Lavender Honey Peach Buttermilk Pie

What a mouthful. Lavender honey peach buttermilk pie. What can I say? I love putting together different flavors, and honey and lavender are just subtle enough to be placed with peach. This custard pie is sweet, refreshing, and permeated with the peach flavor, and adapted from Joy’s Apricot Buttermilk Pie. Topped with a greek yogurt cream and honeycomb, I can almost say it’s healthy. Well, not really, but the point is, it’s not exactly the most unhealthy dessert right? I used lavender as a secondary taste, and it worked out really well in this pie. Lavender can often be an overpowering flavor, so I ground it up with sugar – think of it as using a lavender scented sugar, if you will. The point is, it’s August. Peaches are ripe. Go pick some peaches. And make this pie.

I started out with lavender and sugar. There are two ways to do this. You can first grind up the lavender, then rub it with sugar, or you can put the sugar with lavender buds in a spice grinder and process it that way. The sugar becomes quite fine (almost like powdered sugar), which is nice side effect.

This recipe is inspired by Joy The Baker’s apricot buttermilk pie. I did not have dried apricots on hand, but I did have some plump, ripe yellow peaches. So I fiddled with this, changed some of that, and here is a peach buttermilk pie. This pie not only tastes good, but it also looks so darn pretty! I’m all for the lattice pie and all the interesting things you can do with a double crust (like this), but a clean custard pie… In the way a freshly made bed just invites you to lay on it, a clean custard pie just calls for me to dive in with a fork. A custard pie invites vignettes of lazy summer days, pristine white walls, a clear blue sky, and a fancy tea party. But that’s just me.

Strawberry blueberry basil pie

Everyone knows that I love pies. So much, in fact, that we had pies in lieu of cakes at our wedding!!

Whiskey Peach Blueberry Pie with a Star Anise Crust

Star anise is a potent spice that can easily overpower any dish. I use it frequently when braising meats (such as hong shao rou – red braised pork belly) or making beef noodle soup. I learned about this spice from my mother. It’s a common spice used in Chinese cooking, and I think it adds a lot of complexity to a meat dish. I decided to use this flavor with my peach pie. However I had to be careful about the spice – it has to contribute a subtle flavor and not overpower the entire pie. I ended up grinding it up and incorporating it into the pie crust. It was perfect! The pie had a hint of star anise without overpowering the peach pie.