More pie

When I told my friend Jennifer that I had signed up for the pie crust class, she told me that King Arthur Flour was bringing one of their traveling baking demonstrations to Syracuse. I looked up the date of the demo and put it on my calendar without knowing the subject of the demo; all I knew was that the demo would take place at the New York State Fairgrounds (very convenient for me) and that is was free.

The demo was yesterday and the subject was...wait for it...pies and scones. James and I arrived about thirty minutes early and there were already quite a number of people there. We were handed a small booklet containing recipes and helpful tips, along with a numbered ticket for the door prize drawing. We scored seats right up front with an excellent view of the demo table:

The room was decorated with several large signs like this one:

To the right of the demo area was the tempting display of door prizes:

So many prizes, but no winning tickets for us.

But we did win lots of great information and had a very fun time. The presenter, Irene, had a pleasant style and voice and she did an excellent job of talking and doing, told lots of stories, and she interacted well with the audience. I found that the info she presented added to the info I learned in the class two weeks ago. The single most interesting thing I learned yesterday is to add your butter in two steps: the first half of the butter is worked into the small pieces, but then the second half is left in bigger pieces. That allows for both a tender and a flaky crust.

I tend to get fidgety during presentations but the time flew by. In addition to the pie crust demo, Irene showed us how to make scones. Both James and I have never cared for scones, but we came to agree that perhaps we have just never had a good scone. I will definitely try the cheddar, bacon and scallion scone recipe from the booklet that Irene demonstrated.

On the way out, each participant received a King Arthur bowl/dough scraper (a $1.95 value!) and a sample of cheese from Cabot, one of KA's partners.

Today I put the information I learned yesterday into practice and made an apple pie:

It looks and smells good, so let's hope it also tastes good!