So today Paidhi girl and I went to the Viking Culinary Arts Store. It just opened up, and we were in the area and had some time. We saw lots of cool little gadgets, but what really set her six-year-old heart on fire were these tiny little pans. They were round, and oval, and some were fluted–and maybe an inch long. She begged me to buy some.
I didn’t. But I promised I would look into just what one did with such a pan and see if we couldn’t come up with a suitable project. I’m pretty sure one could make pastry shells, since one of them looked exactly like a trayful of filled shells I saw once at a fancy party. The thought crossed my mind that we could make pie crust, and bake off some of these, and put pudding in them. But I figured someone here had used, or knows how to use, little tiny pans like that. What do you do with them? Anybody got any recipes or advice?
As a professional baker I can tell you this. You can roll out piecrust and fill them as you suggested. But prebake the little crusts of course, and for such a small pastry roll the crust rather thinly. Prick them with a fork. Now they may shrink, so try to stretch to crust as little as possible. Or you can lace another of the little tins inside the other and turn them upside down. The pressure of the two tins, one inside the other, discourages shrinkage. It may take a while to get the hang of it but practice makes perfect.
Any pudding or ganache will do as a filling, or you could place slice fruits or small berries in them.
Go ahead and buy some! It sounds like a really fun parent/child activity. It could even spark a life-long interest in the culinary arts. Don’t laugh, something like that happened to me!
For filling ideas go to
www.allrecipes.com and look in the pie and desserts sections. I love that site. When it gives you a recipe it will even alter the ingredient amounts if you want to decrease/increase the yield, and will print directions with metric instead of our American measurements.
I saw little tiny pans in a kitchen shop a week ago. I almost bought some, in spite of being an unenthusiastic baker. I may still. I managed to exit the shop with only a bunch of china, but I could go back next week…
There were also some little pans that had fancy bottoms, that I assume couldn’t be used for little pies. These were also about an inch across–can I make regular cake or banana bread or whatever in them and just watch the baking time very closely, or is there something else those are used for?
Lissla Lissar, I know just what you mean. Cooking stores are like office supply stores, for me–everything is just so cool and I want to have some of all of it, but I’m darned if I need any of it. Even though…
…I don’t actually like cooking all that much. But I like having the results, and like other people enjoying the food, so every now and then I go on a kick and make bread, or something fancy. My last favorite Cool Pan was the donut pans my MIL got me–they came with a recipe, a lot like very thick muffins, you put them in the cute little donut shaped depressions, and it’s donuts in less than fifteen minutes. They don’t really taste like fried ones, but the kids don’t care, especially if I get the frosting out.
In any event, I plan on both the kids learning basic competency in cooking things, and if it turns out to be more for either of them, well more power to them!