Grapefruit Galore !

Living in Florida in the winter means that one not only has warm weather but also an abundance of citrus fruits.  Oranges, key limes and grapefruits have been in our landscape since we have lived here for the past 11 years. Grapefruits have been particularly plentiful. We have eaten them for breakfast, juiced them for a tasty refreshment, made grapefruit martinis, and given them away to visitors. For years, we had cows living in the farmland behind our house. Turns out, the cows loved our grapefruits!  My sister-in-law and each of us would sometimes feed grapefruits to the cows. Sadly, the cows are no longer here and we have tons of grapefruits!! I was wondering what to do with our "Ruby Red" sweet grapefruits.  Then, I discovered a pie recipe in the Four and Twenty Blackbirds cookbook. The pie is called "Grapefruit Custard Pie". It sounded rather strange to me, but I knew I needed to try this one.

The recipe is fairly simple, containing grapefruit juice, cream, eggs, and sugar. The crust is the usual excellent butter crust. One ingredient that the Elsen sisters love to use in their tasty pies is alcohol in some form or fashion.  In this case, they use Campari liqueur and a dash of orange bitters.
Custard pies can be a tad tricky, in that it can be difficult to determine when the pie is done.  The first time that I made this pie, I honestly cooked it a little too long.  It tasted good, but was a little dry for a proper custard.  This time, I cooked it less than the 50 minute recipe called for, and it was perfect! The tip on testing for a fully cooked custard is that the center of the pie should "wobble a little in the center", according to the Elsens, but not be liquid  The grapefruit flavor is sweet and tart, and really is a unique flavor. Rich preferred his with whipped cream, but I liked that tartness without the cream. Both of us agreed that we could have easily eaten another piece, but our good sense made us wait until tomorrow for the second piece.

If I have an issue with the grapefruit custard pie, it is the aesthetics.  I like a pie to look every bit as good as it tastes. This one has a weird color to me  It is kind of a cross between pink and orange. While this looks somewhat appropriate for Florida and its fondness for pastel colors, I am not wild about eating something with a Miami like color . Rich actually likes the color - he is an artist and likes this orange/pink mixture with our cobalt blue dinnerware. This is an individual issue but I can tell you this:  it is a delicious pie, and I will eat it, strange color or not.  And I am sure the cows would have agreed!!