Food TV Cooking Club - Anna Olson's Perfect Pumpkin Pie

Today is Thanksgiving Day in Canada, and this month's Foodtv.ca cooking club recipe was a perfect dish to make this weekend, Anna Olson's Perfect Pumpkin Pie.

I am not a fan at all of pumpkin pie. But it's one of Scotts favorite desserts, so we made it to take to my parents house for Thanksgiving dinner last night.

The recipe calls for you to make your own crust as well as the filling. I have never had luck with pie crusts, but this one was very easy to make. I had no trouble rolling it or lining the pan. I was very surprised to see that the crust was not baked before the filling is poured in. But I figured Anna must know what she's talking about.

The filling was just as easy to make. Canned pumpkin, brown sugar, molasses, spices, eggs, cream and brandy are whisked together.

I poured the filling into the crust - well, most of it. Not all the filling would fit in. Then I followed the baking instructions: 10 minutes at 400', then 20 to 30 more minutes at 350'.


I had to cook mine for an extra 10 minutes to get it set enough around the edges. It smelled wonderful and the color was so deep and beautiful. We barely had the pie cooked before it was time to go to my parents house, so the pie cooled out on their balcony until after dinner.

The day before, we'd run into my parents at the grocery store. My Mom showed me a magazine cover with Paula Deen on it, with a pumpkin pie decorated as a jack o lantern. So we tried that too:


The pie was amazing. Really, truly, amazing. The filling was smooth, creamy, perfectly spiced, and almost mousse-like. It was borderline being slightly uncooked, but none of us complained. I cut myself a little sliver to be polite, gobbled it down and went back for a second sliver. We all loved it, even my Dad who is not a dessert person. He gave it a 9 out of 10. The rest of us gave it an 8 because the crust was definitely slightly undercooked. The crust should have been pre-baked before the filling was added.

Thanks very much to Elana at the Food for Thought blog for picking this recipe! This truly is the perfect pumpkin pie.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Food TV Cooking Club - Anna Olson's Perfect Pumpkin Pie

Today is Thanksgiving Day in Canada, and this month's Foodtv.ca cooking club recipe was a perfect dish to make this weekend, Anna Olson's Perfect Pumpkin Pie.

I am not a fan at all of pumpkin pie. But it's one of Scotts favorite desserts, so we made it to take to my parents house for Thanksgiving dinner last night.

The recipe calls for you to make your own crust as well as the filling. I have never had luck with pie crusts, but this one was very easy to make. I had no trouble rolling it or lining the pan. I was very surprised to see that the crust was not baked before the filling is poured in. But I figured Anna must know what she's talking about.

The filling was just as easy to make. Canned pumpkin, brown sugar, molasses, spices, eggs, cream and brandy are whisked together.

I poured the filling into the crust - well, most of it. Not all the filling would fit in. Then I followed the baking instructions: 10 minutes at 400', then 20 to 30 more minutes at 350'.


I had to cook mine for an extra 10 minutes to get it set enough around the edges. It smelled wonderful and the color was so deep and beautiful. We barely had the pie cooked before it was time to go to my parents house, so the pie cooled out on their balcony until after dinner.

The day before, we'd run into my parents at the grocery store. My Mom showed me a magazine cover with Paula Deen on it, with a pumpkin pie decorated as a jack o lantern. So we tried that too:


The pie was amazing. Really, truly, amazing. The filling was smooth, creamy, perfectly spiced, and almost mousse-like. It was borderline being slightly uncooked, but none of us complained. I cut myself a little sliver to be polite, gobbled it down and went back for a second sliver. We all loved it, even my Dad who is not a dessert person. He gave it a 9 out of 10. The rest of us gave it an 8 because the crust was definitely slightly undercooked. The crust should have been pre-baked before the filling was added.

Thanks very much to Elana at the Food for Thought blog for picking this recipe! This truly is the perfect pumpkin pie.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Food TV Cooking Club - Cottage Pie

Part of my more resolution was to take part in more food events, and another favorite of mine is the Foodtv.ca Cooking Club. This month Catherine chose Cottage Pie from Anthony Sedlak, host of The Main.

Anthony Sedlak was one of the finalists in the Superstar Chef Challenge on Food Network Canada. I've never seen that show, but I am a huge fan of The Main. It's my favorite show on Food TV right now. I love the food and I think Anthony Sedlak is a fantastic host. So yay! Excellent choice this month.


