Get Your Ass in the Kitchen and Make Me a Pie

I've been sleeping for shit lately--waking up early more than having trouble getting to sleep--but I've decided to ignore it. I don't actually feel tired during the day, so I"m going to assume that my brain just is a little wired at the moment. It's true that there's a lot going on, mostly at work, some of it very stressful, but I don't think that's it. I tend to regard these things as random and transient, so whatevs.

Meanwhile, on Top Chef this week: Pie Fail! Partly as a way to introduce the upcoming latest in the Top Chef line of programming, they had a rock star pastry chef to judge the quickfire, which was: make a pie. Seriously--that was it. And the Pie Fail? Was all over the kitchen. The absolute best comment, however, was the person who complained, "I'm not a pastry chef," to which RockStar Pastry Chef said, "My grandmother's not a pastry chef, either, and she can make a pie." Total pwnage.

That's the thing that kind of blows me away. This is Season SEVEN, people! Once you know you're going to be on the show (or hey, live dangerously, when you're still fucking trying out to get on), there are a half a dozen formulas you need to commit to memory:
1. A basic pie crust--this can be used in both sweet and savory concoctions, so it will increase your options for your all kinds of dishes (e.g., a breakfast quiche, anyone?)
2. A basic cake formula (ratio of flour, fat, liquid, leavening), which can be adapted in a number of ways; old Domestic Science cookbooks are full of this shit, because it dates to when women were trying to get into places like MIT by demonstrating the scientific aspects of their household work; if you make it look more like a chemistry task, then it looks all sciency and it "elevates" it, which of course is a whole nother patriarchy-induced cringe moment, but we'll ignore that for the moment. The point is? Cake.
3. Pastry cream. Really not difficult, and it can be used in so many ways it's not even funny.
4. A basic cookie recipe. Sugar cookies cab be flavored with all kinds of herbs and spices, and you've suddenly expanded those possibilities as well.
5. A basic yeasted dough. You can turn this into a whole-grain bread, or a baguette, or sweet rolls. This may be the least important one, but it may give you an opportunity to put an extra something on a plate at some point (restaurant wars, anyone?), and a lot of yeasted doughs don't require much work on your part--the yeast does all the work!
6. A basic ganache. You can go crazy and add a buttercream and/or an italian meringue to this (the latter would be very useful, as the meringue principle could probably be used in savory concoctions somehow as well).

This will get you enough information for just about any dessert challenge, I'd say. BT, whaddya say? What am I missing? What would your list have?

Point being, however, even if you're going to be hiring a pastry chef at Your Famous Restaurant, you should know some basic things to make (not least because you want to have a potential pastry cook know how to do these things, I'd say), and you really want to be able to evaluate the work that your pastry kitchen is putting out the door.