Cracker Pie: An American Classic →

When you see crackers in a pie recipe, you’re probably thinking crust—crushed graham crackers for Key Lime or Banana Cream, or maybe a saltine crust for the salty-tart Atlantic Beach Pie. But crackers in the filling? It doesn’t sound too appealing. Turns out, though, that Cracker Pie, a.k.a. Mock Apple Pie, is a classic American recipe, dating back to at least the mid-1800s. It’s mentioned in an 1858 letter from Henderson, Texas resident Sue Smith to her friend Bet. She writes,

"Bet I have learned to make a new kind of Pie I think you all would like them they taste just like an apple pie make some and try them see if you don’t love them… Take a teaspoon heaping full of tartarlic acid and dissolve it in water a teasp full of sugar and stir it in the acid then take cold biscuit or light bread and crumble in it."

Read on in The Runcible Spoon

State pie project: Michigan’s tart cherries

It’s getting to be that gloriously overwhelming time of year when just about everything is ripe. So much fruit, so much pie-making potential. Going back and forth among the blueberries, raspberries, blackberries and stone fruits, I remembered that I had some Michigan friends coming to my house in a few days. Of course. Cherries. I had to get tart cherries.

Michigan, specifically Traverse City, is the cherry capital of the world. The state grows about 75 percent of the nation’s tart cherries. Down here in the Mid-Alantic where I live, tart cherries are harder to come by and the season is rather fleeting. All the more reason, then, to buy a few pints at the farmers market, bring them home and put them in a pie.

Read on via American Food Roots

Baking with Nothing in the House →

I started baking pies the summer after college. My friends and I had discovered a wealth of berry trees and bushes near the house we shared in Ann Arbor, and we’d go out on frequent picking missions. We collected so many berries that we started baking pies together in the evenings. When I moved away after that summer, my friend Margaret suggested that we start a blog to keep in touch through the pies we baked, and “Nothing in the House” was born.

Nothing-in-the-house pies, also called “desperation pies,” were popular during the Great Depression in the South and beyond. These pies were made from a few inexpensive ingredients, and include vinegar pie, cracker pie, and green-tomato pie. Thus the name of my blog is a nod to history, thrift, and practicality, in solidarity with other home bakers, past and present.

Read on in Gravy.

Which Came First, The Chicken or the Egg Cup?

The humble egg cup—that cute little soft boiled-egg holding device-- is perhaps not the most frequently used piece of dishware, but it is one of the oldest! Examples of it were found at the Knossos archaeological site in Crete, and dated as early as 1700 BC. Silver versions were also found in the ruins of Pompeii.

The Dark Ages were apparently also dark for the humble egg cup, until it sprung into popularity again in the Elizabethan age (perhaps Shakespeare used one?). The holder was also favored by King Louis XV of France, who was known to show off his “egg beheading” skills to guests. A bit ironic, considering the guillotine legacy of his grandson…

Read on in The Runcible Spoon

Four and Twenty Blackbirds Pie: An Illustrated History →

Though there are a few days that claim to be THE “Day of Pie" — the U.S. House of Representatives recognized “Pi Day” on March 14th, and a second somewhat dubiously decreed “National Pie Day” on December 1st — according to the American Pie Council, today, January 23rd, is the actual “National Pie Day.” It was probably chosen so that people have at least one thing to look forward to after the pie-promises of Thanksgiving and Christmas have faded, and you’re left cold and hungry in the depths of mid-winter.

In honor, of this, we present an illustrated investigation and recipe of the legendary 4 and 20 Blackbirds Pie.

Read on via The Hairpin

Belgian Sweets Not Just for Sinterklaas →

Though my grandmother Georgette was born in the United States, she is half Belgian (Flemish) and half French. On top of the cabinets in her blue kitchen you'll find a little Dutch village of porcelain houses. Above the sink are miniature figures of the Statue of Liberty, Manneken Pis and the Eiffel Tower — representations of her three nationalities. In her Delft cookie jar you'll find speculaas (also called speculoos) — the Dutch windmill-shaped gingersnap-like cookie traditionally eaten on St. Nicholas Day.

Although my grandmother has speculaas on hand year-round, St. Nicholas Day, which was last week (Dec. 6), reminded me of our family tradition. We would get together with my grandmother for a little celebration, with gifts from Sinterklaas in our shoes, Belgian chocolates and, of course, her homemade speculaas.

Read on via NPR

The Pies of Late Summer

My dad used to sing to me an old folk song before I went to sleep. One of my favorite verses went:

Peach in the summertime, apples in the fall.

If I can't have the one I love, I won't have none at all.

I still like that lyric for its simplicity and its assertion of seasonal eating at a time when that was unquestioned. You ate fresh apples in the fall (and probably storage apples through the winter) and peaches all summer. Love could be fleeting and unreliable, but autumn apples and summer peaches would always be there.

That little girl who was serenaded each night with words of lost love and fruit grew up to have a pie obsession. I write a pie blog, bake at least once a week, and collect old pie paraphernalia, heritage recipes and family stories. In a way, that old verse explains this obsession. Though I have many reasons for loving the classic dessert — its ties to tradition and the past, its association with women home cooks and, of course, its deliciousness — one of the main reasons I like pie is because maybe more than any other dish, it is dependent on season.

Read on via NPR

Lardass Returns!

Prior to the mid-20th century, lard, the rendered fat of a pig, was America’s preferred grease. In the 1950s, however, the Procter & Gamble company had a lot of excess oil on their hands, and developed Crisco, marketing it to housewives and cooks as the better, healthier lard. Then we all watched the movie Stand By Me, met the character Lardass, and lard was officially pronounced dead.

But recently lard has waddled its way back to our tables, as pork-based Southern dishes are all the rage and nutritionists tell us it's more about unsaturated vs. saturated than the fat itself. Don’t get me wrong, lard is nothing but 100% pure unadulterated FAT (butter compares at 81%), but in this pie crust recipe, a little goes a long way for a flaky, fluffy, beautiful crust. Throw in some potatoes, chilies, cheddar, and bacon, and you’ve got yourself a perfect pie for a hot summer day at the beach. After all that fat, you’ll be a pro at floating along on those ocean waves!

Read on in The Runcible Spoon

The Best Time My Civil War Soldier Came Home

My boyfriend, let’s call him Eli, fights for the Union Army. Sometimes Confederate, but mostly Union. He uses the excuse “I don’t have enough ammunition” as a reason for not going away for a weekend, and he once gave me a piece of hardtack, saying “Something to remember me by — it’ll last longer than I will.” Yep, dude’s a Civil War reenactor. And though my parents and friends may have guffawed a little when I first told them, dating a reenactor is pretty great.

For one, it means he’s most definitely a history nerd. Now maybe this is not a plus for you, but for me it’s a major pro. You’ll have flirty email correspondence in Morse code, and you can spend an evening together geeking out over early color photographs from the Russian Empire. It also means he will most likely love to cuddle up over an episode or two (or three, or four) of Downton Abbey, then engage you in conversation over the implication of Sybil’s harem pantaloons or Branson’s Irish radicalism.

Read on via The Hairpin