Kitchenbabble

Over the years I have longed to find the perfect pie, alla Ramona, and here in the East, with pies not tasting anything like they are supposed to, my craving for a decent pie has turned into something moving in the direction of desperation.

We have something here in Thailand called Puff and Pie, but despite the promise in their name, their pastries are neither puffed, nor are they worthy of being called a pie.

Many years ago I read a short story called ‘Dieper Dors’ (a Deeper Thirst). It dealt with a woman who was stuck on a farm in the arid Karoo, and all she wanted was to return to the excitement of the big city. This desire had become an unquenchable thirst, where the sweltering daily heat and the sound of the passing cars on the distant motorway, were a constant reminder of her unfulfilled emotional thirst.

So Ramona Bakery is my Dieper Dors, my very own pie in the sky.  Over the last few days I had the need to get something which would qualify as an actual pie into my system, so I decided the only solution would be to make a batch myself.  Select and prepare an appropriate filling, crack some eggs, cube the butter for the puff pastry, the works.

But I did not just want any old thrown together cafe pie.  I wanted to make a pie which someone would have had the courtesy of bringing to a Biduur, or perhaps, as a thoughtful afterthought to a grieving widow, would leave her with a plate of these after all had left her husbands funeral… she would have the bittersweet comfort of being able to delay having to cook for her widowed-self for the first time, thanks to the plate of homemade pies she was now holding in her hand. I longed for a culinary experience that reminded one of wildsvleis en bokskiet, one which would connect with such primitive desires, it could bring about a culinary catharsis by ultimately allowing one the luxury of having a meaningful cry about the untold shortcomings of this imperfect world.

Ok, wait -  this is really taking it a bit far… I mean this is real life, and this me and my imperfect baking record we are dealing with, not a scene from Like Water for Chocolate.

So, toned town, I would be quite pleased if I could manage to produce a litter of pies which would not be out of place in a dining room somewhere in the Karoo. There they wait in all their plated glory, under faded recoloured photographs of an austere dead relative, staring out at them from above a heavy oak dining table. Yah, a beautiful plate of pies somewhere in the inner confines of a dusty farm, situated on a windswept African plain, miles away from a shop that sold Rennies. Yes, this is a far more delicious fantasy, and one within the boundaries of my actual baking abilities.

So I went about the next few days planning how I would construct my object of deep desire.  I wanted a taste which would remind me of  boerewors or biltong, or something which would make me think of  wildspastei, in short an experience  which would quantum leap over my rather safe definition of what I considered to be comfort food.

The crust had to be somewhere between pastry and tart, the way that they would make it on a farm. So a sophisticated flakey pastry alla Ramona was absolutely out of the question. The filling would need to be very there and very plaas.  Quite salty. something slightly sour, perhaps malt vinegar, the undeniable presence of copious amounts of dried coriander,  some spices which were hinted at – maybe just the slightest suggestion of nutmeg or a whisper of cloves.

This is what I came up with…

Kamma Wildsvleis Begrafnis pies / Widow’s Sausage Rolls

Filling

750g ground beef

450g pork mince or a packet of fatty beacon, ok make that two…

1 tablespoon ground coriander

1 level teaspoon nutmeg

A splash of cinnamon

A decent pinch of ground cloves.

About a Teaspoon of salt

About a  teaspoon of pepper depending on how you prefer it.

1/2 cup of malt (brown) vinegar

2 slices of white bread, crumbed

Two eggs

Oil for browning

Except for the breadcrumbs and eggs – mix the whole lot using the dough hook on your mixer for about a minute. or in the absence of one, your hands. Careful not to over mix, especially if the meat is near room temp. Put in the fridge to marinade for a half hour

Once done, test-fry a small piece in a little oil to make sure you are satisfied with the taste. Add whatever you feel it may lack. If its over seasoned, you can add another egg or slice of bread. Or a bit of frozen mixed veggies. ( though introducing anything healthy like a vegetable, you’d be straying from what would be a boere funeral pie, so consider making the pies for a different charitable cause. Now let me think… Veggies boiled in salt? quite English – the local church Anglican church fete, perhaps? )

Having mixed up the batch, I realise that there would soon be a choice to be made regarding the cooking methodology.  A critical decision, which would bring about two very different end results: 1) I could either mix in the crumbs and egg, put the raw mix in the fridge, then shape the pies using the raw meat and dough, and bake it in the oven till done. Or  2) I could cook the meat a little, then let it cool, mix in the crumbs and beaten egg, shape the filling fold the pastry.

