Recipe: Fig Butter Pear Pie

I have been making my apple butter pie for years.  It is essentially a pumpkin pie, but using apple butter instead of pumpkin puree, and it is delicious.

When I saw fig butter at the store, I knew I wanted to try a similar pie with it.  I decided to try it with pears, because I love fig and pears together.

This may have been the best idea I've ever had.

Fig Butter Pear Pie

1/2 c fig butter (you could make your own, if you can't find it)
2 c evaporated milk
1/4 c sugar
1 egg
1 Tbsp flour
2 vanilla beans

3 Bosc pears
2 Tbsp brown sugar

1 Pie Crust

Roll pie crust out and line a 9" pie plate.  Preheat oven to 425 F.

Peel and thinly slice pears.  Boil a pot of water (about 8 c) with the brown sugar and one of the vanilla beans, with seeds removed and put into the water, and the bean also put into the water. 

Blanche the pear slices briefly, until they are just flexible. 

 

Remove from water with a slotted spoon and arrange in pie crust (I made a spiral rose design)

 

Mix together fig butter, evaporated mik, sugar, egg, seeds from the second vanilla bean, and flour. 

Pour mixture over the pears in the pie crust.

Bake for 425 for 10 minutes, and then 350 for 35 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.  Cool on a wire rack, and enjoy.

Lunches: 11.21.14

It's the last day of school before Thanksgiving break, so this is the last lunch post until after the holiday - but pies are coming!

Wrap: 20g, grapes: 6g, apple slices: 6g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g

For this Friday, The Boy has a wrap with hummus, salad, and turkey.  He also has some grapes, apple slices, and freeze-dried strawberries.  His snack is a cereal bar (not pictured, 28g).

The Girl has leftover Spatchcocked chicken and roasted squash, on a bed of greens, with some grapes, freeze-dried blueberries, and mini chocolate mint star cookies.  

Recipe: Roasted Spatchcocked Chicken

I picked up a whole roasting chicken at the store the other day, and I wanted to try something different with it.

I've seen Spatchcocking all over the internet.  Sounds dirty, doesn't it?  It's a little on the violent side, as cooking techniques go.

Bye bye, backbone!

All pressed down

First, you cut out the backbone of the chicken (and put it aside, to use later in a chicken soup or stock!), then flip the chicken over and press down hard on the chicken to make it flat.  Spatchcocking makes chicken roast in about half the time, and it cooks nice and evenly.  Plus, it's fun.

Chilling with the spices all day

I rubbed the bird down with olive oil, and then seasoned with smoked paprika, kosher salt, and oregano.  I let it marinade in this mixture all day in the refrigerator.  (I spatchcocked the chicken in the morning before work).

Ready to roast!

When it was time for dinner, I took the chicken out of the fridge and let it warm up a bit while the oven was heating up to 450 F.  Roast the chicken on a flat roasting rack over a roasting pan for about 30 minutes, or until the internal temperature is 165 F.

Crispy, delicious skin, and a moist chicken!

Let rest for 10 minutes before carving and enjoying.  I served it with some jasmine rice and roasted squash.

I will definitely be using this technique again! 

Lunches: 11.20.14

One week until Thanksgiving, and visions of pies and turkey are dancing in my head... I cannot wait to make my Shoofly pie and my Apple Butter Pie!  What's your go-to pie?

For now, though, it's lunches.

Wrap: 20g, grapes: 6g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, apple slices: 4g, cookies: 6g

The Boy has a wrap with salad, hummus, and turkey, along with some grapes, apple slices, freeze-dried strawberries, and mini chocolate mint star cookies.  His snack is a cereal bar (not pictured, 28g)

The Girl has the same thing - wrap with salad, hummus, and turkey, with grapes, apple slices, freeze-dried strawberries, and mini chocolate mint star cookies.  She told me that she doesn't need a snack today.

Lunches: 11.19.14

Lunches are not all that inspired today.  We were up late last night, because I brought the kids to a book signing by Jeff Kinney, the author of Diary of a Wimpy Kid.  The signing was a 40 minute drive each way, and then we stood in a line (with some activities along the way) for over an hour...

But, I'd say it was worth it.  It was also fantastic seeing so many kids there, all clutching books in their hands.

I was thinking of making Diary of a Wimpy Kid lunches for today, but I just had no energy for fancy lunches.  Thus, easy and simple lunches.

