Snack Attack Saturday 12/4 : Cancelled

Just a quick update to announce that Snack Attack Saturday for December 4th has been cancelled. The next SAS will be December 18th. I apologize for any disappointment or confusion.

Have a lovely weekend!
xo*annie

so. much. rain.

It is so wet and cold and dark outside, the only thing I have much motivation for is snuggling on the couch with my pup, drinking hot chocolate and watching movies.

But, pies must persevere!
This weekend for snack attack, I'm doing a Thanksgiving preview...

Pumpkin/Snickerdoodle Pie: exactly what it sounds like, a traditional t-day pie in a snickerdoodle crust!
Savory Feast Pie: turkey, stuffing, cranberries, monterey jack, mashed potatoes and gravy!

The usual info:
where: vega dance+lab, 1322 se water ave portland or
when: saturday 11/20 from 11am - 2pm
how much: pies $1.50 / coffee $1. cash only

I hope to see you there!
pies + love + happiness
annie


ps. I have a toaster oven this week, melty warm MiniPies on a cold rainy day!

Tomorrow!

Hello friends!

Tomorrow is the 2nd installment of Snack Attack Saturday at Vega Dance+Lab! Vega is located at 1322 SE Water Ave Portland OR 97214. I'll be there from 11am - 2pm.

Here's the menu...

Sweet MiniPies:
Honey-Bourbon Poached Quince in a Sugar Cookie Crust
Persimmon in a Gingerbread Cookie Crust

Savory MiniPies:
Artichoke/Gouda Tartlets (Vegetarian w/ eggs+dairy)
Spicy Turkey/Pepper Jack Tartlets (Gluten Free)

All MiniPies are $1.50 each, cash only.
Stumptown Coffee, $1.

I hope to see your beautiful faces there!

pies, love and happiness,
annie

Photos!

My friend Allison Franco took some gorgeous photos today at Snack Attack Saturday, I'm so glad she was there with her trusty camera in hand. Oh, and if you've ever wanted to learn how to be a really cool hip hop dancer, you should take her class at vega. She's a kick in the pants!

Peanut Butter Pies in Chocolate Chip Cookie Crusts

Savory Prosciutto Tarts with Caramelized Onions, Pears and Rosemary

Me at my mini pie table!

Success!

Hi everyone!

The first Snack Attack Saturday went so well! I had a pretty adorable little table in the lobby of Vega Dance+Lab with flowers and coffee. I sold out of about half of the pies, which I'm pretty happy with considering the limited amount of advertising that I did. Friend Allison took some really nice photos that I can hopefully post a little later.

Thank you, thank you to everyone who came out and supported! It means so much to me, you don't even know. Especially huge thank you to Evie Graham  for your endless love and support and Vega Dance+Lab for just being totally radical.

Rumors of an additional pie day at Vega may or may not be true... Stay tuned ;)

pies, love and happiness
annie

 

Snack Attack Saturdays!

AnniePies is partnering with Vega Dance+Lab to bring you Snack Attack Saturdays! Come on down and try a dance class and then some mini pies! Or just dance... or just eat pie. Either way, come visit! There will be a limited quantity of two flavors of pie, changing every saturday. 


The menu for tomorrow is...

sweet: peanut butter pie in a chocolate chip cookie crust

savory: prosciutto with caramelized onions, pears and rosemary

All pies are $1.50 each or $15 for a dozen. And I'll have Stumptown Coffee on for $1. 

Who: AnniePies

What: Snack Attack Saturday

When: Saturday, November 6th, 11am - 2pm

Where: Vega Dance+Lab 1322 SE Water Ave Portland OR 97214

Why: because snacks are good and mini pies are better.

I hope to see your beautiful faces there!  
xo*a

Let me just clear something up...

I keep getting asked if I am a baker or a chef or a pastry chef. No, I am not. I have no formal training whatsoever. It makes me nervous when I see blogs like friend of a friend Brandi's (I made That!) blog. She makes amazing looking and sounding food. All. From. Scratch. And I think she even grows a lot of it herself too. There's just a lot of attention around good, well made food these days, especially here in Portland, in case you haven't noticed. So, I start to wonder what kind of business I have in making mini pies. Because I really have no idea what I'm doing. I mean who do I think I am?

