Culinarty

Do you have a sweet tooth? Well, I’m a more of a savoury type of girl but my husband prefers sweets every single time! So what do you do when you have to cater two different cravings? You start thinking that since you’re the one doing the cooking it should be all about you and your craving OR you make fried pies with two different fillings.

And since quinces speak of autumn and so do the colours of my sweet fried pie, I am sending it to PheMOMenon for her Art You Eat #5–Autumn Edition.

My husband’s favourite also goes to Ivy’s Sweet Pies event.

Ingredients

For the dough (makes enough dough for 4 pies):

• 300 g bread flour
• 4 ½ g instant yeast
• 1 egg white (from medium egg) – room temperature
• 1 ¼ Tbsp EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)
• ¼ tsp salt
• 130 ml warm water
• Sunflower oil – for frying

For the savoury filling (makes enough filling for 2 pies)

• 400 g potatoes (about 4 medium potatoes)
• 1 Tbsp fresh parsley leaves – chopped
• Salt-to taste
• Ground white pepper – to taste
• A pinch of ground nutmeg (optional)

For the sweet filling (makes enough filling for 2 pies)

• 150 g homemade quince marmalade
• 25 g unsweetened desiccated coconut

Directions

Mix together the flour and the yeast in a deep glass bowl. Add the egg white, the olive oil and the salt and mix again with your fingers. Gradually mix in the water: pour about ¼ of the water, mix that in with your fingers (just like you did with the egg white and the olive oil). Pour another ¼ of the water, mix that in as well, then another ¼ of the water mixing it in with the same technique. Add the remaining water, mix it in with your fingers, then start kneading to form into a smooth ball. I doesn’t take much kneading, about 2 minutes will suffice.

Cover the bowl with cling film (plastic wrap) and let it rise for 40-50 minutes in a warm place.

You’ll have plenty of time to make both fillings while the dough is rising.

Wash the potatoes then boil them in their jackets (Clean them off with water. Put them in a pot of boiling salted water, bring to a boil, and cook for 20-30 minutes or until you can easily poke them with a fork).

In the meantime, combine the quince marmalade with the desiccated coconut and voilà your sweet filling is ready. Set aside.

When the potatoes are cooked, discard the water, then peel and mash them with a fork. Add the chopped parsley and season with salt, ground white pepper and some nutmeg (optional). Mix well. Let them cool for 3-5 minutes.

After your dough has risen, take ¼ out of the bowl (cover the rest) and roll it on a slightly floured surface (sprinkle a bit of flour on your working surface, then on top of the dough and finally on your rolling pin). Try to form a 1/3 cm thick disc. Don’t worry if it’s not a perfect round, this is not it’s final shape. If the disc becomes sticky, sprinkle some flour on top and also on your working surface (it’s always better to sprinkle some flour as you go, when and if needed, than to “overflour” before you start rolling it out).

Place half of the potato filling in the center of the disc, then spread it toward the edges. Don’t spread the filling over the entire disc as you’ll still need about 3-3 ½ cm of uncovered dough around the edges. Lift one edge up in the air, then move around the disc lifting all the edges and gathering the disc into a parcel or a purse (the bottom of the purse should sit on your working surface at all times). You’re now holding the purse by its neck. Everything bellow the neck should be formed out of dough covered with filling while the portion above the neck should be plain dough (the 3 cm of uncovered dough that I told you about). While your left hand is firmly holding the purse by its neck, the right hand should twist the dough above the neck and turn it around until it’s completely detached from the purse. Put the plain dough (that you’ve just detached from the parcel) back into the bowl. Now gently press down the purse to release the trapped air. This technique alone should leave you with a filled disc. Use your rolling pin or your fingers to flatten it a bit more, not too much, otherwise the dough will become to thin, the filling will break through and eventually leak when you fry the pies.

Repeat the steps with the remaining dough and fillings. You should end up with 4 pies (2 savoury and 2 sweet).

In a non-stick skillet, heat 1 cm deep of sunflower oil until hot. Fry one pie at a time (or as many as the skillet’s dimensions allows you to without overlapping them) over medium heat. As soon as you see the edges of your pie turning golden brown, flip it over gently using two wooden spatulas. Fry until the other side turns golden brown as well. Transfer to a paper towel coated plate to absorb the extra oil.

Repeat with the remaining pies.

These pies are best when served warm (the savoury version is great hot too) with an overgenerous dollop of sour cream

Lose your fork&knife (or maybe not) and enjoy!