Alright; I'd give this one 3 stars out of 5. All in all, too much vanilla, not enough avocado, and some weird texture differences. Next time, I'm definitely blending the avocados, and just making an avocado-pudding pie. But anyway, it was pretty successful, I think, and here it is!
1/2 C sifted flour or 3/4 C cornstarch
2/3 C sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
2 C milk, scalded
3 slightly beaten egg yolks
2 Tbsp. butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 baked 9-inch pastry shell
3 ripe avocados
Mix flour, sugar, and salt; gradually add milk. Cook over moderate heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and boils. Cook 2 minutes; remove from heat.
Add small amount to egg yolks; stir into remaining hot mixture; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Add butter, vanilla; cool slightly.
Slice 3 avocados and place around base of pastry shell. Pour pudding over top into baked pastry shell. Cool. Consume voraciously.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
August's Pie: Grapefruit!
Grapefruit Pie:
1 pie shell
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1/2 C grapefruit juice
4 egg yolks
1 or 2 drops red food coloring
Beat egg yolks and add sweetened condensed milk. Mix. Add grapefruit juice and food coloring. Mix. Pour into pie shell and bake at 350 degrees for approximately 23 minutes. Let cool one hour while the pie sets, then refrigerate until cold.
Eat that goodness!
1 pie shell
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1/2 C grapefruit juice
4 egg yolks
1 or 2 drops red food coloring
Beat egg yolks and add sweetened condensed milk. Mix. Add grapefruit juice and food coloring. Mix. Pour into pie shell and bake at 350 degrees for approximately 23 minutes. Let cool one hour while the pie sets, then refrigerate until cold.
Eat that goodness!
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
The Maltese Trousers
A Story of Crime, Pants, and Other Family Affairs
It was the height of some low, low times in downtown Provo – a city that never sleeps, never drinks, and never says die. I was sitting at my desk when she walked in, five feet, two inches of fury in a Latin skirt. She was a brunette, though I didn’t know it yet. I put down my work to listen; a dame like that never comes in without a good case.
She was in a spot of trouble, as her kind usually is. She’d ratted the wrong information about the wrong man, and now she was paying the price. She was at a wedding when she got the call. The man on the other line was a baritone, with eyebrows so wiry she could hear them through the receiver. He said he had something of hers, something she needed. She’d left her things at an old motel, where she’d been staying for a fling - a short marriage with an Armenian who’d left her for a bottle of Jack Daniels. Now her wardrobe had been stolen, held at the local landfill against her will. The plot grew thicker – turns out, the main man responsible was her brother. I began to wonder just how involved I wanted to get. What kind of sick family was this?
Most dames in a fix like this would be crying up a storm, but not my client. Somehow, no wardrobe to her name but the clothes on her back, she was laughing. Laughing like a jackal. I won’t lie; I was a little unnerved by a woman who found that kind of entertainment at being left without pants. In the end, I decided not to explore the implications, and got to work.
My first stop was to visit this brother of hers. He lived on the far reaches of town, and it took me some time and a good map to find out where he lived. I found him sitting on a porch swing, screaming incoherently at small children and cackling to himself. He didn’t seem like much of a talker, and after narrowly dodging a right hook, I decided I might get better results from the neighbors.
I spoke with the landlady first. She was a small woman, even shorter than my client. She didn’t look like trouble, but I still figured it was best not to let my guard down. Turns out I was right to suspect; our conversation led me to believe she was one of the brother’s henchmen. She’d bought him a couple pair of pants just the other day, she said, but they weren’t good enough; had to be altered. By hand. The day of the wedding – the day my client had gotten the call – he’d come home late, tossing her a pair of khakis. “It’s tar, Toots,” he’d said. “See what you can do about it.” The woman said he’d sat in the stuff at the wedding, and it was a royal pain to get out. Just a few hours earlier, he’d brought her a different pair, all covered in sick. I didn’t ask for details. Both pair were brand new, she said. Seems this man had a thing against pants.
Next morning, I got a call from my client. The violence had escalated: her truck’s back window had been shattered, run through with a wooden beam she lugged into my office and threw down on my desk. I was irritated when the wood chipped the finish on my lamp, but I recognized the wood. It was a piece of an old shed down by the car wash, a part of an old floor someone was tearing out. That narrowed my list of suspects quite a bit. While she was in my office, the phone rang. The man on the other line had the voice of a baritone with wiry eyebrows. I let the dame lean close to listen.
“You’ve got exactly ten minutes to get down here,” the man said, “or the kitty gets it.” Then the phone went dead. The girl looked shocked. “Not the kitty,” she whispered. With an innocent feline in danger, I knew we had to act fast. I pressed thirty dollars and a small tape recorder into the dame’s hand and told her to catch a cab. I needed a search warrant and a good weapon before I arrived; she was to take the long way to the old shed, hopefully arriving just before me to get some evidence to bring to court.
