Baking with Brittney

Howard and I rented a car and drove up to Milwaukee this weekend. My friends Brittney and Brian are living in Wauwatosa (or Tosa, as it's called) for Brian's residency, and this summer they're moving down to Greenville, South Carolina. I blame my atrocious geography for the fact that it's taken three years to visit them. If I'd known Milwaukee was just an hour away it wouldn't have taken me so long to make a trip up there!

I haven't seen them since their wedding, but like with all good friends, the lapse in time didn't matter. Brittney and I met while working at a tavern in Cleveland and bonded, among other things, over our love of good food and drink. In that vein, we started off our visit at this amazing Milwaukee restaurant called Wolf Peach, which I would recommend if you make a trip up there. We enjoyed delicious food while overlooking the city. After brunch we went to the Public Market and picked up some delicious Wisconsin cheeses and a bottle of Musar Jeune, a Lebanese wine. Over wine and cheese Brian taught us euchre and pinochle. When I asked Brian if he knew how to play, Brittney, with her characteristic snappy humor, said: "He's breathed Michigan air, of course he knows how to play euchre!"

After games, Brittney, Howard, and I went to a charming little French place called Pastiche. It was snowing heavily by that time, but the place was packed full. The food was incredible! It was so good we even each ordered desserts. There were no leftovers. 

We planned to leave the next day, but the snowstorm had other plans. We weren't bothered! Luckily, I have a great coworker and friend who made time to stop in an additional night to visit the cats, and Howard and I were able to rest easy and just enjoy our snow day with Brittney. Brian was at work for the day while we watched The Shining, shoveled the drive, and baked. 

Which brings me to what this blog really is about: Baking. Brittney had picked out a savory pie from Bon Appetit for us to make for this week's post. Here's what we aimed to make:

A carmelized garlic, spinach, and cheddar pie with a braided crust. Brittney and Brian have a nice big kitchen with everything you'd need.

Across the way you see evidence of a middle schooler: 

Mealy Cyrus?

I really enjoyed the other window that read: "Don't make me ginger snap!" Ginger pride!

We started making the crust as soon as I woke up on Sunday, using Brittney's family recipe. While the dough chilled, we went about our morning, and then returned to the kitchen to roll out the dough and start cooking the garlic. 

Brittney was in charge of the garlic, so I'm a little fuzzy on what all that entailed. Two whole heads of garlic were first browned, I believe, and then boiled in water and balsamic vinegar, lastly cooked with the herbs. 

We rolled out the dough, put it in a pie plate, and chilled it for fifteen minutes. Then we rolled out a second disk of dough and sliced it with a pizza cutter. This was the toughest part. I didn't actually expect we would make the braided decorative crust, but Brittney insisted we try. 

Hearing Brittney talk about food is one of the most exciting things about being with her. She's so passionate and knowledgeable and so clearly loves food. If she ever decides to leave social work, I think she'd be wonderful running her own catering business.

Despite years of braiding my sister's hair, I completely forgot how to do it when it came to strips of dough unattached to a head. Luckily, Brittney came to the rescue, and with copious cursing we managed to braid all the dough before it broke into pieces. We brushed the edge of the dough on the pie plate with egg and laid the braided strips down like this:

We were very proud of the result:

We then lined the crust with waxed paper and weighted it down with beans and baked for tenish minutes. If I remember correctly, it baked again for a few more minutes, and then we took it out and put down a layer of cheddar cheese, a layer of spinach, then drizzled a crème fraîche mixture over that, and finally added the carmelized onions. It baked about an hour and came out looking like this:

Delicious and beautiful! Considering that a lot of food pictures in magazines is made out of materials not at all edible but considerably more malleable, we were very proud of our finished product's appearance. Brittney really upped my game! I wish she lived in Chicago so she could continue to push my limits and help me braid dough.

It was such a pleasure baking with her and spending a couple days with that wonderful couple! Visits like that cement friendships, and I look forward to future visits, wherever we may end up.