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Post by chickenbenoit on Jun 16, 2008 16:31:14 GMT 12.75
Hi! I'm Toby's little sister Terri, but all my family calls me chicken. I got a problem and Toby said that you all might be able to help me. We got a pile of wild berries around the farm and all through the woods right now that are ripe. Granny calls them hawpaw beries, but Dad and Toby says that is not there real name. They're about grape sized and ripen up to look like a red grape and they sweeten up okay, but they're still real tart too. My sister and granny make jelly out of them every year and Dad made wine with them a couple of years ago, but I want to make a pie or cobbler with them. We got a ton of them. I made a cobbler yesterday and made my own crust and all and I sweetend the berries with two cups of sugar after I got the seeds out and I added a tsp of cinnamon. It smelled almost like a apple pie cooked, but it was really tart. dave and Tyler loved it, but the rest of us couldn't eat it. Granny said I need more sugar in it, so I made pies today from scratch and used three cups of sugar on one and three and a half cups on the other. Now they are still really really tart but are way too sweet, almost like a syrup inside and the tart berries taste like an aftetaste to the sugar. Now you know my problem, can you tell me how to fix it?
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Post by chickenbenoit on Jun 16, 2008 16:33:10 GMT 12.75
Oh yeah, there taste is alot like a cherry, just a real tart one, but it ain't a cherry.
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Post by Paws on Jun 16, 2008 23:15:13 GMT 12.75
Add a lkittle bit of table salt to them along with the sugar. See if you can find a rhubarb pie recipe and try it substituting the berries in the recipe first. You'll just need to experiment with the thing until it suits you. Oh! Make sure you try it on Toby first in case they are poinsenous!
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Post by Mars on Jun 17, 2008 1:24:21 GMT 12.75
If they are on a tree then I'm thinking persimmon. They are sour until frost turns them.
If on a bush then I would think a member of the currant family.
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Post by chickenbenoit on Jun 20, 2008 12:52:52 GMT 12.75
No, they aren't a persimmon. We have a lot of them also, but they will be ripe in September and we never do much with them except let the deer eat them. I haven't baked any more pies, but i will try the extra salt Mr Paws.
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Post by Snake Eyes on Jun 21, 2008 0:54:42 GMT 12.75
Ms Chicken-Terri, I am wondering how long the berries you are using are being kept in the sugar prior to making your pie or cobbler. Keep them together for at least 24 hours refrigerated prior to your baking project. I agree with Paws some salt is required,as it will extract flavor from the berries. Now this will sound a little strange,when you think you have a too tart taste but add the juice of 1/2 lemon with the berries, and salt to your 24 hour refrigeration. When you get this worked out,let us know what worked best??? snake-eyes
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Post by Paws on Jun 21, 2008 4:58:20 GMT 12.75
Smart aleck Snake! I'm fixin' to see if a pie recipe adapting a Key Lime pie recipe might work with those berries.
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Post by Toby Benoit on Jun 24, 2008 13:36:17 GMT 12.75
Chicken asked me to update ya'll that she'll be building another cobbler tonight from these hawpaw(?) berries. She'll let ya know how it goes.
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Post by Toby Benoit on Jul 9, 2008 17:15:05 GMT 12.75
Here's the final pie of the 2008 Hawpaw season; there were six pies and two cobblers all together. Bless her heart, she tried and tried and tweaked ya'lls suggestions until she got it just about right. I gotta get her to post up her final revised recipe for this one. It was pretty good if you like tart pies. Very flavorful.
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Post by Paws on Jul 9, 2008 22:12:49 GMT 12.75
Sure is a pretty pie! Only thing is if she made that crust herself and handled those berries too; ...... might taste like chicken! I been thinking about this little problem. Here is the plan: mix the berries fifty fifty with zucchini squash cut up about the size of the berries. Use the same amount of sugar. The plan is to stretch the acid over a larger area and hopefully reducing it proportionally.
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Post by brittonfaith on Jul 10, 2008 6:26:26 GMT 12.75
I am impressed! She did a real nice job on that pie. I've got one of my boys ("Noodles") looking over my shoulder right now and he says any gal that pretty and who can bake a pie like that is someone he'd be willing to have come stay for an extended visit. Chicken and Noodles sittin' up a tree....
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Post by Paws on Jul 10, 2008 6:41:16 GMT 12.75
Chicken N Noodles??? Do you realize what you just said?? ;D
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Post by Toby Benoit on Jul 10, 2008 15:50:23 GMT 12.75
Zuchini squash in a berry pie??? Your cheese done slipped plumb off'n your cracker! I get the "spread the acid out" thing. Might just work too. But still, there's words that don't belong in the same sentence together and two of them are "squash" and "pie"!
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Post by Two Tales on Jul 10, 2008 19:41:34 GMT 12.75
Toby, Aint nothing wrong with a tart pie...if served hot with Neller Ice Cream ;D...Granny used to bake up wild crab apple pies...ain't sure if this is what helped but she always added a splash of apple cider vinegar to the apples after they was cut up...if ya'll ever ate one of these face inverting fruit you'd know how tart/sour they can be..thing is those pies weren't that tart...no worse than a lemon or key lime pie.... Squash in a pie?? sounds like that there Cali. pie thingy...."quish" is that how it's spelt? WTH Paws, you gonin' Global on us again ;D ;D
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Post by Paws on Jul 10, 2008 23:30:57 GMT 12.75
Zuchini squash in a berry pie??? Your cheese done slipped plumb off'n your cracker! I get the "spread the acid out" thing. Might just work too. But still, there's words that don't belong in the same sentence together and two of them are "squash" and "pie"! Yeah well, you can make up for it with "Chicken N Noodles!" I suppose you might be able to leach out the acid by soaking them in Qucik Lime; but....... Can I get some of those berries? I'd like to make my future "X" a pie! Never heard of a "quish" except after I had my fiber; then followed by a "plop".
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Post by Snake Eyes on Jul 10, 2008 23:35:12 GMT 12.75
Chicken N Noodles??? Do you realize what you just said?? ;D Paws, Good one! ;D ;D ;D! snake-eyes
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Post by brittonfaith on Jul 11, 2008 3:45:45 GMT 12.75
I fugure your granny added the vinegar to the crab apples to keep them looking nice. I use lemon juice the same way. And Toby, squish is great in pies!!! PUMPKIN PIE!! Just my opinion, but I think summer squash makes a fairly decent quiche pie too. That's if you can get enough other flavors in the mix.
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