Egg: 0g, cheese: 1g, crackers: 20g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, grapes: 8g, apple slices: 4g

The Boy has a hard boiled egg (wrapped in saran to keep other things from getting damp), cheese, crackers, freeze-dried strawberries, apple slices, and grapes.  His snack is a cereal bar (not pictured, 28g).

The Girl also has a hard boiled egg, cheese, crackers, freeze-dried strawberries, apple slices, and grapes.  Her snack is a cereal bar (not pictured).

Lunches: 11.18.14

We woke up yesterday morning to some snow on the ground - not much, but a "cosmetic coating," and the entire day it was stuck between snow and falling slush.  Not the most pleasant of days, but the kids were excited about the snow.

Sandwich: 30g, apple slices: 4g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g

I decided to do a little nod to the colder weather in their lunches for this Tuesday.  The Boy has a sandwich with hummus, turkey, and cheese, along with apple slices, and freeze-dried strawberries.  His snack is a yogurt (not pictured, 10g).

The Girl has a leftover stuffing croquette, a hard boiled egg with a little winter hat, a cereal bar, apple slices, and freeze-dried strawberries and blueberries. Her snack is a yogurt (not pictured).

Lunches: 11.17.14

It's Monday!

Sandwich: 20g, Inca Corn: 10g, yogurt: 10g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, apple slices: 4g

The Boy has a sandwich on a whole wheat roll with hummus, turkey, and cheese, along with some Giant Peruvian Inca Corn from Trader Joe's (think really big corn nuts), a yogurt, freeze-dried strawberries, and apple slices.  His snack is a cereal bar (not pictured, 28g).

The Girl has a turkey, hummus, and cheese sandwich on a whole wheat roll, Giant Peruvian Inca Corn, a yogurt tube, freeze-dried strawberries, and apple slices.  She has a cereal bar for snack (not pictured).

Lunches: 11.14.14

It's Friday!

Sandwich: 20g, strawberries: 1g, blueberries: 5g, apple-carrot sauce: 14g, apple slices: 4g

The Boy has some freeze-dried strawberries and blueberries, a sandwich on a whole wheat roll with hummus, cheese, and turkey, apple slices, and carrot-applesauce.  His snack is a cereal bar (not pictured, 28g).  I got some cool snack talk picks from BentoUSA, and with them, I can leave little messages in the kids' lunches.

The Girl also has some freeze-dried strawberries and blueberries, a sandwich with hummus, cheese, and turkey, apple slices, and a carrot-applesauce.  Her snack is a cereal bar (not pictured).  She has something fun going on after school, so I let her know that I hope that she has a good time.

Edible Geekery, the Harry Potter Way: Harry Potter Blog Hop 2014

Both of my kids love Harry Potter.  The Girl has a great Harry Potter birthday party for her 11th birthday (because a kid only gets the chance to go to Hogwarts for the first time once), and The Boy has been working on reading some of the books himself this year.  We read the first one with him, and this year, he has reread the first one, and continued on to read the second one and is now working on the third book.

We still have some wands leftover from The Girl's birthday party..

The Girl was even Hermione for Halloween last year..

When my Edible Geekery friends decided that they wanted to have a little Harry Potter themed blog hop, I was of course all for it.  This is Throwback Thursday Blog Hop, so these lunches were made a couple of weeks ago, and the kids have already enjoyed them.

The Boy decided that he wanted a lunch featuring Professor McGonnagal.  Way to make my life easy for me, huh?  I drew the best portrait I could of the honored professor on a tortilla, using food coloring and a toothpick.

The rest of his lunch was some carrot stick "wands", magical star yogurt cookies, some lentil curls (they look like pig tails, in honor of Dudley), a skull hard boiled egg (I thought it looked like He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named), and some apple slices.  (Because this is a throwback lunch, there are no carb counts - I send an email to the school nurse on the day I packed them.)

The Girl requested a Dobby lunch.  I drew her Dobby on a tortilla with a toothpick and food coloring.

The rest of her lunch is a hard boiled egg skull (hard to get a picture of it, but it was cool - promise), along with some carrot stick wands, a clementine pumpkin, lentil curls, and yogurt star cookies.

Want to see what my Edible Geekery Friends have to show for their special Throwback Thursday Harry Potter Blog Hop?  Head on over to Bent On Better Lunches to see what kind of magic is in store!

Lunches: 11.13.14

Stay tuned for a special Harry Potter Blog Hop later on today - they are from some lunches I made a couple weeks ago, but did not blog (because I was saving them for the hop!).  For Thursday lunches, though, here's what the kids have.

