Basil and Thyme Pie

This Basil and Thyme Pie was delicious! I figured it was about time for a savory pie. I especially loved the thyme. It was very savory and very pretty. Other than my hack job on the braided crust, it was very delicious.

Sweat Potato Pie

This sweet potato pie turned out really good. It was very delicious. And it had a few different spices in it to give it flavor. I also made some stars with a cookie cutter to give it some visual appeal. I still haven't fixed my shrinking crust problem. But the pie was still good.

Reeces Peanut Butter Pie

I made this Peanut butter pie thinking it would taste a lot like a peanut butter cup. But in the end it just didn't. The peanut flavor wasn't peanut-y enough. And the chocolate wasn't chocolate-y enough. So I don't know if I will ever try this pie again, because I'm not sure how to fix these problems. On a positive note, it was a pretty pie. And you can see the peanut butter cups on the top. Mmm.

Pumpkin Pie

During the Thanksgiving season I made a pumpkin pie for my neighbor Ruth. She is a very sweet lady and her favorite kind of pie is pumpkin. I was really lucky with the first recipe that I chose. It had a lot of spices in it which added a lot to the flavor. This was not a boring pumpkin pie by any means! It wasn't overwhelming though. I also tried to cut out some leaves from the left over pie dough. They turned out a little sloppy for my taste. So next time I will spend more time on that and maybe make a template. This pie was so good!!! And it was so fun to share it with my neighbor.

Coconut Cream Pie (My other favorite.)

I was lucky when I started baking Coconut Cream Pie, because I came across a really good recipe from the start. It is very creamy and has a good coco-nutty flavor. Mmmm.

French Silk Pie (My favorite.)

A couple of months ago I made 4 French Silk Pies. I finally came across a recipe that I just loved. The chocolate cream was made of coco powder, heavy cream and vanilla. And the topping of the pie was made with freshly whipped cream and chocolate shavings from a Hershy bar (Because who wants to spend $5 on fancy chocolate? Not me!).  This pie is not only yummy, it is very attractive too!

Apple Pie (A little runny.)

One of my first pie making attempts was an Apple Pie. It tasted really good. But it was really runny! After this experience I read a lot of apple pie recipes The trick to making an apple pie with out all of the juice soaking up the bottom crust and running all over the plate when you take out a slice is two easy steps. 

First, blind bake the crust before you put any of the filling in. This makes it so the juice from the apples doesn't soak into the crust so easily. 

The second trick is to precook the apple mixture in a sauce pan. This way you can drain out all of the extra juice before you put the apples in the pie. 

I just love it when I can read up on recipes and figure out how to fix what went wrong. That's what makes the process of learning pie baking so fun!

Buttermilk Pie Yum!

Today I made my first buttermilk pie. I had never had buttermilk pie before, so I made it not knowing what it should taste like. After I made the pie I thought the texture was perfect. It was creamy with a little crunch on the top. But I thought the pie wasn't sweet enough, so in the end I dusted it with powdered sugar. I got the recipe from my subscription of Cooks Country Magazine, and it was so yummy! Another problem I have with baking pies is that they always taste good, they just don't always look good. My crust always shrinks when I bake it. And I read somewhere that it was doing that because I was stretching it. So I made sure not to stretch it and it still shrank. So someone told me to use pie weights. So I'm going to try that next time.

Introduction

Hello All,

My name is Emily Magnuson. I am a 30 year old Human Resources Generalist. I used to be a web designer, but I didn't really like it. I live in Iowa. I love to garden and make pies. This blog is going to focus on my quest to learn to make the PERFECT pie. It is a life goal, it is on my bucket list, and I am totally motivated to figure it out and perfect the craft. I have not made the perfect pie yet, but the journey has been very enjoyable so far and I thought I would share.