But! What I do know is that I grew up in a restaurant and have worked in food service for longer than I care to remember. And, while I'm no professional, I also know that I love comfort and comfort food and snacks and making quirky/cute/creative things and seeing people eat delicious tiny pies.

I guess, when it comes down to it, I'm not in it to make gourmet food or be a star food cart chef. I would never even try to compete with the incredible food artists in this town. I'm just in it to make a few (or several) people happy. I hope that's enough.

till soon lovelies.
xo*a


ps. Dharma, if you're reading this, I totally stole your sign off phrase. Hope that's cool with you! :)

busy times = not enough pies

Hello friends,

It's been busy in my lil corner of the world! I love it! Working on some really cool projects like the Brightwater Art Windows. Check it out, such a brilliant idea, and the people/creative forces behind it are pretty rad too. I feel honored to be doing the PR for it and helping plan the launch event. I'll post more about that later.

In the meantime, the very first Snack Attack Saturday quickly approaches! I'm super excited about it and have a lot to do to prepare. A trip to the fabric store, gotta find a smallish table with folding legs, some cake covers would be cool, and of course shopping for ingredients... just a bunch of stuff that requires driving all over the place.

The menu is still being contemplated. I'll definitely make some Flom Pies (peanut butter/choc chip cookie cups). But I need to decide on a savory option.


And it's Halloween! The best holiday ever. Check out part of our group halloween costume! I'm going to be one of the bowling pin dancer girls, of course.

till soon lovelies
xo*a

Big News!!

I am very excited to announce that Snack Attack Saturdays are happening for real! Every Saturday starting in November you will be able to purchase mini pies from me at Vega Dance+Lab! There will be a table full of bite size happiness from approximately 11am - 2pm. For now, there will be two flavors, one sweet and one savory and a limited number of pies. The flavors will change every week, so check here or the facebook page often for menu updates. Pies will range from $1-3 depending on size and ingredients.

In other news, I made a new pie this evening! Peanut Butter Cup in a Chocolate Chip Cookie Crust. Holy Moly, it's so good! I'm naming it after my friend Megan Flom. Henceforth it shall be called the Peanut Butter Flom Pie, or just Flom Pie for short. You can taste this and other goodness at the very first Snack Attack Saturday (aka SAS) @ Vega on 11.06.10.

I hope to see your beautiful faces there!
xo*a

stuff and things

For my dinner tonight, in the spirit of the prosciutto cups, I decided to make turkey/pepper jack cups. I am happy to report that they were successful AND delicious. This basically solidifies my theory that meat+cheese+egg+cream+baked=YUM.

Also, there are a few opportunities on the horizon for AnniePies! They're not set in stone yet, so I can't reveal anything, but these things will make pies more accessible to you. And that is a good thing. That is all I can say at this point.

pies love happiness,
annie

New Look!

Okay, the pink was really getting to me. I needed to change things up to better represent the design direction towards which I'm pretty certain that I'm heading. Whaddya think?

xo*a

Branding + Design

Hello dear ones,

The other day as I was delivering some pies I had an inspiration for some real branding. Not that I don't like this this super cute, pink, flowery blogspot thing that I have going on. Those of you that know me, know that I like simple things. Simple, clean, comfortable, well designed, not too foofy. Know what I'm sayin? For example, I can be found, most of the time, in my favorite pair of jeans, a soft t-shirt, a hoody and some flops, if it's summer. In winter, killer boots, of course. Comfort and simplicity come first, always, then add just a bit of well placed flair. This is not to say that I don't occasionally love me some glitter or sequins, but there's a time and place.

So, back to my branding idea. I bought a giant package of your standard recycled cardboard to-go boxes at cash and carry, filled a couple up with pies, and printed out a little description of them on crisp white paper. I used the font American Typewriter Light, which normally I'm not a huge fan of. {I heart helvetica neue ultralight so much.} But in this instance it looked so perfect on the white paper against the brown boxes. Maybe I like the font because it reminds me of this...

