Good morning or good evening, wherever you may be. It is just past 12:00 a.m. in "The City."

I did it! I made a pie for Pi(e) Day. I believe that this is my best pie to date. I owe it all to Mary for giving me my Kitchenaid™ stand mixer and her attendance at her weaving session yesterday leaving the kitchen all to me. In addition, I also baked Rye Bread loaf 4.0 and made another batch of my vegan No-Bull Beefaroni. All of that in between walks with the fur-children. Where shall I begin to tell the story of how great a day can be?

I'll start with Rye Bread loaf 4.0 since that is where my day in the kitchen began. This time I got it right if appearances mean anything.  I'll let my readers be the judge of that from the picture below.

I don't know about the taste yet, but I really like how this loaf turned out.

I had to mix the yeast with warm water, add the rye and bread flours with some molasses and then pour them into the bowl of the stand mixer and let the machine do the work of mixing and later kneading. I started with Rye Bread 4.0 because, with rise times, it takes about three hours from start to finish. 

I followed that initial mixing and kneading with preparing the flaky crust for my Pi(e) Day apple pie. Once again, it was a labor of love as the dough came together nicely before I placed it into the freezer for about 30 minutes. While I was waiting, I peeled the Granny Smith apples and sliced them thinly in preparation for placing them into the pie dish. I rolled out the dough and then placed one-half of it into the dish and then added the apples. 

Granny Smith's are my apples of choice for my pies.

Yes, the crust was completely made with my own hands. No store bought crust for me!

Some brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg flour, salt, and pats of vegan margarine completed my filling.

Of course, since it was Pi(e) Day, I had to include a Pi symbol on top of my creation. I printed one out, then used a sharp knife to cut it out of the dough scraps. 

A little sugar for crispiness helped top complete the Pi(e) Day apple pie, and then into the oven.

The finished pie looks awesome! I hope you agree. We'll taste test it later this morning. 

While the pie baked, Rye Bread loaf 4.0 was rising and it was ready when the pie came out. A slight reduction in oven temperature and in it went.

While I was having fun in our kitchen, Mary was having fun at her weaving session. This time, she made it to Wyoming without a mishap.

Her nearly finished result looks awesome too! I say nearly finished because she still has to tie the ends off. However, I took this picture to memorialize her excellent results.

Worthy of note is that this is a rare picture of  Mary wearing her scarf or is it a shawl? In addition, she is also wearing the hat that she knitted several years ago.  

I never got around to the weather earlier in this blog because the storm of the decade that is hitting the East Coast never really hit here. Our local West Michigan meteorologists are like sports announcers trying to keep the viewers watching when their team is being blown out. The meteorologists are talking about how much we got or could have gotten or whatever. It didn't happen here!

We have a current temperature of 19° under fair skies. Fair skies? Is that a forecast or a bit of wishful thinking? Later today after the sun rises @ 7:56 a.m. and long before it sets @ 7:51 p.m. the high temperature is forecast by the NWS to be 30° with a 20% chance of snow showers in the evening.

The rain is still in the forecast for Friday @ 70%, but Sunday's high is forecast to be 42° under sunny skies. 

We have no special plans for today. A few indoor chores, a possible visit to the movie theater to see the big-screen showing of Dirty Dancing and a chance to eat more popcorn and drink a ginormous cherry-cola. What's not to like about that? That's all I have to say about that. Ciao.