Putting Food By - Janet Greene [197]
All-purpose Pie Pastry
2 single crusts or 1 double crust
This pastry can be made and frozen in 1-crust balls up to 3 months ahead of time. If you will be using the pastry for tartlets, freeze pastry in balls the size of large shooting marbles, wrapped individually then all together in a freezer bag. Come time to make your tarts, simply press and flatten each “marble” in the cup of your tart pan. Fully assembled tartlets can be frozen, then removed from pans and repackaged for freezing up to one month ahead of the holiday.
The basic ingredients may be titivated with more sugar, almond or vanilla extract, an extra egg yolk if the batch is doubled, etc. A combination of unsalted butter and vegetable shortening—never oil—does best.
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 to 3 tablespoon sugar
½ teaspoon salt
⅔ cup lard, butter, or combination with vegetable shortening
1 large egg
1½ teaspoons any vinegar
Ice water to bring egg-vinegar-water to ½ cup total
Combine dry ingredients; cut in shortening quickly until all is mealy. Beat the egg-vinegar–ice water mixture until blended and then pour in, mixing with a fork. When dough gathers, knead it a couple of quick passes, separate into two 1-crust balls, let it rest, chilled, until rolled out.
Include in the gift basket some pint or quart jars of Pie Filling (from Chapter 12). Then, come the cold winter days, the keeper of a small household can make some pies. And tuck in some individual aluminum pie pans either small ones, which will take most of a pint of filling—dessert for two—or large ones, which will take a quart jar of filling.
To ensure a better bake with the pans, puncture them from the inside out, using an icepick or a similar small, sharp instrument.
Raspberry “Vinegar,” a Cockaigne
About 3½ pints
This beautiful quencher can be made in late summer or early fall when raspberries are abundant. But if your fresh raspberries are too precious, it can be made anytime of the year with frozen fruit.
5 pounds frozen raspberries, of course not sweetened
5 cups apple cider vinegar, preferably freshly pressed
About 8 cups sugar
Frozen, the berries are well “broken down,” and the vinegar therefore can go into them in one addition, rather than in two separate additions as with fresh berries. In a large enameled or stainless steel bowl, pour vinegar over thawed berries. Stir, cover, and refrigerate overnight. Stir again the next day, refrigerate again. The third day, bring berries and vinegar to the boiling point in an enameled or stainless steel kettle, cook gently 3 minutes, pour immediately through a stout jelly bag or maple-syrup-straining felt. Measure extracted juice, add ⅔ to ¾ cup sugar (or to taste) for each 1 cup of juice, stir, bring to a simmer, stirring and skimming. Pour hot into hot pint and ½-pint canning jars, leaving ½ inch of headroom. Cap with scalded disc lid held in place with a screwband. Process in a Hot–Water Bath to cover—190 F/88 C—for 15 minutes. Remove jars, cool upright away from drafts.
Use ¼ cup over cracked ice in a tall glass, fill with still or sparkling water, and stir—a great holiday toast, especially for those who don’t drink alcohol.
For Your Part of the Party
What to take to a holiday get-together that’s going to have its share of Christmas cookies and eggnog and fruitcake and specialty dips? Hot Pepper Jam, that’s what. Turn a squat ½-pint jar out in the center of a disposable waxed holiday paper platter. Around it spread some good, softened cream cheese. As a vehicle for this crowd-pleaser, make Pita Triangles instead of buying wheat crackers: cut apart the largest white pita loaves, open halves, and tear or