Pie Festival

Over the last few months I have been practicing my pie. I entered Claremont's pie festival contest that was hosted this weekend. I found a pie I liked and then practiced and practiced. This morning I dropped off my pie and waited to see what happened.


This is my pie crust. When it comes to pie crust there are a few things you should always make sure of. One, you should not over work your dough. Two you should love your crust just as much as your filling. I made an orange pie for my entry. The first thing you should know about oranges is they are filled with amazing juices. Okay everyone knows that oranges have juices but does everyone know how to capture them into a pie?


What comes to mind when you make a fruit pie? It is all liquid because of the fruits natural juices making the pie soggy. So how do you fix this, you ask? I was about to keep all the juices in the orange by poaching them first. By poaching the orange it keeps all the juice inside while it is baking. Know this is not true for all fruit but when it comes to oranges or pears this works really well. To poach the fruit just put it on low heat in a pan of sugar water. Make sure your fruit is fully covered so the whole fruit gets poached.

Once I had the oranges poached and the filling all ready to go I put my pie in the oven. Since this pie does not have a top crust I wanted to make sure that the fruit was arranged nice and pretty. There are two types of pies. One with crust on top and the bottom, the other with just crust on the bottom. Something that I learned when baking this pie is that the tin helps. When you bake in a glass tin you are able to see if the crust is baked all the way through. The downfall of not having a glass tin is you have to be confident in yourself that your pie is fully baked. Have you ever gotten a piece of pie and the bottom crust is raw, it is so sad. After I took the pie out I added some apricot glaze and toasted almonds.


Okay after a few hours of walking around the Claremont shops with my mom the judging had commenced. It was time to announce the winners of the contest. This was the first time I had ever entered any contest before. Even though I knew there would be a lot of great pies I did hope I won something. Well after all the waiting I can say I was not disappointed. I won second place for my division. I was so excited, not only was it my first time entering, I won. I can honestly say even with all the nervousness I get from not knowing what will happen it was definitely worth it.

Me and the owner of I Like Pie

For all you bakers, cooks, learners and anyone else. I say go for it. Find local things near you and enter to see how you do. Even if you don't win, even if you have never made the item before, go for it. It is so fun and if all else fails you get random people to eat your food. No doubting if your spouse is just being nice. Maybe that is just me, that doesn't always trust my ability. Until next week try something new and broaden your boundaries.