I pulled my end of the bargain and showed up at the old shed. I was shocked to find it was no longer standing; even the staircase had been carted off. There was nobody there, and the dame never showed. After asking around, I found out the shed had belonged to a big man with graying, wiry eyebrows, and that his son and daughter had been pulling crazed pants schemes for years, posing as the victims of horrible crimes. I got a description of the two: the son fit the profile of the porch-sitter perfectly, and it sounded like my “client” had been in on it all along. Seems I’d been swindled out of thirty dollars and a tape recorder, not to mention a pair of pants I’d loaned her. The family didn’t even own a kitty. I walked away slowly, a bit wiser. I didn’t mind the money so much, but I swore I’d never be conned out of a good pair of pants again.
It was the height of some low, low times in downtown Provo – a city that never sleeps, never drinks, and never says die. I was sitting at my desk when she walked in, five feet, two inches of fury in a Latin skirt. She was a brunette, though I didn’t know it yet. I put down my work to listen; a dame like that never comes in without a good case.
She was in a spot of trouble, as her kind usually is. She’d ratted the wrong information about the wrong man, and now she was paying the price. She was at a wedding when she got the call. The man on the other line was a baritone, with eyebrows so wiry she could hear them through the receiver. He said he had something of hers, something she needed. She’d left her things at an old motel, where she’d been staying for a fling - a short marriage with an Armenian who’d left her for a bottle of Jack Daniels. Now her wardrobe had been stolen, held at the local landfill against her will. The plot grew thicker – turns out, the main man responsible was her brother. I began to wonder just how involved I wanted to get. What kind of sick family was this?
Most dames in a fix like this would be crying up a storm, but not my client. Somehow, no wardrobe to her name but the clothes on her back, she was laughing. Laughing like a jackal. I won’t lie; I was a little unnerved by a woman who found that kind of entertainment at being left without pants. In the end, I decided not to explore the implications, and got to work.
My first stop was to visit this brother of hers. He lived on the far reaches of town, and it took me some time and a good map to find out where he lived. I found him sitting on a porch swing, screaming incoherently at small children and cackling to himself. He didn’t seem like much of a talker, and after narrowly dodging a right hook, I decided I might get better results from the neighbors.
I spoke with the landlady first. She was a small woman, even shorter than my client. She didn’t look like trouble, but I still figured it was best not to let my guard down. Turns out I was right to suspect; our conversation led me to believe she was one of the brother’s henchmen. She’d bought him a couple pair of pants just the other day, she said, but they weren’t good enough; had to be altered. By hand. The day of the wedding – the day my client had gotten the call – he’d come home late, tossing her a pair of khakis. “It’s tar, Toots,” he’d said. “See what you can do about it.” The woman said he’d sat in the stuff at the wedding, and it was a royal pain to get out. Just a few hours earlier, he’d brought her a different pair, all covered in sick. I didn’t ask for details. Both pair were brand new, she said. Seems this man had a thing against pants.
Next morning, I got a call from my client. The violence had escalated: her truck’s back window had been shattered, run through with a wooden beam she lugged into my office and threw down on my desk. I was irritated when the wood chipped the finish on my lamp, but I recognized the wood. It was a piece of an old shed down by the car wash, a part of an old floor someone was tearing out. That narrowed my list of suspects quite a bit. While she was in my office, the phone rang. The man on the other line had the voice of a baritone with wiry eyebrows. I let the dame lean close to listen.
“You’ve got exactly ten minutes to get down here,” the man said, “or the kitty gets it.” Then the phone went dead. The girl looked shocked. “Not the kitty,” she whispered. With an innocent feline in danger, I knew we had to act fast. I pressed thirty dollars and a small tape recorder into the dame’s hand and told her to catch a cab. I needed a search warrant and a good weapon before I arrived; she was to take the long way to the old shed, hopefully arriving just before me to get some evidence to bring to court.
I pulled my end of the bargain and showed up at the old shed. I was shocked to find it was no longer standing; even the staircase had been carted off. There was nobody there, and the dame never showed. After asking around, I found out the shed had belonged to a big man with graying, wiry eyebrows, and that his son and daughter had been pulling crazed pants schemes for years, posing as the victims of horrible crimes. I got a description of the two: the son fit the profile of the porch-sitter perfectly, and it sounded like my “client” had been in on it all along. Seems I’d been swindled out of thirty dollars and a tape recorder, not to mention a pair of pants I’d loaned her. The family didn’t even own a kitty. I walked away slowly, a bit wiser. I didn’t mind the money so much, but I swore I’d never be conned out of a good pair of pants again.
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