As much as I love this sort of dish, I felt the recipe was a little to heavy on the oil, butter, cream etc. for me right now. So I made some changes:
I didn't add any oil to the pan to cook the ground beef.
I cut back to 1 TB of oil to cook the vegetables.
I used 2 TB of butter in the mashed potatos instead of 1/3 cup.
I used non fat milk instead of cream in the potatos.
I omitted the Parmesan cheese in the potatos.
In the assembly, I omitted the butter and bread crumbs, but did sprinkle the top with Parmesan cheese.

It may not have been as rich as the original recipe intended, but it was fabulous. It's a tough call, but it might be even better than my shepherd's pie.

Recipe: Cottage Pie

Food TV Cooking Club - Cottage Pie

Part of my more resolution was to take part in more food events, and another favorite of mine is the Foodtv.ca Cooking Club. This month Catherine chose Cottage Pie from Anthony Sedlak, host of The Main.

Anthony Sedlak was one of the finalists in the Superstar Chef Challenge on Food Network Canada. I've never seen that show, but I am a huge fan of The Main. It's my favorite show on Food TV right now. I love the food and I think Anthony Sedlak is a fantastic host. So yay! Excellent choice this month.


As much as I love this sort of dish, I felt the recipe was a little to heavy on the oil, butter, cream etc. for me right now. So I made some changes:
I didn't add any oil to the pan to cook the ground beef.
I cut back to 1 TB of oil to cook the vegetables.
I used 2 TB of butter in the mashed potatos instead of 1/3 cup.
I used non fat milk instead of cream in the potatos.
I omitted the Parmesan cheese in the potatos.
In the assembly, I omitted the butter and bread crumbs, but did sprinkle the top with Parmesan cheese.

It may not have been as rich as the original recipe intended, but it was fabulous. It's a tough call, but it might be even better than my shepherd's pie.

Recipe: Cottage Pie

Broken Cookies Don't Have Calories

It has been ages, or maybe 3 months, since I've taken part in the Food for Thought Cooking Club. I missed out on some good recipes, but when I saw that this month was cookies I knew that nothing could stop me from some time in the kitchen.

The cookies we were to make are from the show Sugar hosted by Anna Olson. I've never watched her show - I don't bake much - but she's got a couple of shows, books, and a bakery so you know that her recipes are gonna be good. Chocolate Cookies a la Anna Olson is different than other cookie recipes I have tried - the cookies have cornstarch in the recipe to make the cookies soft and chewy. I don't know about you, but I prefer chewy chocolate chip cookies to crisp ones myself.


These are some delicious cookies. They were fast to make, and I love that the recipe uses chocolate cut into chunks instead of chocolate chips - there were some little pieces of chocolate and lots of big pieces, which of course are the best. I liked the taste of the bittersweet chocolate in the cookie - I've always used milk chocolate but I think I'm going to make a change to bittersweet for future cookie recipes. .All 3 of my testers thought they were great - and how could they not?

Get in the kitchen and give these a try - I bet you'll love them. If you want to take part in this month's cooking club, email your post to Catherine by October 31.

Broken Cookies Don't Have Calories

It has been ages, or maybe 3 months, since I've taken part in the Food for Thought Cooking Club. I missed out on some good recipes, but when I saw that this month was cookies I knew that nothing could stop me from some time in the kitchen.

The cookies we were to make are from the show Sugar hosted by Anna Olson. I've never watched her show - I don't bake much - but she's got a couple of shows, books, and a bakery so you know that her recipes are gonna be good. Chocolate Cookies a la Anna Olson is different than other cookie recipes I have tried - the cookies have cornstarch in the recipe to make the cookies soft and chewy. I don't know about you, but I prefer chewy chocolate chip cookies to crisp ones myself.


These are some delicious cookies. They were fast to make, and I love that the recipe uses chocolate cut into chunks instead of chocolate chips - there were some little pieces of chocolate and lots of big pieces, which of course are the best. I liked the taste of the bittersweet chocolate in the cookie - I've always used milk chocolate but I think I'm going to make a change to bittersweet for future cookie recipes. .All 3 of my testers thought they were great - and how could they not?

Get in the kitchen and give these a try - I bet you'll love them. If you want to take part in this month's cooking club, email your post to Catherine by October 31.