Creamy Brown Butter Yogurt Apple Pie

So much happened this weekend.

Thursday, I attended a #BlogKC/#KCBloggerMeetup event at Sak’s Off 5th Avenue.  I didn’t know what to expect and when I walked in, I was a little overwhelmed.  I was given a $25 gift card and a name tag at the front and then we all got to do some major shopping for 2 hours.  In between the exhausting shopping (such a tough job) snacks were provided – brownies, savory tarts, cream puffs, and sangria – and more gift cards were given out.  I walked out with a new shirt and some fellow blogger friends.  Pretty successful if you ask me.

Friday, I had dinner with Kellen and a few friends at P.F. Changs.  We were gettin’ our noodles in to prepare for the Color Run the next morning.

I’m sure you can guess that Saturday I ran the color run with some friends.  Ohhh my gosh they aren’t kidding when they say it’s the “happiest 5k on earth.”  It was so fun!  Every kilometer, volunteers squirt you with paint.  It’s like chalk and they put it in ketchup/mustard containers and you can get as colorful or not colorful as you want.  There were 30,000 people who signed up for this color run… isn’t that CRAZY?  It was a really awesome experience and the race went by so quickly.  Easily the most fun 5k I’ve ever run.

Afterward, I spent the day hanging out with my some of favorite people.  Perfect weekend.

Nothing can top off a good weekend like a HUGE slice of pie.  So if you had a good weekend, make this pie and finish yours off well, too.  If you didn’t have a good weekend, then you should still try this pie… it’ll make it better.

Have you heard of the color run?  I had never heard of it until about 6 months ago.

Creamy Brown Butter Yogurt Apple Pie
Adapted from: Food.com

Ingredients:

Pie:

• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• ¼ cup plain yogurt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 5 cups apples (5-7 medium)
• 1 unbaked pie shell

Streusel:

• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 cup firm butter

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 400°F. In 1-quart saucepan, cook 1/4 cup butter over medium heat, stirring constantly, until melted and lightly browned. Cool completely, about 15 minutes.
2. In a mixer, beat 1/2 cup granulated sugar and the egg until light and fluffy. Beat in 2 tablespoons flour, vanilla, and cinnamon. Beat in cooled butter and yogurt. Gently stir in apples. Pour into crust-lined pan.
3. In medium bowl, stir together all streusel ingredients except butter. With pastry blender or fork, cut in 1/4 cup butter until mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Sprinkle over apples. Place pie on cookie sheet in oven.
4. Bake 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350°F and cover edge of crust with strips of foil to prevent excessive browning. Bake 40 to 50 minutes longer or until apples are tender and crust is golden brown. Let cool and eat!

 

Double Banana Cream Pie from Scratch

What do you do with 4 completely overripe, disgustingly brown bananas?

My first thought is always banana bread, but banana bread is so boring.  Plus, nobody can make banana bread like my mom.  I remember the first semester of my freshman year of college, my mom would make banana bread for me when I came home.  I would wait in anticipation while the smell wafted from the kitchen and ask, a million times of course, “Is it done yet??” When it finally was, it was well-worth the wait.

But since I wasn’t up to the challenge of topping my mom’s banana bread, I settled for making banana cream pie.  In my house, we’ve always used the box mix pudding to make cream pies, but I wanted to do it all from scratch. I searched for recipes, but all of the banana cream pies used vanilla pudding for theirs and I wanted banana pudding, so I adapted.  It turned out really well!  I added extra vanilla to my whipped cream to contrast the strong banana flavor in the pie and it tasted great.  I really loved the ‘piece-y’ texture of the pudding and the sweetness of the pie was complimented well by the semi-salty crust.  If you can’t tell, I really liked it.  You will, too! 

P.S. I’m switching to collages for my step-by-step photos to make my page load faster.  I went to Numion, an online stopwatch to see how long it takes websites to load, and mine took 12 seconds, so I’m trying to cut that down a little bit!

What food does your mom or someone close to you make that can’t be beat?

Double Banana Cream Pie from Scratch

adapted from: Food.com

Ingredients:

3/4 cup sugar

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 cups milk

3 egg yolks, lightly beaten

2 tablespoons butter or 2 tablespoons margarine

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 overripe medium bananas

2 ripe (but still firm) bananas

1 9 inch pie shell, baked

whipped cream 

Directions:

1. 1. In a saucepan, combine sugar, flour, and salt; stir in milk and mix well.
2. 2. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens and comes to a boil; boil for 2 minutes.
3. 3. Remove from the heat.
4. 4. Stir a small amount of cream mixture into egg yolks; return all to saucepan.
5. 5. Cook for 2 minutes, stirring constantly; remove from the heat.
6. 6. Add butter and vanilla; mix well; allow to cool slightly.
   7. Beat the two overripe bananas into the pudding mixture until texture is fairly smooth.
7. 8.. Slice the remaining 2 ripe bananas and place evenly in pastry shell; pour cream mixture over bananas.
8. 9. Cool; before serving, garnish with whipped cream.
   10. Refrigerate any leftovers.
   
   
9.