Knowing that Afrikaner boeretannies would fear all kinds of unspeakable disease from half cooked meat, I decide that the woman who would be cooking for her widowed best friend’s freshly departed husband’s Karoo funeral, would definitely make sure the meat would be done when the pies eventually get out of the oven. This approach is admittedly a little risky, cause the meat can easily end up becoming overcooked and dry.

In the end I went on the hunch that she would probably risk a dry pie, over having her pastries be the cause of another funeral.

Here is how I prepared the filling…

Preparing the Filling

Heat up a thin film of sunflower oil until sizzling hot in a heavy base frying pan. Add the mix bit by bit, frying it in two or three batches. This is fairly important, as you want to brown the meat – not end up with a pale and watery mince concoction, which is exactly what you would get if you add all the meat at once into the sizzling pan. Once browned, set aside to cool..

Now the pastry dough.

If you have any doubt about making pastry, then don’t. It is a very risky affair, which, considering the time, and expense, will most likely not be worth the disappointment. They make ready puff pastry for a very good reason: making perfect puff pastry in your own kitchen is quite possible if you are nearing your sixties, belong to  a biduur group and have won at least one award for previous pastries at the annual fair.

So run out and get two packs, but don’t admit to anyone what you are about to do – -only when pressed, admit to everyone what hell it was to get the pastry this perfect. (they don’t have to know you mean cutting the corners of each sausage roll at a perfect 90’ angle)

I, however do not have the luxury of dashing to a supermarket stocked with much in the line of anything western, so I am faced with the prospect of having to actually make this dough. Getting ready-to-use puff pastry at a supermarket in a dead average Thai suburb is as much a fantasy as pretending I am cooking in a plaaskombuis in the Karoo. The only baking Thais do, is in their cars in the traffic, and puff pastry can be found, baked to near perfection, in quant shops located just off the foyers of luxury hotels, carefully quaffed and coiffured by chefs who’s parents have spent a fortune to allow them to produce pastries that look and taste like a lost Picasso.

Whatever I would be using to make the outer layer of the pie, would have to be something I made myself.

Puff Pastry. My kitchen nemesis.  The holy grail of baking. I have heard so many people talk about how difficult it is to get right. Everything should be cold. the almost frozen butter, the ice water, the cooled flour, the chilled fingers.  The picture which was emerging for the perfect pastry dough was clearly that it should preferably be prepared on a marble slab in a walk-in deepfreeze.

I’m stuck in the tropics. My kitchen is around 32′C on any given day, and dips just below 40 if I decide to boil the kettle.

Making Pastry in my kitchen is thus out of the question.  The coolest place is the lounge. If I run the ancient aircon for an hour I can get it to about 28C. I could cut the butter in sessions, store it, bit by bit in the minute freezing compartment of the lounge bar fridge. Sounds like a workable plan.

I switch on the aircon, pack up half my kitchen and move into the lounge.

I follow this failproof recipe carefully:

Kittencall’s Fail-proof flaky puff pastry.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups pastry cake flour (or use 3 cups all purpose)

1 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup butter, very cold consider freezing it for a few hours

1/4 cup lard, very cold (you can also use shortening / Crisco

1 egg yolk

7 tablespoons ice water

1 teaspoon vinegar

Directions

Mix both flours, and salt in a large bowl.

With a pastry cutter (or knife) cut in the very cold butter and lard until the consistency of tiny peas. (tiny peas? im using a knife not a miniature ice cream scoop – little cubes will have to do)

In a small bowl whisk the egg yolk, vinegar and water.

Stir the egg/water mixture into the flour mixture until moistened and dough holds together (usually it takes the full amount of water/egg mixture).

Gather into a ball then divide into two.

Cover with plastic wrap and store in the fridge for 30 minutes (or the dough may be frozen after the 30 minutes chilling time, just wrap firstly in plastic wrap and then tightly in foil, leave in fridge overnight to defrost).

PROCESSOR METHOD: whirl the flour and salt for a couple of seconds.

