Still nice weather in NYC, some pie blogging

Sunny, and not humid. Last weekend Bad Mama, Big Daddy and Peanut came to visit from the motherland, Wisconsin! (These are their pseudonyms, of course. For instance, Peanut's real name is Cashew.) For opening day of football season I took them to New York City's premiere Packer bar, Kettle of Fish at 59 Christopher Street, owned by fellow Wisconsin expatriate Patrick, who is a prince among barmen. I also made them pancakes (which they all had) and jambalaya (which Big Daddy and I ate). I may have caught some lurg from playing with Peanut, who is utterly charming and has an intriguing variety of stuffed animals which learned to speak when I was around. (Then again, it might have been from the subway.) Peanut's favorite word is "No!", which she wields with a dexterity that rivals Vyacheslav Molotov's.

I was going to make them all bisteeya, which I have lately become obsessed with, but they left and I had to eat it myself. Bisteeya is Moroccan pigeon pie, except who wants to eat pigeons after living in New York? So I made it with chicken thighs. You boil the meat in spiced broth until it's tender. Then you curdle some eggs in the broth, maybe after adding some lemon. You strain it out and mix it with the meat; this becomes the savory filling. Also, you toast some almonds and mix them with a little sugar; this becomes the sweet filling. Then comes the demented part: you use both in the same pie. It's a Mediterranean pie, so I used phyllo dough. A little like making strudel. Two layers of phyllo dough, brushed with butter, then a circle of the nut mixture, then a larger circle of the savory mixture -- you want this to be moist, but not wet -- then top that with some more of the sugar and almonds. I folded the edges of the phyllo sheets over until I had a sort of roundish shape, which I glued with more butter. Then I slid this onto a plate, prepared two more sheets of phyllo (more butter, mmmm!), flipped the pie onto them, and wrapped it up the other way. This was on a baking sheet already, since I had planned ahead, having had too many strudel-related mishaps in the past. I had enough filling for two, so I made another on a plate, and slid it onto the sheet with less harm done than you might think. I baked them at 350 F / 175 C for about thirty minutes. Some of the melted sugar leaked out, caramelizing and then charring on the sheet. What can you do. You're supposed to dust them lightly with confectioner's sugar or the like, but frankly, I was starving. Wow, that sweet and savory combination is damn good. This was "sweep the kitchen" style bisteeya. I compared a bunch of recipes and pared them down to something a lazy, semi-skilled cook like myself could make without wrecking the basic flavor idea. Paula Wolfert I am not. So: three boneless chicken thighs simmered in water which had a chopped onion, a teaspoon of ground cinnamon, a teaspoon of ground ginger, a pinch of saffron, and a tablespoon of butter. Three beaten eggs. The juice of a lemon in the broth, and I didn't even squeeze hard. Very little salt, and that was after straining the chicken and egg mixture. I dunno, 75-100 grams of almonds? And less than a third of that sugar. Eight sheets of phyllo, and because I am a vulgarian, I thought about what a completely bitchen egg roll this would make. The leftover broth I used to make rice.

Comments

[redclay]

i will have to try almond sugar and thigh pie.

a giddy and frolicsome girl runs off your spam?

they don't run nothing off where i come from. i'll follow them down the street.
hell, i'll follow them up the street.
nothing beats a giddy, frolicsome girl.
not down here.
we don't allow it.

"giglet". damn. i have been chasing them all my life, and didn't even know what they are called.
unless "giglet" is french for "easy".