The Search for a Pie
Hey there everybody! Back in the summer of 2014, I went on a trip to France for a little over a week. This trip changed my life; this was the trip I had the best meal I have ever eaten.
According to my records (my journal), the restaurant was somewhere near Biarritz. The meal was just a salad, a little quiche, and a piece of pie, but holy crap. So good. It probably didn’t hurt that I was jet-lagged and starving when we sat down to eat, but I’m going to assume that regular Nicole would’ve thought it was great, too.
I’m usually against taking pictures of your meals, but I wish I had some photo evidence of this one for once.
Now for the real point of this post! The idea struck my brain the other day that maybe I could try to find the recipe for the pie thing we had. It was a Basque restaurant, so I did some searching for anything under Basque pie and came up this site and recipe! The pictures looked like the pie I had if memory serves, and I had most of the ingredients, so I decided to go for it.
End results first, naturally.
I didn’t have vanilla beans or a lemon, and I didn’t want to go buy those, so I substituted with vanilla extract and pre-bottled lemon juice. I know with vanilla you’re going to get a better flavor when you use actual vanilla beans, but you do you. You can look up the ratios on how much to use of each if you do attempt the recipe with my substitutions.
Pro tip: don’t start making this after 6 in the evening. You have to give the dough a couple hours to chill and the custard at least an hour to chill, so plan ahead! Learn from my mistakes. I may have finished this at 1:30 in the morning…
I’m gonna be straight with you, I don’t actually remember what that magical dessert I had tasted like. I don’t think it was like this. This one is pretty good, though! You’d better like sweet things if you’re going to make it. It’s basically custardy filling surrounded by one big sugar cookie. I’d make this again, but not in hopes of experiencing what once was…
I’ve eaten this attempt fresh out of the oven and also fresh out of the fridge after an overnight chill sesh (see what I did there?), so I still need to try it at room temperature. Maybe that’s the magical secret! I’ll update if I have any shocking revelations. Until then, I’ll keep searching for what once was.
If you have any suggestions for me, please leave ’em below! Otherwise, I’ll see you when I see you! I hope you have a nice day.
–Nicole
You’re supposed to use a double boiler to melt the wax, but I don’t have one of those. Instead I used a pot and a smaller sauce pot! You fill the larger one with water, bring the water to really hot, and then put your wax chunks in the smaller pot. Careful though because the water and wax start jumping out as it gets hotter. You know, boiling and all. 
Michael’s had mason jars for like a dollar so I got a bunch of those suckers, a few wicks with the metal bit at the bottom for securing it to the jar, and some fragrance stuff so they’d smell nice. I think I technically got vanilla pomegranate, but they ended up smelling like fruit snacks. Either way, I call it a win.
I also threw in some sprinkles on top for some cute factor. They probably won’t be so cute when they’re burning up in the wax, but it’ll probably be okay. It’s the thought that counts, right? 
There’s still wax all over the kitchen a week later, but that’s the price you pay for cute little candles I guess. Let me know if you try this out for yourself! That’s all I’ve got for today, so I’ll be see you when I see you! Have a nice day today.
Pineapple Explosion 