Tension in Taste: Not Too Sweet, Not Too Savory

When you take a bite of the key lime pie at Blackberry Farm, your taste buds erupt into a perfectly orchestrated symphony of flavors. Your mouth puckers just a touch from the tartness of the citrus before widening into an indulgent smile as the richness and sweetness of the dessert coat your tongue. The magic combination is the result of hours of tinkering in the kitchen. When Blackberry Farm Pastry Chef Laurence Faber sets out to develop a new recipe, his goal is to create a dessert that strikes just the right balance between sweet, salty and sour, while also delivering multiple textures. “When tasting a dish, there is always a level of tension where our flavors fight against each other,” he says. “Sometimes a dish that is too sweet will help with the addition of sea salt, or it could help with the addition of lemon juice or something pickled to combat the sweetness with acidity.”

Seasonal fruits are one of Faber’s staple ingredients. When it comes to perfecting key lime pie, he says there’s a fine line between being too sweet or too tart. The addition of sweetened condensed milk adds an element of richness, but the filling is almost too intense to eat by itself. “We play with the tension by adjusting our other ingredients so that we can reduce the intensity of the filling but also add, and never subtract, flavor from the dish,” he says. In this case, a salted graham cracker crust reduces the potency, while also providing a crumbly, crunchy texture. The dessert could be fine at this point, but Faber likes to add whipped cream to create three distinct textures: crunchy (crust), thick and creamy (filling) and light and creamy (topping). Each bite sings.

by Jen Murphy

Key Lime Pie

½ cup egg yolks
zest from one lime
zest from one lemon
½ cup lime juice
¼ cup lemon juice
2 cups sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon salt

Place all ingredients in a stainless steel pot over a double boiler. Cook, stirring frequently, until the filling reaches 175F and has thickened. Pour into a fully-cooked graham cracker shell, and let it sit in your refrigerator for at least four hours before serving. Slice and serve with lightly sweetened whipped cream.

Graham Cracker Crust

¾ cup sugar
1½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon cinnamon, ground
1 Tablespoon vanilla paste or extract
¼ cup honey
1½ sticks butter, unsalted
2½ cups whole wheat flour
*This will make more than you need.

Combine sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, honey and butter in a stand mixer bowl with a paddle attachment. Beat at medium speed until light in color, around three minutes. Add the whole wheat flour, and reduce the speed to the lowest setting. Mix until just combined, then turn out onto a work surface. Divide the dough in half and hand knead the dough until mixed fully. Refrigerate for 30 minutes. Next, roll the dough with a rolling pin to fit on a cookie sheet and bake at 325F until brown and crispy, about 20 minutes. Once cool, place in a food processor to break up into the consistency of bread crumbs.

To form the pie crust:

Combine 2 cups of your graham cracker crumbs with 4 Tablespoons of melted butter in a food processor, and mix until combined. Press into an even layer over your pie shell, and bake at 350F for 18 minutes, or until firm and golden brown.

See part one of this article, "Tension in Touch: Secrets of a Dough Master," in Blackberry Magazine Volume 002 — The Tension Issue.