Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Today is that special day of the year. It's the same day that, many years ago, we spent elementary school recess by lying to everyone in our class and telling them we found a leprechaun in the field. 

That's right! It's St. Patty's Day.
(side note: if you type "paddy," just remove yourself from this planet.)

I'm pretty Irish so today is somewhat traditional for my family, in that we all get together for some corned beef and cabbage! I decided to contribute this year and bring a desert.

I googled "Ireland Dessert Recipes" (first mistake) and stumbled upon a website called "European Cuisines" (second mistake).

(http://www.europeancuisines.com/Ireland-Desserts-Apple-Amber-Tart-Meringue-Pie)

I pride myself that I am quite the little chef. I'm not talking like fabulous restaurant, but if you give me a recipe, I can always make something solidly delicious. It's now safe to say, WORST EFFING RECIPE IN THE WORLD.

European Cuisines (EC) set me up for failure. 

Here's my new, and EXTREMELY IMPROVED, recipe for Apple Amber Pie..

• Go buy a pie crust (preferably not one you make from scratch cause this shit takes awhile to make)
• Get THREE (not four, EC..) Fiji (thanks for telling me that EC, NOT) apples and have them cored and peeled.
• 2 Tablespoons of Agua
• Juice of 1 (smaller sized) Lemon
• 3 eggs, separated (yolks in one bowl, whites in the other)
• Around a cup of sugar (EC says, "four ounces to taste" .. who the hell measures their sugar in ounces? what?)

Preheat dat oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. Grate the cored and peeled apples over a cutting board and then proceed to chop them up pretty finely (EC left that part out). Throw your two tablespoons of water into a saucepan over medium heat and let it start to steam, then, put your apples in there too. Your goal now is to make "purée," which, after many google searches, is just a fancy way of saying a little chunkier version of applesauce.

After it's solidly "puréed," go ahead and mix the egg yolks a little bit, then add your lemon juice and about 3/4 of the cup of sugar (not the whole thing). Stir that up, then add the yolks, keep on stirring, then pour the appley-lemon mess into your crust in a pie tin! (I used a Nilla wafer crust from Safeway and it was THE bomb! yum). Put that in the oven and leave it in there for twenty minutes!

Other than the grated apples part, here's where EC reeeeally screwed me over. So now you're going to make the meringue, aka fluffy white shit on top of pie. Lemon pies are the only pies I've ever seen with meringue, but the apple one tasted good with it, so whatever. 

STEP #1: I recommend using an electric mixer. STEP #2: After you get that out and plug it in, start beating your 3 egg whites until they become kinda whipped looking and form "peaks." I don't really know what the hell that means, but i'm thinking foam on the firmer side. STEP #3: NOW ADD YOUR 1/4 OF SUGAR (slowly, like while you're mixing). Dummies at EC told me to add it at the beginning and guess what? It doesn't firm if the sugar is added before the firming process begins. Cool. Awesome.

By this time, your pie should have beeped telling you to take it out. Set it on your counter and begin to put your meringue all over the top of it. Make it all nice and fluffy and pretty looking. Then put it back in the oven for like 10 minutes, until the meringue has some browned top areas, and YOU'RE DONE.

Here's a big screw you to whoever made that recipe. Hope mine works better for all you Ireland lovers.

K '13 (Repost)