Come on. Tell me that I’m not the only person who has ever taken a recipe off a can and made it into something. Everyone starts somewhere, right? In my case, however, I didn’t start here. In truth, beyond all recipe hunting online, it was the pumpkin puree can that featured the ideal recipe for me. How selfish am I that I’d take that over an authentic and delicious actual pie recipe, right? Wrong. Can recipes can be real too… right (see what I did there)? Can’t they? Even if they are not, perhaps the least they could do is provide reconciliation to those of us incapable of research and in desperation of a last-minute birthday gift. Wait, that is exactly what this was. So, backtrack to July 18, 2016. This was almost two years ago. This was a birthday that I often didn’t celebrate rather bombastically. In fact, for the two years prior (2014, 2015), I showed no interest at all and continued with my life. Well, I think I may have celebrated it, just on the wrong day. But not this time! No, I had intentions on crafting an exquisite pie recipe that I knew would just be enamored and prized. That’s when I ran out of time and opted to craft the corporate-mandated formulaic pumpkin pie recipe that existed on the back label of the can I picked up at the store. Nothing wrong with that, right? At least it came from my heart… and barely my paycheck. There’s a first time for everything, and to be honest I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with showing no creativity at all when it comes to cooking/baking, because some people have difficulty finding creativity in that sort of thing. And that’s perfectly fine; I mean, everyone has their own methods of application. While I consider myself relatively adept at applying creativity through cooking (which, let’s be honest, is a rather broad playing field), I think there is equally something to be said about taking a foundational recipe and basing your creative decisions off that. By doing this, you step outside of your own head and into someone else’s. Someone created the can recipe, right? It was somebody’s idea. And that is something worth appreciating. On the other hand, I might just be finding excuses for why I didn’t take time to prepare an original pumpkin pie… I even just bought the crust from the freezer aisle. Here’s the can recipe: ¾ cup sugar ½ tsp salt 1 tsp ground cinnamon ½ tsp ground ginger ¼ tsp ground cloves 2 large eggs 1 can (15 oz.) Libby’s 100% pure pumpkin (oops, now you know what can that I used) 1 can (12 fl. Oz.) evaporated milk 1 unbaked 9-inch deep-dish pie shell And there you have it… an unoriginal recipe. But that’s not to say that you can’t make it your own; after all, it was my idea of a birthday celebration. Think of it as a framework. Once you understand how to make pumpkin pie, then you can customize it however you want! There is this notion that you must learn the rules before you break them, and I don’t uphold this philosophy in all contexts. However, since baking is a basic chemistry, the rules are important. This recipe outlines the rules. Have fun with this foundational recipe and I look forward to your own customizations!
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June 2018
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