Book Review: ‘Pieometry’ by Lauren Ko
I was lucky enough to meet Lauren Ko once very briefly. During National Hispanic Heritage Month / Latinx Heritage Month, my company invited Lauren to come share her story as a guest speaker. Because she was famous for her stellar pie & tart designs on her Instagram, @lokokitchen, she brought three beautifully intricate and oh-so-delicious pies to share with us, too. After Lauren’s talk, my coworker hyped me up & introduced me to her as a really good baker. Our chat was brief, my shyness kicking into high gear, but even so she was a very warm, kind person. Plus, her outfit choice was amazing – a banana print jumpsuit.
In 2020, Lauren Ko released Pieometry: Modern Tart Art and Pie Design for the Eye and the Palate, a collection of some of her geometric, aesthetically pleasing and flavorful pies and tarts she’s created. My husband, bought me a copy from the Book Larder hinting me to do a book review for the blog. I was more than happy to oblige, though it took me a few months to finally deliver on my promise.
Highlights from Pieometry
Pieometry splits into two main sections – tarts and pies, each featuring different crusts and doughs referenced throughout the book. Her recipes are easy to read and follow, with lots of clear photos and guidance to help along the way. This was especially true for the pie and tarts with intricate designs on top! Lauren even offers recommended variations in each recipe. It’s easy to mix and match if you’re not feeling a particular crust style. As an aside, for everything I made for this book review, I stuck to the original recipe and they didn’t disappoint.
If you’re someone who enjoys experimenting and playing with new exciting ingredients, then Pieometry has you covered! Throughout the book, you’ll see Lauren uses various fruit and vegetable powders to offer rich colors to doughs, opting for beet, dragonfruit and even butterfly pea flower powders over gel and liquid food colorings. She also adds whimsy to her fillings and toppings like edible flowers, golden kiwis, and black tahini. The book encouraged me to expand my pantry stock and try new things. Just before this past week, I finally tried edible flowers in my baking.
Also another major highlight: If you’re a punny person (my husband certainly is), you’ll appreciate Lauren Ko’s wit. Each recipe title is a clever pun – everything from Truth or Square to Spike a Pose. But, it’s not just her recipe names that will leave you giggling. Look at the dad joke she dropped in the signed copy my husband bought for me!
Baking Adventures in Pieometry
For this book review, I chose three different bakes – two tarts and one pie. I have never felt particularly confident with my pie baking skills. I took an awesome apple pie making class pre-covid, and that was my best ever attempt at pie until now. Don’t question me, dear reader. Pie crust is my personal crux, okay?!
With Lauren’s variety of crusts and flavors, and her optional method of using a food processor, I felt better about making dough. They turned out pretty great.
Rights of Fancy
I’m not going to sit here & rattle off steps of the recipe because you should buy the book & experience the magic of it yourself! I will, however, tell you about the three picks I attempted. Plus, my honest photos of said attempts. I want to preface by saying I am no Lauren Ko and my design skills are amateur. The Rights of Fancy – egg custard filling with matcha tart shell and right-angled strawberries – was my first Pieometry bake. This was definitely one that my husband, Chris, devoured, and I think it’s because it wasn’t super sweet. The filling paired with the tart crust was awesome – even if my angle-cut strawberries were not quite right.
Wave of Wonders
While my husband seemed to prefer the Rights of Fancy, the Wave of Wonders is my favorite. What drew me to this was not the amazing wavy pears, but the coffee cardamom filling that lay underneath. Most don’t really know this, but I love coffee and cardamom together, and it’s one of my favorite flavor combos. This tart was as pretty as it was tasty, but I did find it challenging to get the pear cuts just right. A lot of the innards (which wasted no time turning brown, as pears tend to do) were showing more than the beautiful skin shades of red, brown, green, and yellow.
Floral of the Story
When I was originally perusing the book to pick out which recipes I wanted to attempt, there was one at the very end of the book called Floral of the Story that caught my husband’s eye. He thought it looked really cool. I, on the other hand, immediately told him “no way, this is too advanced for me!” Well, after making two Pieometry tarts, I revisited Floral of the Story; I don’t know if it was just raw determination, confidence in Lauren’s easy-to-follow recipes, or a little bit of both, but I decided to make it! Was the hexagonal pattern extremely tedious to do? Absolutely. Was it well worth it? One hundred percent!
My best advice for baking from Pieometry: Don’t hesitate, just jump in!
The Floral of the Story pie is an absolute show-stopper – both in flavor and appearance. I felt such a sense of accomplishment after seeing it come together. It reminded me that while things may look hard, I shouldn’t talk myself out of at least trying to attempt them. The best thing to do is make sure you’ve got the right tools and dive head first!
The final verdict: Even the most beautiful and intricate bakes are possible when you’ve got good guidance and clear direction by your side, and that’s exactly what Pieometry is – even for the most novice of bakers.
