Cool Strawberry Cream Pie

Here it comes... everyone's favourite part of the meal (and one that low-carbers don't get often)... DESSERT!

Summers and cottages go together quite well, as most people are aware. I've never really been a winter-sports person, so my main idea of a cottage is a nice little house with a nice big fire pit, some water to play in and lots of old movies. My parents just happen to have such a cottage! So, my friends and I trekked down to enjoy ourselves, and I knew I would be in trouble if there wasn't at least one sweet thing I could eat. (I got into trouble anyways, but that's another story...)

I decided to show off my baking skills to my houseguests by making a pie. Not just any pie...a strawberry pie! How domestic and culinary is that?! Well, let's find out!

Cool Strawberry Cream Pie

Original recipe found at Low Carb Luxury
Serves 8. Carbs per serving: 5g.

Ingredients For Meringue Shell:

• 4 egg whites
• 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 3 Tablespoons Splenda

Ingredients For Filling:

• 1 small pkg. sugar-free gelatin (strawberry or raspberry) (I ended up using 2, I will explain later.)
  
• 1 pint heavy cream
• 1 8oz. pkg. cream cheese, softened
• 1/4 cup Splenda
• 1 quart strawberries, cleaned and sliced

1. Preheat oven to 275°F. Grease one Pyrex pie plate and set aside.
   
   
2. Beat egg whites until foamy. Add cream of tartar then beat until whites stand in peaks. Add Splenda and beat for an additional minute or two. Spread the meringue evenly in the bottom of the plate and up the sides. Bake 1 hour and 10 minutes in a 275°F oven, then raise the temperature to 300° and bake for an additional 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool while you make filling.
   
   
3. Dissolve gelatin with 3/4 cup boiling water. Stir in 1/3 cup cold water. Place in freezer for approximately 15-20 minutes (just until it begins to gel.)
   (So far, so good!!)
   
   
   
4. When the gelatin is ready, whip the heavy cream until stiff (but not dry). Fold in cream cheese and Splenda. Fold in gelatin. Stir in strawberries (reserving a few for garnish if you like.) Pour over meringue shell in pie plate and let chill until firm. — about 2 hours.
   I was a bit worried my filling was a bit runny, so I added another packet of jello. You could just add gelatin if you had that around. Or not. Up to you. (Not sure it helped us any but it didn't harm anything either.)
   Ok. This step is where it all fell apart for me. We followed the directions like...exactly and ended up with this:ew.
   
   So this is what we think was wrong: a) I left the jello in the fridge a bit too long. However it absorbed in the end, so if this happens to you I wouldn't worry too much. b)....there is no way we could get our softened cream cheese to "fold in" like the recipe says. NO WAY! Next time, I am going at this with an electric beater. I honestly think that if you beat it and then just stirred in the strawberries as the last thing, it will turn out smooth, sexy and sweet.
   
   

What I thought...
I thought the thing turned out ok, but as stated above, it really needs to be blended fully. I was a bit weirded out when I got a little lump of cream cheese in my pie piece. On the up-side, it is quite tasty and I thought the crust turned out REALLY WELL. My boyfriend thought it was too 'eggy', but I think that's just because he was in the room while it was cooking. It did smell like eggs cooking. But it tastes more like waffle cone, or McDonald's ice cream cone. I would definitely use that meringue crust again!

Another good thing is despite it's flaws, a few people were brave enough to try it. Did they like it or were they being nice? I'm not sure. But I know next time...everyone will LOVE it.

Good luck and enjoy!

Cheesy Crustless Quiche

This is the story of the quiche which has been months in the making. Some heard rumours of this quiche waiting to be made many moons ago, and yet... nothing ever materialized.

UNTIL ONE DAY... when I finally got my butt to the store and purchased the simple handfull of ingredients this recipe requires.

Then I got home and realized I forgot the baking powder.

UNTIL ONE DAY A WEEK LATER... when I went to the store, and bought the baking powder.

Then I got home and realized that I don't actually have a pie pan.

UNTIL ONE DAY A WEEK AND A FEW DAYS LATER... when my good friend Ana took me to walmart, where I purchased a nice big pyrex pie pan. (ooh. Alliteration.)

And Thus, the Cheesy Crustless Quiche was born!

Original recipe to be found at SimplyRecipes.com
For the whole quiche: Cals 1169, Fat 93g, Sodium 2710mg, Carbs 24g, Sugar 5g, Fibre 1g, Protein 51g according to the daily plate. So carbs per serving = 3g!

Ingredients

• 1/2 stick of butter (1/4 cup) (Mine was unsalted. Not sure it matters.)
  
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cups milk (I used unsweetened soy milk)
  
• 1 cup cottage cheese (NOT light!!)
  
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 5 eggs
• 4 ounces cream cheese, softened (NOT light!!)
• 6 ounces shredded Swiss cheese (I actually used cheddar and mozzarella)
  
• 3 Tbsp grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup chopped green onions
• 3 slices of cooked bacon, crumbled (Or those ready-made real bacon bits from the store!)
  
• 6 cherry tomatoes, cut in half (Yuck)
  

Here we go...
(there are some good "In Process" pics on the simplyrecipes page)

1 Melt the butter in a medium saucepan on medium heat. Stir in flour; cook, stirring until bubbly. Gradually add the milk; cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until sauce thickens. Remove from the heat; set aside to cool, about 15-20 minutes.

2 Preheat oven to 350°F. Combine cottage cheese, baking powder, salt and mustard; set aside.

3 Beat the eggs in a large mixing bowl. Slowly add the cream cheese, the cottage cheese mixture and the milk/flour sauce. Fold in the Swiss and Parmesan cheeses. I have to be honest here, and say I was too lazy to find out how much 4 ounces of cream cheese was, so I just grabbed a tub of cream cheese and put the whole thing in. Ditto with the grated cheese - I just put a few good handfulls from a bag of shredded cheese until it "looked about right".

4 Pour into a buttered 10" pie plate. Sprinkle the top with chopped green onions and crumbled bacon. Arrange tomato halves, cut side up, around the top. Bake at 350°F for 40 minutes, until puffy and lightly browned. A knife inserted into the center of the quiche should come out clean. Let rest for 15 minutes, serve. Here, I left out the tomatoes because frankly, tomatoes are gross. Also in my oven, it took an extra 10 minutes to cook...so I think that the knife-coming-out-clean method of checking it's ready-ness is really key!

About to go into the oven...

What I thought...

Well. First off, this is only the second quiche I have ever tried in my life and it REALLY Surpassed its predecessor!!! (I once tried the broccoli Quiche at Cultures and it was so gross that even though I was starving, I left half of it there. I haad a coffee for dinner instead. How sad.) ((And it was even more of a piss off, because the damn thing was like...6 bucks.)) This quiche is really quite...creamy I'd say. It's great heated up in the microwave with a dollop of sour cream! I think it has staying power too, so it's a great breakfast or even lunch item. My only down point on this recipe is that because you have to make the "batter" in three parts and then mix them together at the end, it makes a lot of dishes. It does however, make one mother of a big quiche as well, so it's definitely worth the effort!

This recipe showed me why some people go crazy for quiche, and chances are I will make it again in the future :)

Enjoy!