of 18 in 1958.

Paris life was not lacking in hardship, as she did not speak the language and had nowhere to live. Living on the streets allowed her to eventually find her way to her future career, as with a stroke of luck, she came across a woman who worked in advertisement who asked her to model for some pictures. It wasn’t long until she became a fashion model, giving her a chance to meet people like Coco Chanel. After changing her name to Anna Karina professionally (with the help of Chanel) she became a successful model and sought out film roles. Jean-Luc Godard, in the process of making his debut film Breathless, was looking for a young actress who could play a short nude scene in the film. He came across Anna in a series of ads for Palmolive, in which she was sitting in a bathtub, purportedly naked, covered in soapsuds. When he approached her about the part, she refused the offered role because of the nudity, which left Godard rather confused. “Are you mad?” she told him. “I was wearing a bathing suit in those ads–the soapsuds went up to my neck. It was in your mind that I was undressed.”

Although one would think that after being told off in such a way would mean the end of the story, it did not deter Godard from coming back the following year to offer her a role in Le Petit Soldat (1960). Despite being a not so experienced actress, she played the lead female role. Unfortunately, the film wasn’t released until three years later, due to its controversial political themes and depiction of torture. Nevertheless, Anna was on her way to becoming the Queen of the Nouvelle Vague. In the following years, she acted in eight of Godard’s films, including Une Femme Est Une Femme (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), and Pierrot Le Fou (1965), finding her place as Godard’s muse.

from Band A Part (Band of Outsiders)

Jean-Luc and Anna

She married Godard in 1961 during the making of Une Femme Est Une Femme. The marriage ended in divorce in 1965, but they still managed to make a couple more films together afterwards. After ending their collaborations, Anna moved on to working with filmmakers like Jacques Rivette, Luchino Visconti, and Rainer Werner Fassbinder.

In 1967, she starred in a TV musical written by Serge Gainsbourg called Anna. Gainsbourg wrote for her the hits “Sous le Soleil Exactement” and “Roller Girl.” The lucky Anna sang songs alongside Serge Gainsbourg and her co-star, Jean-Claude Brialy, with whom she had worked on Une Femme Est Une Femme. If you ever get a chance to watch Anna, I really recommend it, especially if you’re a big fan of both Serge Gainsbourg and Anna Karina. It even features a cameo by Marianne Faithfull. A copy of it is hard to come by, and I somehow found a non-subtitled version of it on YouTube years ago, so you might still be able to find it on there.

from Pierrot Le Fou (1965)

“All you need for a movie is a gun and a girl.” — Jean-Luc Godard

Anna Karina’s style has certainly become influential over the years. At a time when Brigitte Bardot’s sex kitten persona was all the rage, Anna’s brunette good looks appealed to the art-house movie goer. Her famous bangs and cat eye makeup made her recognizable and unique.

“Have you seen a girl who looks like a film in Technicolor?”

from Anna (1967)

Anna’s charm and emotional performances have made her into an icon, most notably in her work with Godard. Although she has been successful in her other work, one will always link her with the French New Wave and Godard’s films. After all, they were a powerhouse couple, him with his brilliant writing and directing, and her with her intelligent acting performances and on-screen loveliness. And she continues to hold an important place in cinematic history.

Recent picture of Anna

Another Mix

You say you want your freedom.

The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul: Of Gods and Holistic Detectives

I recently finished reading Douglas Adams’ second installment of his Dirk Gently series. Featuring the self-proclaimed “holistic detective,” The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul weaves religious and social criticism with wit and absurdity. As always, Adams confronts the reader with commentary on modern life while making them laugh out loud. Although the humor is slightly different from that of his best-known book, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, it’s similar enough for lovers of his most famous work to enjoy.

The novel involves Detective Dirk Gently, who is purposefully described as a nearly incompetent and lazy independent investigator. Although seemingly inefficient, he is however a detective who always ends up in the right place. A now famous quote from the book in particular is a favorite of mine: “I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.” Essentially, Gently isn’t necessarily smarter than he appears; he’s more of a product of circumstances working in his favor, or rather, luck. But the book does not introduce Gently at the beginning. We first come across Kate Schechter, an American woman at a London airport in a hurry to get on a plane to meet with a man in Norway. While waiting in line, eager to get her boarding pass, she encounters none other than the Norse god of thunder, Thor. Due to Thor becoming a tad bit enraged, the ticket counter explodes, leading to a few people being killed and to Kate ending up in the hospital. She soon becomes entangled in a ridiculous web of godly intrigue and foolishness, in which Gently also becomes entangled.

Gently and Kate team up inadvertently to figure out why Thor needed a plane ticket to Norway, why Odin is content living at a type of psychiatric institution, and why there’s a green-skinned monster named Toe Rag killing off record producers. At the root of the plot is the idea that humanity created gods and they were worshiped for a long time, but that once humans began to lose interest in them and increasingly found no need for them, the gods have been cast aside and neglected. They live in a parallel world to ours named Valhalla (after the mythological Norse deity residence), where they have become somewhat destitute and pathetic. The book is filled with brilliant passages and original observations. Adams’ wit and unapologetic mockery of humanity and its need for religion are undeniable and clever.

I recommend this book if you like witty social criticism and are not offended by theological criticism.

Star rating: 4/5