2009/03/23

Field Journal Entry #4 – apple pie

Today is the Monday of the Spring Break. This is the first journal entry that I am writing with a few days delay. Unfortunately, I managed to dislocate my right shoulder later and so I was not able to type. What is more, I could not bake too. Hannah and I could have rescheduled our Thursday session for later after the break; but we decided to keep it as planned and adapt to circumstances for once again. My hand was in a sling. Therefore, my role was to watch and learn by seeing. If you remember my plan, that was actually the original idea, which never happened, for the first session.

We were baking the apple pie this time. Although I did not literally put a hand to our work, I put a hand in fact. Hannah brought a recipe and pretended not to know. I read through it and instructed Hannah to make proper apple dough which she added to a crust prepared in advance. Hannah made it beforehand because it is necessary to chill the crust for at least 30 minutes. I, however, learned how to make it anyways because we went through its recipe too. I discovered a real life analogy with snow balls in a part where it instructed us to test the constituency by squeezing a small amount together. If it is too humid, water squeezes out; if it is too dry, it does not stick together.

As far as the apple dough was concerned, I learned many other important practicalities. For example, cinnamon, nutmeg and ground cloves are usually referred to spices; the juice out of one fresh lemon can be substitute by 4 table spoons of lemon juice; and it is possible to skip the final part of brushing the top a pie with beaten egg since it only adds on extra yellow colour and glossiness.

The pie came out really neat. I have to say, however, that I expected something more solid, something one could grab. But nobody objected the final look of the pie as the traditional American pie is supposed to be quite wobbly indeed. It was only my European image of cakes in general that made me worried.

Frankly, I was surprised how much I can learn just by observing. Also, the different perspective of trying to instruct instead of following instructions helped a lot to understand baking better. Moreover, I did not have to tire myself by mixing all different kinds of ingredients into dough and I still got a piece to eat. And lastly, probably the best, it was the first time I did not have to wash the dishes!