Ha ha haa! No really, I love that movie. 

But, I digress. For the past week I've been seeing these types of things in my head...

brown paper boxes, parchment paper, white linen, butcher block with flour sprinkled over it, wooden tart tools, twine and white cloth ribbon. Are you seeing it?! I realize that's more of a memory or snapshot of objects and textures, but that's where my branding inspiration is heading. Now if only I knew a designer... ;) 

Here's what the font looks like...

And here is a baking cup that I'm going to experiment with today. I'm hoping it will solve some of my crust woes. Notice the lovely brown color... 

Till soon, lovelies.

xo*a

First Order Fulfilled!

Hello friends! 

I just delivered my first real order a few hours ago! 24 mini pies, 2 flavors.
Flavor #1: apple and walnut tart (gluten and dairy free).
Flavor #2: prosciutto quiche cup with rosemary, pear, and caramelized onions, also gluten and dairy free.
I have to say, they both came out really well. The apple crust was pretty crumbly. The recipe needs a little tweaking, although I was using GF flour and coconut oil instead of butter, so that could have been the culprit. But the prosciutto quiche cup? OMG. so good. Really stoked about how these turned out!

Pics of the prosciutto cups (before and after) are below.

til soon...
xo*a

Photos!

Okay there are only two (one is above), but a gorgeous two they are! These were shot by Brian Lee at Melinda and MacGregor Campbell's wedding rehearsal dinner. I also have to give a shout out to friends Dharma and Meagan for helping to make the platters look so beautiful! These were gone in less than 10 minutes!

In other news, I'm working on a prosciutto cup recipe! It will be a tart of sorts with a sweet onion, pear and egg mixture filling. My good friend Becca ordered some mini pies for a friend and some of the challenges were that they have to be dairy and gluten free, so this is one of my solutions. Here's hoping it turns out!

xo*a

Explorer's Log : Day 7

Discoveries continue to be made, and I'm only a week out of the harbor. A few days ago I experimented with savory fruit tarts, aka mini quiches. Flavor on the left is Grape with Dubliner Cheddar. Flavor on the right is Apple with Brie, which was the more successful one. It is subtle and creamy with a good balance between the apple and brie, not overpowering at all. I had high hopes for the grape/dubliner... alas, it needs some work. It's a bit too tangy and has a pretty intense flavor. Maybe it needs to be combined with another type of cheese to mellow it out. Or maybe some people would love it. Not sure yet... This was a great exercise for me though, it led me to really think about where my focus should lie. I'm very inspired by sweet pies these days. Daydreams of Mexican inspired pies keep floating into my head. Spicy Chocolate Banana, Flan Pie, butter/sugar/cinnamon tortilla pockets, mango empanadas... the list goes on and on. More on Mexi-Pies later...


As always, thanks for the support!
xo*a

pictures from internets from cameras on phones

Pardon the camera phone pic in the header above. It's just a place holder until my track suit wearing brother in law can come over to take some real profesh pics.

xo*a

They're a hit!

I did it. I made my first mass batch of mini pies! Two of my favorite people got married last weekend and they asked me to make some pies for their rehearsal dinner. I gladly said yes, of course.

I made 3 different kinds: mixed berry in a graham cracker crust with cream cheese filling, bourbon soaked peach in graham cracker crust with cream cheese filling and apple in a tart crust with a spiced creamy dulce de leche filling. People loved them! In fact, I don't think I made enough. 144 mini pies for 90 people, I probably should've made twice that.

It was a little harrowing but successful. Now that my spirits are buoyed by so many people's support, it's time to get cranking on perfecting my crust situation (aka the structural integrity of pie) and shopping some pies out to another event!

phew!
xo*a

Hello there!

Welcome to my brand spanking new adventure in miniature pies! I make sweet pies and savory pies here in  Portland, OR, and I have to say, they're pretty delicious! Pies are available for custom orders for private events. Give me a shout for more info!