In a small bowl mix the egg, vinegar and water together; set aside.

Add in the partially frozen butter cubes and lard to the flour mixture; pulse until well mixed, then add in the water/egg mixture.

Process/pulse JUST until the dough holds together (do not over process, or your dough will be tough!).

If it holds together, collect your junior pastry chef certificate on your way out.

Wow, that actually worked. To my utter surprise, I have a very workable dough.  I finish off a double batch of the dough, cut it up into 4 equal bits and cool it for an hour.

In the meantime, I take the cooked and cooled meat mixture out of the fridge, add two beaten eggs and two handfulls of breadcrumbs, mix it well and put it back into the fridge. Back to the dough, I take a lump and cut it in two. One half goes back into the fridge with the others, the remaining one is rolled into a rectangle of about 15x25cm.  I spoon a rectangle of cooled meat onto the dough, roll it over with my fingers to shape it into an cylinder, then seal it with eggwash and transfer it carefully onto the  baking tray, covering each sausage roll with clingfilm to prevent the raw dough from drying.  Each sausage roll takes about 5-10 minutes to complete.

So is this what those bakers at Ramona had to do for each of the hundreds of pies they made every day, multiplied by the fifty years they were in production? This is a helluva lot of work for a measly sausage roll…  My adoration for Ramona has just deepened to a genuine desire to worship.

After about forty minutes I have 7 sausage rolls, each differing ever so slightly in shape and size.

Having never baked pastries, and being rather surprised that the failproof recipe did not include baking instructions, I resort to reason and experience to figure out the baking time and temperature. So I preheat the oven to 210′C and set the timer for 25 minutes.  My reasoning is that at the traditional180’C, they may take too long to cook, and this would most likely increase the risk of drying out the meat more than it needs. Increasing the heat by 30 degrees would allow a faster baking time and, in theory at least, reduce the time for the moisture in the meat to escape. At 25 minutes they should be golden brown, and if they are not, I can always leave them in a little longer until they are the desired colour.

I make an eggwash made up of one egg beaten with a half an eggshell of water. What the hell, if this ratio produces perfect scrambled egg and perfect omelet’s every time, it should produce a perfectly fine eggwash. I brush the wash liberally over the pastries before putting them into the oven.

My reasoning turns out to be well-argued . At 210C they are done after 25 minutes. I take them from the oven and let them cool for 30 minutes before I try the first one.

Stop the clock :

Total time to from the moment I pack up the kitchen, to the moment I bite into a cooled sausage roll : 4 hours and twelve minutes.

Total time since I have had the desire to bite into a cooled sausage roll in asia and actually bit into one:  8 years and 7 months.

V E R D I C T

The piecrust.

Softens after cooling. Not overly flaky, in fact not flaky at all. It is just moist enough to produce a slight crunch when you bite into it. Definitely not London Pie Co, instead very Sunday afternoon with tea on the stoep, sheep grazing  motionless in the endless dusty veld, whilst I effortlessly cut through the warm pastries with my knipmes.

The filling

Unsurprisingly, the filling is slightly dry. (more pork fat next time?) But the texture and wildsvleis taste is totally from someone’s plaaskombuis. The coriander and nutmeg, combined with the slightly sour taste of the cooked vinegar, creates the impression that this is authentic fake wildsvleispastei.  A culinary quantum leap has occurred in the comfort-food department.  Very much what I was aiming for.

CONCLUSION

I imagine these pastries on that oak table on the crocheted beige tablecloth, neatly plated next to the fake flowers in the elaborate turquoise vase. I imagine the murmur of the funeral guests and the distant crinkling of teacups in the nearby kitchen.  Not wanting to seem impolite or overzealous, I reach over for my second pastry in just under three minutes. I glance at the family portrait on the wall as I take a bite. Perhaps it’s the way the afternoon sunlight has caught the glass, or perhaps it’s my imagination, but that menacing stare has definitely softened to something far less threatening… For  the moment, I cannot hear any cars on the distant motorway, and for a brief instant the room feels slightly less oppresive.

And if there had been any doubt about having satisfied my Dieper Dors after this elaborate undertaking, not 15 minutes after the first pie, I am searching for the pack of expired Rennies I keep in the Deepfreeze for these kind of emergencies.