Dumplings with sauce: 20g, apple-carrot sauce: 14g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, cookies: 6g

The Boy has some pork dumplings with sauce, carrot-applesauce, freeze-dried strawberries, and chocolate mint star cookies.  He has a cereal bar for snack (not pictured, 28g).

The Girl has some stuffing balls (just some prepared stuffing, scooped into balls and baked), cheese, mango chips, freeze-dried strawberries, apple-carrot sauce, and chocolate mint star cookies.  Her snack is a cereal bar (not pictured).

Lunches: 11.12.14

We had little pizzas for dinner on Tuesday, and I packed leftovers in the kids' lunches for this Wednesday (which happens to be pizza day at school - the kids always like it when I pack them pizza on pizza day).

Pizza: 18g, cereal bar: 28g, grapes: 6g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, cookies: 8g

The Boy has some leftover pizza, a cereal bar, grapes, freeze-dried strawberries, and a couple yogurt star cookies with chocolate mint mini star cookies.  His snack is a banana applesauce (not pictured, 16g)

The Girl has leftover pizza, banana applesauce, grapes, freeze-dried strawberries, and some yogurt star cookies and chocolate mint star cookies.  Her snack is a cereal bar (not pictured).

Lunches: 11.11.14

Today, I made some fun snack-style lunches.

Crackers: 30g, turkey: 2g, grapes: 5g, cheese: 1g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, banana applesauce: 14g, cookie: 2g

The Boy has some crackers, turkey, Colby Jack and cheddar cheese, grapes, freeze-dried strawberries, a banana applesauce pouch, and a single chocolate mint star cookie.  His snack is a cinnamon applesauce (not pictured, 16g).

 

The Girl also has crackers, turkey, cheddar cheese, grapes, freeze-dried strawberries, a banana applesauce pouch, and a chocolate mint star cookie.  Her snack is a cinnamon applesauce (not pictured).

Family Lunches: 11.10.14

I have been packing lunches for the whole family most days, but not sharing them most of the time - lest you think that the grown-ups in the house are not eating lunch!  The Hubby was on vacation last week, though, so I thought that I would make him a blog-worthy back-to-work lunch, to soften the blow of going back. ;)

Grapes: 6g, honey crisp apple slices: 11g, freeze-dried strawberries: 1g, veggie tortilla chips: 4g, sandwich: 20g, cookies: 9g

The Boy has a sandwich on a whole wheat roll, with hummus, turkey, and some Colby Jack cheese, along with some vegetable tortilla chips, some freeze-dried strawberries, grapes, honey crisp apple slices, and some yogurt star cookies topped with one chocolate mint star cookie.  His snack is an applesauce (not pictured, 16g).  As a note, we generally estimate that an apple has 8g of carbs, but I was looking on the honey crisp bag last night, and it says one apple is 22g of carbs!  No wonder honey crisps are so delicious!  The Boy has about half an apple here.  I thought I would mention that for any other diabetic (or other) carb counters out there, so you didn't think I had lost my mind with the high apple carb count.

The Girl has a sandwich on a whole wheat roll, with hummus, turkey, and cheddar cheese, along with some vegetable tortilla chips, some freeze-dried strawberries, grapes, honey crisp apple slices, and some yogurt star cookies topped with one chocolate mint star cookie.  She has an applesauce for snack (not pictured).

The Hubby has a sandwich on a whole wheat roll, with mayonaisse, turkey, and some Pepper Jack cheese, along with some vegetable tortilla chips, grapes, honey crisp apple slices, and some yogurt star cookies topped with one chocolate mint star cookie.

I have a sandwich on a whole wheat roll, with hummus, turkey, and some Pepper Jack cheese, along with some vegetable tortilla chips, grapes, honey crisp apple slices, freeze-dried strawberries, and some yogurt star cookies topped with one chocolate mint star cookie.

Lunches: 11.7.14

These lunches brought to you by "Mommy didn't go grocery shopping, but she did order pizza..."

Pizza rolls: 48g, apple slices: 4g, apple strawberry fruit leather: 12g

The Boy has two pizza rolls, apple slices, and a fruit leather.  His snack is an apple (not pictured, 8g)

The Girl has two pizza rolls, a couple clementines, and apple slices.  Her snack is a fruit leather (not pictured)

Tonight = grocery shopping, and more interesting lunches for next week!